To understand what anti-virus software is, we must first have an understanding of what a computer virus is and how they threaten our privacy. The main goal of antivirus software is to counter virus programs. At the core, a virus is nothing more than a program which continuously duplicates itself on a person's system. These programs typically either allow an unwanted user to gain access to the affected system or performs some unwanted action on the affected system. As such, viruses are almost always used for nefarious reasons by malicious programs, and as I've mentioned before; antivirus software came about to counter such programs.

In its simplest form, a computer virus is basically some form of software with nefarious intentions which continuously duplicate itself much like a regular virus would do within a human. This program typically alters the behavior of some device as it continuously duplicates itself so as to make it harder to purge from the system. This is accomplished through exploits and vulnerabilities found within the software to aid the virus' creator; to gain unwanted access to the system or to perform unwanted actions on the system.

The Cloud is a general term referred to as the Internet in a broad way. It generally refers to accessing computer, storage and applications over the Internet. It should be noted that these services involve the use of some extremely powerful machines, mega scale storage devices in remote locations that the user would not be able to access physically.

You've chosen to purchase a new PC for your everyday computing needs. What would you choose for your operating system: MacOS, Windows or Linux? It may seem a simple choice for the most, but you do have a choice.