Ohio University

 The university chose to move from McAfee to Sophos after an extensive evaluation of competing products through an official RFP process.  Sophos benefits include:

• Speed
• Security
• Cross-platform support
• Ease of use

Sophos is an anti-virus and anti-malware tool.  It protects your computer from malicious computer code that can spread via email, file downloads, disk media, on websites, and through direct network attacks.  Sophos runs quietly in the background on your computer without slowing it down, and it updates itself automatically as new virus definitions become available.

We expect Sophos installers to be available later in fall semester, possibly as soon as mid to late November. For more details, visit the Schedule page.

Sophos has been site licensed for both academic and home use for all faculty, staff, and students.  You may install Sophos on all of your computers, both university-owned and personally owned.

University owned computers:

Departments that are using McAfee will need to move to Sophos once it is available.  OIT will work with department heads and departmental IT staff to develop low impact transition plans.

Departments that pay to maintain an independent subscription to anti-virus software other than McAfee may wish to switch, as well.  Sophos is fast, secure, and - through OHIO's site license - free.

Personally owned computers

If you are using McAfee, you should switch to Sophos once it is available.  If you currently are using a different anti-virus program, you are welcome to continue using that program; however, the university's site licensed version of Sophos offers excellent virus protection at no charge to you.

Sophos works with:

• Windows
• MacOS
• Linux
• Solaris

Once the university's McAfee subscription ends in December, anyone still using our copies of McAfee will stop receiving virus updates.  Without updates, anti-virus software is not useful.  

Also, the home use portion of the university's McAfee agreement expires in December as well, so you will be required by the terms of the license to remove McAfee from your personally owned devices at that point.

The university's Sophos installers are designed to automatically remove McAfee as part of the upgrade process, so if you install Sophos, you will not need to worry about removing McAfee.

Sophos fully supports the MacOS, and we strongly recommend installing it on your Mac.  Contrary to popular belief, Apple systems are not immune to viruses, and hackers are paying more and more attention to the MacOS.

Make sure to remove your current anti-virus software before installing Sophos. For university versions of McAfee, you can use this McAfee Removal Tool for Mac OS.  For other anti virus products, follow the manufacturer's instructions for removal.

If you are using a Windows computer, the Sophos installer will remove the university's version of McAfee and many other anti-virus programs automatically.

If you are using a Mac, the home use installer will not remove your old anti-virus software.  You should uninstall it before installing Sophos.  For university versions of McAfee, you can use this McAfee Removal Tool for Mac OS.  For other anti virus products, follow the manufacturer's instructions for removal.

Sophos includes protection from web sites and web ads that may include malicious code, malware, or viruses.  When you visit a site that includes risky ads, those ads will not load.  If you attempt to visit a web site that may include malicious code, viruses, or malware, Sophos will prevent that web site from loading.