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AVG Mobilation Anti-Virus is an easy-to-use solution that keeps your Android smartphone and your identity duly protected at all times.Walking into mobile platforms is a trend all major security software development players have started making special emphasis on. The indisputable convenience of owning a portable gadget that keeps you connected in every sense of this word inherently imposes elevated security requirements and identity protection measures to be implemented. Using a smartphone, you can get your accounts and settings synchronized across different devices, so basically what you’ve got on your personal computer at home or at work – can now be accessed from a phone. This is why the notion of protection is acquiring pretty much the same semantics with both PCs and mobile gadgets these days.
AVG Mobilation trademark, a subdivision of the world-famous AVG Company, came up with their own solutions for securing smartphones running a number of mobile operating systems. What we are going to review today is the vendor’s application for Android, called AVG Mobilation Anti-Virus. What struck us from the beginning is the amazing simplicity of the software, starting from the setup – all the way to performing application and content scans, doing the upgrades, customizing anti-theft settings, accessing device performance and optimization data etc. Apart from the regular virus and malware protection, this app accommodates remote tracking and controlling features to help you locate the device if misplaced or stolen, and avoid the consequences of someone else’s physical access to it. Complemented by SMS filtering and browsing protection capabilities, the above features delivered by AVG Mobilation Anti-Virus add up to make a comprehensive and fairly efficient all-in-one tool for securing your mobile world with ease.
Both free and Pro versions of AVG Mobilation Anti-Virus are available for downloading on Google Play (former Android Market) and on the vendor’s official site www.avgmobilation.com. A few words about differences between these builds, or to be precise – what additional features the Pro one ships with. Advantages of the paid version include permanently functional App Locker and App Backup (in contrast to 14-day trial period in the free counterpart); expanded support options (FAQ and email support, as compared with FAQ only); and no ads.
The setup process takes about a minute, the time frame mainly depending on the Internet connection speed while the full database and definitions get downloaded. Installation being competed, the app welcomes you with the main screen containing the logo and basic tips to kick off using the software. Simply touching the screen at this point launches a scan that checks your apps and content by default. Further on, you can add additional smartphone content and locations to be checked during the scan – this is doable via ‘Settings’ by putting checkmarks next to the items you want monitored in manual scan, or in real time.
It takes tapping the menu button on your phone to open the program’s options: Scan, Tools, Anti-Theft, Upgrade, Settings and Help. The items that include additional options open up as a list where you can pick and activate or configure the default parameters. Exploring the entire menu and learning how to use the app’s functions is a matter of mere minutes since everything is designed to be incredibly comprehensive and intuitive. Another advantage is the option of choosing from a total of 16 languages for the interface.
A great lure about using AVG Mobilation Anti-Virus is the speed it exhibits while performing pretty much all the operations covered. The application turned out to be swift in updates, accepting settings modifications, device performance tuneup, killing unused tasks, and even phone scanning. The latter even kind of got us perplexed and somewhat doubtful as it’s not that easy to believe that scanning the apps, the settings and the content of the device gets completed within 20-25 seconds. However, it certainly does monitor your gadget: obvious evidence of that was the insecure setting reported in the log (USB debugging enabled) after the very first scan, with further recommendation to modify it for safety purposes. Moreover, the app provides a button serving as a shortcut to enable immediate navigation to the device location concerned, so you don’t really have to spend time looking for the potentially unsafe parameter on your own.
Overall device performance remained unaffected by this app throughout the test – what is more, the optimization options help determine related issues and provide tips on addressing those effectively. To sum it up, all the basic usability criteria – installation process, user interface design, and speediness – kept us completely satisfied. Well done, AVG!
There are several leitmotifs ‘built into’ AVG Mobilation Anti-Virus architecture and goal set: defense against mobile viruses and scams, identity protection, device performance optimization and phone location options. In this section of our review we will touch upon the features designed specifically to accomplish the above objectives.
To conclude, this app’s feature set is more than enough for adequate malware protection and anti-theft, and yet we wish the vendor provided parental controls and SIM card replacement countermeasures that some competitors implement (e.g. sending a message with new number if your SIM is removed from the device).
Since the number one reason to install this type of software is protection against mobile-specific viruses which are on the rise, we paid special attention to the efficiency criterion in our test. First off, to measure AVG Mobilation Anti-Virus in terms of defensive capabilities, let’s resort to the verdict by AV-TEST which is an authoritative software evaluation resource. According to their latest stats, this application ranks to be in the top of the second group of tested solutions, which means its detection rate is somewhere between 65% and 90% – this is considered “very good and have the potential to join the group of best products if small changes are made to the set of malware tested.” So they got results that claim AVG Mobilation Anti-Virus to exhibit above-the-average reliability, missing some samples that might not be prevalent in certain environments. And still, that’s far from perfect. For instance, it detected such infections as DorDrae downloader (automatically downloading and running other arbitrary code without user’s consent and knowledge) and Jifake (indulging in SMS frauds) only in 0%-40% of the cases; and completely missed the Opfake trojan (sending text messages to premium-rate numbers).
In the context of our test, this app did fairly good detecting security threats out of the general malware population, missing a few non-critical samples. Moreover, AVG Mobilation Anti-Virus actually did more than that, spotting insecure settings and giving advice on how to get things back to the safe path. Additionally, the solution appears to do a good job protecting you online; it effectively employs the AVG LinkScanner engine that checks websites for malicious traits in real time.
There is quite a tangible differentiation between Free and Pro version users in terms of customer support. If you installed the former, your options are bound to the FAQ section and resources that are open to the public, i.e. the general product information provided on the vendor’s website www.avgmobilation.com. The plus side of it is the fact that the FAQs are really informative and embrace a lot of basic issues that might arise. On the other hand, the Pro version users can take advantage of personal support by submitting a ticket via the ‘Contact us’ form available directly in the ‘Help’ menu. That’s not too broad of a choice overall, but with the app’s simplicity and reliability, the listed options should do the trick.
AVG Mobilation Anti-Virus is extraordinarily simple about everything: the setup, the controls and the use of features. In addition to that, it’s not resource-heavy. So the app definitely hits the point in regards to peculiarities of the devices it’s intended to protect. Although the solution might miss part of the prevalent mobile malware samples, the overall protection is sufficient to prevent scams and severe virus infestation of the smartphone, not to mention the innovative approach to anti-theft due to state-of-the-art remote phone management. All in all, AVG Mobilation Anti-Virus is an easy-to-use solution that keeps your Android smartphone duly protected at all times.
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How to retrieve or unluck AVG anti theft forgotten password...please help.
Terrie,
To solve your issue, consider contacting AVG tech team via their Support Center at support.avg.com. In your query, be sure to specify the product name, your email address, and describe the problem in detail. Alternatively, you can log in to AVG MyAccount and submit your question from there.
Thanks for contacting us!
Good information but How can I safe my mobile features like application turned out to be swift in updates, accepting settings modifications, device performance tuneup, killing unused tasks, and even phone scanning. The latter even kind of got us perplexed and somewhat doubtful as it’s not that easy to believe that scanning the apps, the settings and the content of the device gets completed within 20-25 seconds.