BullGuard security - thoughts?

[Martinr36]

I really do not understand why Bullguard has got a bad rep of these forums. I have been using it since 2012 and have never had any issues. The game optimizer seems to be very good and the whole thing has very little impact on the performance of my comp. Whenever I try to ask people about their concerns, they throw out general comments like *It causes issues* and *It's bloatware*. They never given any detailed info on what problems Bullguard causes.

I will hopefully have my new PCS comp by Jan/Feb and I would appreciate anybody explaining why I should not keep Bullguard.

I was having an issue when i had it installed that my zwift was dropping so many frames it was unbelievable & totally unusable, turned bullguard off and problem solved, so uninstalled it

 

[ubuysa]

I really do not understand why Bullguard has got a bad rep of these forums. I have been using it since 2012 and have never had any issues. The game optimizer seems to be very good and the whole thing has very little impact on the performance of my comp. Whenever I try to ask people about their concerns, they throw out general comments like *It causes issues* and *It's bloatware*. They never given any detailed info on what problems Bullguard causes.

I will hopefully have my new PCS comp by Jan/Feb and I would appreciate anybody explaining why I should not keep Bullguard.

I just analysed a kernel dump for a user with a new PC that was BSODing. Here's the relevant bit from the dump....

ffffeb00`ae6c7018  fffff804`6e0e8ece Unable to load image \SystemRoot\system32\DRIVERS\atc.sys, Win32 error 0n2
atc+0x38ece

The atc.sys driver is from Bullguard, and this is far from the first time I've seen this driver cause a BSOD. Is that detailed evidence enough for you?

 

[RogWal]

When i purchased my recent 2 PCS machines (one desktop, one laptop) I opted for the free 3 months of Bull Guard until I can transfer my F-Secure licenses over to from my old machines.
I have no plans to keep Bull Guard long term but I have so far found no negative effect from having it installed.

I see a lot of posts on here where the user has a problem and one suggestion (not always successful) is to remove Bull Guard.
Is it really that bad?

Hello. I can't comment on Bull Guard specifically as I have never installed or used the product, but as to whether a third party anti-malware product is necessary, I would humbly suggest that it depends on the use of the computer.

If you use your computer solely for gaming, then the free Windows Defender is probably adequate.

At the opposite extreme, however, if you are a self-employed professional and:

• your livelihood depends on the computer, e.g. you use Adobe Creative Cloud to generate work for clients;
• you access personal data, e.g. internet banking;
• you receive/send sensitive information, e.g. emails to clients/solicitors

then I would advise that you engage in due diligence to decide what level of anti-malware to have on your computer.

Whatever your own situation, absolutely take into consideration what the good people on these forums advise. But please do your own due diligence as well, whether that is asking people who are IT literate that you personally know and trust, or research on the internet, especially if you put high value on the computer's use and the data that you store on it (photos, videos, work etc).

If this is your work computer, or you are concerned about identity theft/internet banking/phishing etc., it is worth looking into what the paid-for versions of anti-malware products offer over the free anti-malware products. Paid-for versions do offer a lot of additional protection, but whether that premium is justifiable for your needs depends on your judgement and research.

Personally, I do have a paid-for anti-malware solution on my computer. I haven't encountered any issues, and whilst there is probably a performance hit on the computer, it is not noticeable to me. Of course, what is suitable for my needs, may not be best suited for your needs.

 

[ubuysa]

Hello. I can't comment on Bull Guard specifically as I have never installed or used the product, but as to whether a third party anti-malware product is necessary, I would humbly suggest that it depends on the use of the computer.

If you use your computer solely for gaming, then the free Windows Defender is probably adequate.

At the opposite extreme, however, if you are a self-employed professional and:

• your livelihood depends on the computer, e.g. you use Adobe Creative Cloud to generate work for clients;
• you access personal data, e.g. internet banking;
• you receive/send sensitive information, e.g. emails to clients/solicitors

then I would advise that you engage in due diligence to decide what level of anti-malware to have on your computer.

Whatever your own situation, absolutely take into consideration what the good people on these forums advise. But please do your own due diligence as well, whether that is asking people who are IT literate that you personally know and trust, or research on the internet, especially if you put high value on the computer's use and the data that you store on it (photos, videos, work etc).

If this is your work computer, or you are concerned about identity theft/internet banking/phishing etc., it is worth looking into what the paid-for versions of anti-malware products offer over the free anti-malware products. Paid-for versions do offer a lot of additional protection, but whether that premium is justifiable for your needs depends on your judgement and research.

Personally, I do have a paid-for anti-malware solution on my computer. I haven't encountered any issues, and whilst there is probably a performance hit on the computer, it is not noticeable to me. Of course, what is suitable for my needs, may not be best suited for your needs.

Each to his own, but Defender isn't some cheap low end tool just for gamers, and paid for tools are often not as thorough as the vendors might like you to think.

TBH the only thing that Defender doesn't have that would be useful is a sandbox, and I happen to know that Microsoft are working on that.

It's your money though, you're free to spend it where you want.

In any case, the single most important tool bar none is the end user. No antimalware tool can protect the system from the careless user.

 

[PhilGP]

Hello. I can't comment on Bull Guard specifically as I have never installed or used the product, but as to whether a third party anti-malware product is necessary, I would humbly suggest that it depends on the use of the computer.

If you use your computer solely for gaming, then the free Windows Defender is probably adequate.

At the opposite extreme, however, if you are a self-employed professional and:

• your livelihood depends on the computer, e.g. you use Adobe Creative Cloud to generate work for clients;
• you access personal data, e.g. internet banking;
• you receive/send sensitive information, e.g. emails to clients/solicitors

then I would advise that you engage in due diligence to decide what level of anti-malware to have on your computer.

Whatever your own situation, absolutely take into consideration what the good people on these forums advise. But please do your own due diligence as well, whether that is asking people who are IT literate that you personally know and trust, or research on the internet, especially if you put high value on the computer's use and the data that you store on it (photos, videos, work etc).

If this is your work computer, or you are concerned about identity theft/internet banking/phishing etc., it is worth looking into what the paid-for versions of anti-malware products offer over the free anti-malware products. Paid-for versions do offer a lot of additional protection, but whether that premium is justifiable for your needs depends on your judgement and research.

Personally, I do have a paid-for anti-malware solution on my computer. I haven't encountered any issues, and whilst there is probably a performance hit on the computer, it is not noticeable to me. Of course, what is suitable for my needs, may not be best suited for your needs.

@RogWal I agree with all of your points.
I have already decided on the level of protection I need on my PC.

My original post was a simple enquiry as to whether Bull Guard really is that bad. I think the general opinion is yes.

 

[Tanbleeky]

Blimey, not looking good atm. I will remove Bullguard from my spec. I always thought windows defender was not good enough on its own. Oh well, many thanks for the above replies.

 

[Bhuna50]

Blimey, not looking good atm. I will remove Bullguard from my spec. I always thought windows defender was not good enough on its own. Oh well, many thanks for the above replies.

When it first came out it wasn’t but Microsoft has vastly improved it and the security around Win10.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Gavras]

The only bloatware i know of that installs normally with W10 is Edge

To be fair Edge is more secure than Chrome which is farcical and Firefox which has recently opened it doors to being exploited.

in a recent exploit, both Edge and Chrome were vulnerable, but Firefox was giving everything including user credentials even when not asked For lol.

I refuse to use Chrome either on mobile, my works laptop or my home PC, it’s just so vulnerable.

I think google must hold record for number of security patches in 2 months lol.

 

[Martinr36]

To be fair Edge is more secure than Chrome which is farcical and Firefox which has recently opened it doors to being exploited.

in a recent exploit, both Edge and Chrome were vulnerable, but Firefox was giving everything including user credentials even when not asked For lol.

I refuse to use Chrome either on mobile, my works laptop or my home PC, it’s just so vulnerable.

I think google must hold record for number of security patches in 2 months lol.

Agreed with you on chrome, I use firefox on mobile and waterfox on pc and laptop

 

[Gavras]

Agreed with you on chrome, I use firefox on mobile and waterfox on pc and laptop

Firefox is a bit of a sieve at moment.

When they were smaller, less of target, these days just another target with a large user base to exploit.

 

[ubuysa]

This is a good overview of what Defender can do: https://community.windows.com/en-us/stories/defender-security-center. The key advantage of Defender, apart from it's features, is that Windows is built around it - security is at the heart of Windows 10 and Defender is your interface to that security. That means that Windows and Defender are designed to work together - all third party antimalware solutions have to use the published Windows APIs, which are not as deep a level in the system as the APIs that Defender is able to use, or they use undocumented features of Windows to get the level of control they want. Because they're using undocumented features any Windows update can break them - and break them in ways that lead to a BSOD.