Avoid Non-Microsoft Antivirus Software
I also want to raise an alarm about a current AV practice, not mentioned in the article:<p><pre><code>    AV products like Bitdefender will MITM
    your HTTPS connections by installing their
    own root certificates, by default and 
    without warnings
</code></pre>
In the name of &quot;security&quot;, this undermines the very purpose of what HTTPS is about, knowingly endangering their users.<p>And consider that I, a highly technical and security conscious software developer, only noticed it because I saw green icons appearing in my search results and then noticed that Google&#x27;s SSL certificate is now a fake. And I only noticed it because I know how this shit works and those green icons seemed suspicious.<p>And yes, I&#x27;m using the word &quot;<i>fake</i>&quot;, because I doubt that companies like Bitdefender have to pass the same certifications as a certificate authority or that they have any deals whatsoever with Google. And it&#x27;s a serious vulnerability, because their certificate can get stolen and used by malicious software, not to mention you now have to trust a third-party with all of your secure connections, which includes your Google searches exposing your most secret desires, your Facebook and Slack chats, your bank account, everything. A third-party that does not have the scrutiny of your open-source web browser.<p>That&#x27;s just preposterous and these products only survive because users are gullible and technically illiterate.