If you’ve recently seen Microsoft Defender for Endpoint flagging Google Chrome upgrades as suspicious, know that it was a false positive. You shouldn’t be concerned. Chrome isn’t infected; Defender was simply malfunctioning.
Multiple Windows system administrators reported that Defender for Endpoint was blocking Chrome upgrades. Microsoft addressed the situation. The organization concludes that all alerts are false positives. A spokesperson added that Defender for Endpoint’s logic has been revised to fix the issue.
False positives
Microsoft Defender is prone to false positives. Recently, a report by AV-Comparatives revealed that other popular antivirus solutions beat Defender in terms of offline accuracy. According to AV-Comparatives tests, common antivirus software — such as Bitdefender, AVG, Total Defense — outperformed Microsoft’s product in offline detection capabilities.
Cloud security remains highly effective, which is a key quality that Microsoft Defender has over its offline competitors. Yet, given the results, those who don’t have the most reliable internet connections do well to look into other options than Microsoft’s default.