Tag Archives: Performance

AVG

AVG’s Top Blogs of 2014

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2014 was a big year for the security industry and a busy one for AVG. There were high profile security breaches, some incredible new apps for our smartphones and huge game releases that pushed the performance of our devices to the limit.

 

Threats:

Heartbleed was arguably the most significant security story of the year after a crucial vulnerability was found in Open SSL, the technology used to encrypt data online. Potentially, OpenSSL estimate that as many as 66% of all websites were vulnerable.

Our blog post on how to stay safe from Heartbleed was our most popular post of the year and a follow up post later in June showing that many websites were still vulnerable comes in at number two.

One of the year’s most prevalent malware breakouts, known as GameOver Zeus was also amongst our top stories. GameOver Zeus picked up a lot of media coverage as experts gave a two week countdown until a massive suspected cyber-attack would be unleashed.

 

Mobile:

AVG had a big year for mobile with exclusive deals to protect Sony Xperia devices and we even created custom apps specifically designed for the Amazon Fire Phone’s ‘Dynamic Perspective’.

We also sealed the acquisition of Location Labs which has brought powerful security and device management features to millions of people.

In November, we release our first ever Android App Performance Report which detailed the secret ways that the apps we use can affect our smartphones. How much space they take up, how much battery they use and how much data they send.

 

Gaming:

Gaming also enjoyed a big year in 2014 with the release of many big name titles including Watch Dogs, where you play a hacker in a beautifully rendered open world. Our performance expert Sandro Villinger’s Ultimate Watch Dogs performance guide for the PC was our third most popular post this year.

Sandro also created a simple nine step guide to maximizing PC gaming performance which helped users of all abilities squeeze the most out their machines whether top of the range or 3 years old!

If you are a gamer, check out Sandro’s Ultimate performance guide to

Gaming looks set to have another big year in 2015, keep an eye out for Sandro’s GTA 5 performance review coming soon!

 

2014 was a great year at AVG and we’re looking forward to bringing you more big stories in 2015.

Happy New Year!

AVG

Improve your smartphone battery life with smart profiles

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We’ve just released a new update to our AVG Cleaner for Android PRO.

In version 2.2.1 we’ve tweaked one of your favorite features, Battery Profiles, and now support Android L to help you clean up, speed up and especially boost battery life even better than before and on all the bleeding-edge devices out there.

 

So what’s new?

Despite that it started out as a cleaning app, we’ve made it a super-powerful tool to help you speed up and boost the battery life of your Android and even tell which apps drain your devices mobile data traffic, battery and storage. We’ve continued this tradition in our latest update even more.


Smarter Battery Savings with Battery Profiles

First and foremost, for the folks who love to improve battery life manually, we added a new button called “Choose Manual Settings” which puts you in charge of what features and built-in devices of your Android can drain your battery, such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Mobile Data or the automatic synchronization of your files:

As you can see, we’ve also added new “On/Off” buttons to make it more clear what’s enabled and what’s not – the green indicator now shows you exactly how much battery life you can save with each tweak.

Plus, there’s a new profile called “Low Battery” which is available in the PRO version and kicks in when battery life hits a certain threshold, such as “20%” (you have to run it once and then set it up):

That’s super important when you’re nowhere near a power outlet and the phone is running on fumes. It saved my digital life more than once…

Overall, we’ve also made the “Profiles” easier to set up. Once you select a profile for the first time, such as “Car” (for when you’re on the road), we’ll walk you through what conditions and settings you can set up. In the example of car, I set it up so that AVG Cleaner for Android always disables Wi-Fi, auto-sync, screen rotation and screen time-out whenever it’s connected to the Bluetooth of my car:

That’s because I don’t need any Wi-Fi in my car. Plus, I’m using the phone as my GPS so I don’t want the screen rotating randomly or turning itself off after a while.

Download AVG Cleaner for Android now.

AVG

Three essential tips for new Android devices

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Unfortunately, with today’s smartphones (which have the capacity and the feature-set of a high-end PC from about 10 years ago) it’s no longer a matter of popping in the SIM and using it.

There are a million things to watch out for and set up. In this week’s blog, we’ve compiled the three most useful steps you need to take besides running through the initial setup and downloading your favorite apps.

Sign into your Google Account:

One of the first things your new Android will ask you to do is sign into your Google account. Now, you could technically go without a Google account, but the benefits outweigh a lot of the worries some users have: once you sign in, it will back-up your phone’s settings, installed apps, account data and more – plus it allows you to purchase apps on the Google Play Store.

If you’re worried about privacy, simply create a new account and leave out information you don’t want to be shared with Google.

Google Sync

Get the latest update:

Most phones come with outdated software right out of the gate (as software continues to improve after devices come off the production line). We suggest checking for updates in your “Settings” app under “About device” (or similar).

Do the same for your apps so you don’t have to go into the Google Play store all the time. Go to Settings again and look for the “Auto-update apps” checkbox.

Software update

Get rid of preinstalled bloatware:

As we discovered last month in our AVG App Consumption report, one of the top reasons for battery drain, storage consumption and data traffic are the preinstalled apps on your phone.

We’ve actually made a free app, AVG Cleaner for Android, which lets you view the most draining apps on your phone and helps you get rid of them: Open it up and go to the App Uninstaller.

This will list all your currently running apps. If you tap on the little blue arrow in the top right, you can then sort the list by:

  • App Usage – how often you use each of your apps
  • Storage Usage – how much space your apps use
  • Battery Usage – how demanding each app is on your battery
  • Data Usage – the apps that send and receive the most data (to help avoid hitting your data plan limit)

Uninstall Bloatware

 

AVG

Black Friday Sale: 33% off PRO apps for Android

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The Black Friday and Cyber Monday weekend can be a great time to take advantage of big discounts on electrical items including smartphones.

If you’re planning on treating yourself or a loved one to a new smartphone this holiday weekend, or even if you just want to look after your existing device, AVG has some great discounts to help you keep your Android smartphone running securely and smoothly.

 

33% off AVG AntiVirus PRO

AVG AntiVirus PRO for Android is a complete security solution for your smartphone that combines powerful protection tools with useful features that can even help recover your device should it get lost or stolen.

With AVG AntiVirus PRO Android Security you can:

  • Scan apps, files, emails and messages for malware
  • Locate, lock and wipe your lost or stolen phone
  • Kill tasks that can slow down your phone
  • App Lock – password protect app access
  • A Camera Trap – that emails you a photo of anyone who enters an incorrect pass code three timese

Video

AVG AntiVirus PRO

Download AVG AntiVirus PRO now

 

33% off AVG Cleaner PRO

AVG Cleaner is a FREE app that helps you get more from your Android device. By cleaning out junk files and cache files, AVG Cleaner gives you more space for the files that matter. This holiday weekend get 33% off AVG Cleaner PRO features.

AVG Cleaner FREE allows you to:

  • Remove junk and cache files
  • Automate cleaning for no-hassle performance

AVG Cleaner PRO has these extra features:

  • No advertising
  • Set up custom battery profiles to make your phone run just how you want it to

Video

AVG Cleaner PRO

Download AVG Cleaner for FREE

AVG

What’s New in AVG PC TuneUp?

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In our last blog post, we’ve shown you our new killer feature for cleaner for AVG PC TuneUp, which is part of our all-new AVG Performance 2015 package. But that’s not all. AVG PC TuneUp also got an all-new Disk Cleaner which removes even more clutter from your Windows PC, laptop, and ultrabook:

Improved AVG Disk Cleaner

Our new “AVG Disk Cleaner” includes significant new and improved cleaning definitions to help remove the wasteful files of 39 additional programs.

This year we’re cleaning out unneeded files from:

  • Origin & Steam
    Wasteful log files & telemetry data hidden within the two gaming platforms.
  • Windows®
    We’re now cleaning even more temporary files, caches, log files, and leftover 8.1 Apps cookies from all built-in Windows 8 apps.
  • Skypeâ„¢
    Cache files, temp files and backup installation files from Skype.
  • All Cyberlink® products
    Leftover log files, temp files, trace files and also backup installer files from more than 25 Cyberlink products, such as Cyberlink® PowerDVD.
  • Apple® software
    Unfinished and broken downloads, such as videos or music, from iTunes (on Windows) and many locations in which Apple products, such as QuickTime or the iCloud client store backup installation files and updates, which are no longer necessary once they were installed.
  • nVidia, ATI and Intel
    Leftover data that gets created by installing and running Intel, AMD and nVidia software drivers, such as cache files for nVidia Shadowplay.
  • Windows UAC
    In order to protect Windows and users data from harm, the User Account Control (UAC) redirects files from programs which require administration rights, such as older Windows XP programs. AVG Disk Cleaner remove wasteful files that were created by these older applications.
  • Windows Upgrade Files
    All leftover files from when a user has upgraded to a newer version, such as Windows 7 to Windows 8.1 right within the new category:

  • Screenshots
    This new Disk Cleaner category shows screenshots that an application or the user has takenwithin applications such as BS Player or VLC
  • Flash and Java
    In addition to cleaning Flash and Java cookies, AVG Disk Cleaner now cleans temp files leftover temporary data, too.

 

In addition to that, we now clean up leftover data and improved existing cleaning algorithms from the following applications: Multiple Ashampoo programs, Avira, Amsn, Ad-aware, Auslogic programs, Audials tunebite, AIMP, Avast software, BS player, CleanMyPC, Comodo programs (CertSentry, PaintShop, VideoStudio), Cyberlink programs (PowerCinema, YouCam, Downloader), CleanMyPC Registry Cleaner, Drivermax, Google Talk, IMVU, Java, Jukebox, Jdownloader, Microsoft Office, Nero Programs, Norton antivirus, Picasa, Roxio, Starmoney, Skype, Spybot search and destroy, Ultraedit, WPFFont, Yahoo! Messenger, ACDSee, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Lightroom, Corel AfterShot Pro, Corel PaintShop Pro, GIMP, Google Nik Collection, Paint.NET, PhotoPad, Photomatix, Snagit, Zoner Photo Studio

 

Step by Step: Here’s How You Clean Up

  1. Download and install AVG PC TuneUp trial version here. Finished? Then move on to the “Cleaning” category. AVG PC TuneUp now scans your entire hard disk for invisible data crud:

Example: On this 6 year old desktop PC, we found 68 GByte of worthless data!

 

  1. To open AVG Disk Cleaner, click on “Clean up Windows and programs”. You should find a list of things you may not need:

Note that AVG PC TuneUp doesn’t delete any files that are actively used by any of your programs – so  your precious files should not go missing. However, it may be worth going through the list and looking at the help pane on the right to confirm that you really don’t need any of these files.
Ok that’s it for now: Have you tried it out? Let us know how much you were able to clean up on your PC with the new AVG PC TuneUp.

AVG

Get rid of clutter from your Android devices now!

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We all have way too much unnecessary clutter on our phones and tablets – things that eat away our storage, waste mobile data and drain battery life. Some of this is caused by the apps we use on a daily basis, like games or social media– but much is also caused by apps we no longer use or that are running constantly in the background.

Our new AVG Cleaner for Android 2.2 makes it quick and easy to identify (and remove) such unwanted apps but also helps you clean the clutter from your phone, such as cache, history, and call logs.

Video

Introducing AVG Cleaner for Android

So what’s New in Version 2.2?

  • Large file finder: Our all-new version 2.2 app scans your Android tablet and phone for massive files, such as downloads, app packages, videos, music files or other data that you may have downloaded or copied over to your device – and perhaps forgotten about.

  • Caller History Cleaner: AVG Cleaner for Android helps you clean up all calls or even one specific entry in your call history.
  • Check up on your Android from your PC: You can remotely check up on your Android smartphone or tablet from your PC. In this example, I added a Galaxy S5 to my AVG Zen network and monitored it right from my PC.

 

Now the really cool thing is that you can’t just check up on your AVG Zen network from your PC – but also direct from your Android. That’s right, you can even check up the Performance and the Security status of all your AVG Zen connected devices, such as PCs or Laptops running Windows and Mac computers right from your phone. To do that, fire up your Google Play store and download AVG Zen Admin console:

Once you’ve signed into your AVG Zen account, you can even check up on your devices from wherever you are!

 

AVG

Introducing a cleaner for iPhone, iPad & iPod Touch! 

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Yes, this is not a typo for the first time, AVG PC TuneUp will also include an all-new AVG iOS Cleaner feature to help users get rid of the hidden leftover files, which can amount to thousands, from both iOS itself as well as apps used on a daily basis.

In this and the next blog post I’d like to talk about what’s new for our PC utility AVG PC TuneUp. Let’s jump right in?

AVG Cleaner for iOS – Wait, an iOS Cleaner for PCs?

That’s right. We know that a lot of users out there are struggling with disk space on their iOS devices (iPad, iPhone, iPod touch). They’re getting messages like this when snagging a photo or downloading apps:

Also, iTunes seems to explicably show that there’s a lot of stuff in the “Other” or “Documents & Data” category. Well, if you’re running out of disk space, hidden clutter may be the culprit. That’s why we came up with AVG Cleaner for iOS. Since it’s technically not possible to have an app delete hidden temporary files and other unneeded files (more on that below), we’re doing that right from our PC and it’s the reason it’s part of AVG PC TuneUp.

 

How exactly does it work? (Step by Step)

Open up AVG PC TuneUp and select “Dashboard”. Then, go to the “Clean up” category.

Connect your Apple device to your PC and click on ‘Clean Up iPhone, iPad or iPod touch’.

 

Hit the ‘Clean Now’ button. Have a look at the results.

 

How much did we clean up?

I was as surprised as you will be when I first laid my hands on an early version of our AVG Cleaner FOR iOS months ago: It found a LOT of unexpected files on my iDevices. I guess the biggest surprise was my iPad:

7.5 GB on my iPad. Another 500 MB on my iPhone 5S and more than 700 MB on my iPod touch. So how’s that even possible?

I found that rather incredible, and even more so after my iPad showed another 1 GB just a few weeks later:

Digging deeper, I found that many of the daily apps I use create a lot of temporary files without deleting them. For example, after 2-3 days of Spotify streaming, its offline cache grew up to 655 MB on my iPad. But what is all this stuff? Let’s find out:

 

What AVG Cleaner for iOS cleans up

Download Cache & Temporary Files

Most apps create a “Cache” and “Temporary Files” folder to store data that’s needed while they are running. Unfortunately, many apps tend to forget to clean out these hidden downloads, which may result in your iOS device running out of space soon.

AVG Cleaner™ for iOS cleans out these hidden cache folders. Even according to Apple’s official guidelines, the cache folder is safe to delete as it includes data that can easily be renewed or downloaded again by the app – so we’re not doing anything harmful to your device. In fact, it may help even solve some problems when one of these cache files gets corrupted or damaged by a bug in the app.

 

Thumbnail Cache

Every time you browse a photo related app, it creates thumbnail files to display the little previews (see image above), but may forget to delete them even if they’re no longer necessary.

AVG Cleaner™ for iOS cleans out all thumbnail files from 3rd party apps. It gets rid of all thumbnail files that are no longer being used and will only recreate the ones you need. Don’t worry, your stored photos will not be touched.

 

System Logs & Crash Reports

Every time an app crashes or an error occurs on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, a crash report and logs will be created. If you want to, these can be sent to Apple or the maker of the app. However, these reports take up valuable storage and may even contain personal information.

AVG Cleanerâ„¢ for iOS helps users delete system logs and crash reports, free up more disc space and the protect your privacy by removing personal information within these cookies.

Ok that’s it for now: Have you tried it out? Let us know how much you were able to clean up!

AVG

The secret life of apps revealed

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Have you ever noticed that your smartphone has surprisingly little storage space left for things like photos or even the latest updates? Or that battery life and reliability have begun to deteriorate over time? Or perhaps that your monthly data usage is growing inexplicably? Over time, the apps we love and use day in and day out affect our tablets or phones and impact their performance – sometimes while you’re using them, and sometimes completely invisible in the background.

 

The study

We decided to investigate to see if we could better understand how apps influence devices over time in our first Android App Performance Report.

When it comes to the performance of our phones, we noticed that users care about three things above all else:

  • Storage consumption – how much space do you have left for the files you love?
  • Battery consumption – is your phone making it to the end of the day or not?
  • Data plan consumption – are you constantly hitting your mobile data limit?

 

We felt that in order for the report to reflect what is happening to people’s phones out there in the real world, we needed to use data from real devices. Unlike other tests that might conduct benchmarking in a lab environment it was important to us that these results applied to everyday smartphone users.

 

Methodology

 

So with that in mind, we analyzed anonymized data from over one million AVG Android app users, so that we could better understand which apps they are using and how those apps affect their devices.

Some of the results were quite surprising.

 

Key Findings

 

Pre-installed apps

One of the most interesting learnings we made in the first report is that many devices are still carrying around a lot of apps that were installed by the manufacturer. These can take up a lot of storage space but more importantly can drain battery life – something that is already under strain with the constant use of most smartphones.

 

Apps with background activity

Another thing that became clear was that as we add more apps to our devices, we seldom remove the ones we no longer want or need. Over time this means that the limited resources of our devices are divided over an ever growing number of apps, affecting performance.

The reason for this is simple: the “always on” nature of apps means that they often-times continue to run in the background to check for notifications, updates or download data which uses valuable battery and data.

 

Social and News apps

It will come as little surprise that with its constant background notification checks, which run even when the app is not open, the social networking app from Facebook emerged as having the biggest impact on your mobile device when it comes to overall performance. The constant demand and transmission of data makes the app a real drain on both battery life and data use.

 

 

App growth

As we ran the report over several months, we observed some interesting behavior amongst apps that are automatically updated. Over time, their storage footprint and battery drain both increased. This is mostly due to downloaded content (songs for Spotify, items in games etc.), but is also in part thanks to automatic updates. With automatic updates enabled, developers can push out new versions and features that take up more space and are more resource heavy without having to ask the users permission. Combine this with the steadily growing number of apps we have on our devices (including those that we’ve downloaded and no longer use) and very soon you begin to observe a noticeable dip in performance.

 

What can you do to improve your device performance?

One of the most fundamental issues that the report has raised is that keeping your smartphone running in top condition is quite a labor intensive task. Keeping check of which apps are running in the background and removing apps that you don’t use is more than enough for most of us to commit to.

There are products that are designed to make your life easier though like AVG Cleaner for Android which can show you how much data, storage and battery life each of your apps is consuming to help you take the right actions to tackle any issues.

 

Our full report doesn’t just detail what apps are the most consuming of them all, it also details best practices and helps you get rid of performance hogs on your Android smartphone or tablet.

 

Full Report

Androidâ„¢ is a trademark of Google Inc. in the US and other countries.

AVG

AVG Technologies Launches 2015 Products

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AMSTERDAM and SAN FRANCISCO – November 4, 2014 – AVG® Technologies N.V. (NYSE: AVG), the online security company™ for 182 million active users, today announced the availability of its 2015 portfolio of protection, performance and privacy products. This includes the new all-in-one AVG Protection and AVG Performance suites for PCs, Android devices and Apple devices, and AVG Ultimate, which includes both protection and performance suites in a single package. These come with the latest version of AVG Zen®, the app for Windows PCs and Android smartphones and tablets that makes it simple for consumers to look after their own and their family’s devices.

 

What’s new in AVG Zen

AVG Zen can be downloaded from the Google Play store or when installing AVG Protection, AVG Performance, or AVG Ultimate. It shows at a glance the full status of the Protection or Performance settings customers have on the PCs, Android devices, and Mac computers they have added to the AVG Zen network.

AVG Zen’s refreshed look and feel for the 2015 products means users can easily:

  • Add an unlimited number of their family’s devices.
  • Run a scan remotely from their mobile device to their PC (and vice versa), other mobile device or Mac computer.
  • Run Automatic Maintenance on Windows PCs and laptops remotely or check up on Android devices and Mac computers.
  • Easily access individual products, such as AVG AntiVirus or AVG PC TuneUp®, directly from AVG Zen.

 

Yuval Ben-Itzhak, Chief Technology Officer, AVG Technologies said, “AVG Zen is designed to make it easy to manage the necessary maintenance and updating that keeps people’s favorite online devices working at their best simple. In the last few months, we have added some key features to AVG Zen, including being able to scan and fix issues on a device remotely, and offering all-in-one packages for full device protection and performance improvement. The Internet of Things is exploding with smart home revenues expected to reach a global market value of $71 billion by 2018. We see great potential for AVG Zen to become a household fixture that simplifies and makes this online experience more meaningful.”

 

AVG Protection: includes AVG AntiVirus or AVG Internet Security, AVG AntiVirus for Mac®, AVG PrivacyFix™ and more, all-in-one package

AVG Protection delivers the latest versions and full range of AVG’s Protection products for desktop and mobile in a single suite, without the customer having to purchase the individual products. With AVG Zen, all PCs and mobile devices running AVG Protection products can be monitored for security issues. The new Remote Actions feature also helps users fix security problems, such as remotely enabling security features that have been disabled on one from another device, such as a PC or Android smartphone.

AVG Protection includes:

  • AVG Internet Security: now delivers even earlier detection methods with our new outbreak detection and priority updates.
  • AVG AntiVirus for Android: customers get the same great experience on their Android tablets as on their mobile devices. This includes locate, lock and remote wipe a smartphone using the Anti-Theft feature if it has been stolen. It also features app lock and backup, privacy settings for social media, call and message blocker and wipe device for improved online privacy.

Customers purchasing the AVG Protection subscription will receive the PRO products including AVG Internet Security. They can also add the devices of family members to their AVG Zen Network to share all the PRO benefits at no extra cost. The PRO subscription for unlimited PCs and mobile devices is $59.99 for one year, with the individual products also available. AVG Protection is also available as a 30-day trial from www.avg.com/protection.

 

AVG Performance: includes new AVG PC TuneUp®, AVG Cleaner, AVG Cleaner for Mac, AVG Cleaner™ for iOS® and more, all-in-one package

AVG Performance brings together all of AVG’s hero performance products in one single place, AVG Zen, for ease of use. It includes software and mobile apps to keep PCs or laptops running Windows, smartphones and tablets running Android, Mac computers and now even iPhones and iPads in top shape, an all-in-one performance suite that covers all popular platforms on the market. AVG Zen makes it simple to check the status of all the devices in the home and clean PCs remotely from a smartphone or a secondary PC.

AVG Performance includes:

  • AVG PC TuneUp: AVG’s award-winning version includes 39 tools to speed up, fix up, clean up, and enhance battery life of all Windows® PCs and laptops with features like Automatic Maintenance, Program Deactivator and Economy Mode. The all-new AVG Cleaner for iOS feature safely removes leftover files from iPhone and iPads once plugged into any Windows PC and laptop. It also removes redundant files, such as corrupt downloads, temporary files, or invisible crash reports, helping free up space for their personal data or to install the new iOS updates. The Disk Cleaner feature has also been significantly enhanced support has been added to clean up leftover files from popular gaming platforms Steam and Origin, Skype, nVidia/Intel/AMD drivers as well as iTunes and Quicktime.
  • AVG Cleaner for Android: with the new ‘large file scanner’, users can scan their Android phones for storage hogs, such as old downloads or videos in addition to enhancing battery life with ‘Battery Profiles’ and thorough cache cleaning. AVG Cleaner for Mac scans disks and looks for leftover files from Mac OS X and programs as well as duplicates that users may have forgotten about.

 

AVG Performance is available as a 30-day trial from www.avg.com/performance. The PRO subscription for unlimited PCs and mobile devices is $39.99 for one year, with the individual products also available.

AVG Ultimate is available as a 30-day trial from www.avg.com/ultimate. The PRO subscription for unlimited PCs and mobile devices comes in at $89.99 for one year. The individual products are also available.

AVG Zen with AVG Protection, AVG Performance and AVG Ultimate are available to customers in Canada, Germany, Ireland, Spain, UK, US.

 

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About AVG Technologies (NYSE: AVG)

AVG is the online security company providing leading software and services to secure devices, data and people.  AVG has over 182 million active users, as of June 30, 2014, using AVG’s products and services including Internet security, performance optimization, and personal privacy and identity protection. By choosing AVG’s products, users become part of a trusted global community that engages directly with AVG to provide feedback and offer mutual support to other customers.

All third party trademarks are the property of their respective owners. AVG does not claim any affiliation, sponsorship or endorsement by such third parties of AVG products.

www.avg.com

 

Yuval Ben-Itzhak

Yuval Ben-Itzhak, CTO, AVG Technologies

 

Contacts:

US

Katie Han

Waggener Edstrom for AVG

[email protected]

+ 1 (212) 551 4807

UK

Samantha Woodman

Waggener Edstrom for AVG

[email protected]

+ 44 (0)20 7632 3840

 

Keep in touch with AVG