Microsoft is offering it's free anti-virus product, Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) to 75,000 lucky people today.

The company is offering the product via a beta program and will likely extend the cap of 75,000 downloads depending on demand. MSE is Microsoft's free anti-virus and anti-spyware product that is set to replace Microsoft's paid Windows Live OneCare subscription service which is being withdrawn a week today.

MSE is being distributed on Microsoft's Connect site as a beta program. The build available on the connect site is 1.0.1407.00 compared to the 1.0.2140.0 build of the leaked copy.

You will need to be registered with or sign up and register with Microsoft Connect to be able to complete the download. Once logged in you will need to answer a couple of quick questions ( I don't know if they relate to your acceptance to the beta), once completed you should be taken to a download link for MSE Beta.

This beta is available only to customers in the United States, United Kingdom, Israel (English only), People’s Republic of China (Simplified Chinese only) and Brazil (Brazilian Portuguese only).

Welcome Screen


License Agreement


Validate Windows


Ready to Install


Installing


Installation Complete


Auto Update


Auto Quick Scan


Scan Near Completion - Around 12minutes


Scan Completed + Home Page


Updates Page


History Page


Settings Page

This threat was not detected on the Quick Scan as it only scanned the C: Drive. This Full Scan scanned the D: Drive aswell and found the threat amongst the user's documents.

An infected file was placed within the documents to show the outcome of a threat being detected.


Potential Threat Detected


Threat Details


In depth Threat Details


Threat Removed


History page now updated with threat details


The sections blanked out are the username and folders, this was my machine and you don't need to know that info :rabbit:

Yeah I grabbed this earlier today, and I am going to play around with it when I get home from work tonight.

:topicmoved: to Security Products.

It's actually proving to be better than i anticipated.

Originally this was just a post to mention the release, i kinda went into a bit of a review by the time i finished but didn't think to move it at the time, thanks Jay!