The company is usually more known for its range of antivirus software for computers, but now it has a consumer focused anti-theft application for the iPhone and Android handsets. Unfortunately people can experience the inconvenience and expense of having their handset stolen, or not handed in if mislaid.

With the application users can back up contacts, photos, videos, and also track the whereabouts of their device remotely with the McAfee WaveSecure online portal. Contacts can also be restored wirelessly, and owners of the iPhone can even do this to an Android device.

This means if the worse happens and your cell phone has been stolen, lost, damaged, or you have accidentally deleted your data you can still get it all back. If you are trying to track your lost or stolen device the app, it will plot the locations of it on a map.

Director of product marketing at McAfee Lianne Caetano said about the application “We’ve been in mobile security for about ten years, but we’re in a period of rapid changes now.” The application is available in a number of languages that include English, Danish, Dutch, German, Greek, French, Indonesian, Italian, Norwegian, Portuguese, Japanese, Spanish, Swedish, and Russian.

The application will give users piece of mind when having lots of important information and content on their cell phones, and allow for the quick restoration of this if the worse happens. McAfee WaveSecure 4.0.3 is available worldwide on the App Store for only $19.99/£13.99. iOS 4.0 or later required. Android users can find out more information and download via the Android Market.

In a recent report by the security experts they found that in Q4 2010 malware increased by 46 percent over the same period in 2009. It was found that Flash and PDF software were then main focus of these attacks. The main reason for this is because there are far more smatphones on the market compared to that same period in 2009 – with Android making up the huge bulk.

The Inquirer said that Apple must be feeling smug about now – well maybe Steve Jobs more so, as it was he who made a point of never allowing his iOS devices to run Adobe Flash, as he sad that it was too buggy.

An article on PCMag picks up on the fact that malware is now getting more sophisticated. As with computers these viruses do different things to the OS, these include making calls or texts to a specific numbers amongst other things. One thing is for sure, if things don’t change soon, then we can see the likes of McAfee and Norton offering their products to mobile devices as well.

However, the biggest offender to this issue is Adobe, so maybe they need to look at what is the cause of this issue and understand how they can address it. So if you want a handset that has no malware issues, then looks like you had better choose the iPhone – wait for the 5th-generation version though, as that is just over five months away now.

Following on from the recent post about the Security Suite virus and how to remove it, we thought we would give our readers a quick round up of some free virus removal tools that are available to download from the best in security.

If you need a virus removal tool then we recommend you visit one of these options. First is McaFee, and their free virus tools that can remove certain viruses from your system, you can see the details and download links on their “Virus Removal Tools” page.

The Kaspersky Virus Removal Tool looks pretty good, they say that their utility can remove “all types of infections”, which seems a big claim. Full details and download link here.

AVG has created a section on their site that lists tools to remove popular infections and viruses from your computer, you can see more at avg.com/in-en/virus-removal. Symantec has a page similar to AVG, which lists tools developed by Symantec Security Response that can automatically carry out a removal, they also promote their fee-based service (see both here).

Have you used any of the above virus removal tools? Let us know more in the comments.

McAfee recently released a report which shows that malware has been “on a steady incline” so far in 2010 and now the risk is becoming more of a problem for Mac users, who up until now have been pretty secure against these risks.

There is no way of becoming completely secure against malware, however there are a few things that you can do to help, firstly make sure you have installed the latest service pack for Windows, this can be done through Windows Updates, also ensure that you have automatic updates turned on.

Make sure that you have antivirus software installed preferably with antimalware capabilities, AVG is a great example, it is free (for non-commercial use) and can be downloaded here. Once installed it will update automaticaly and scan daily.

I would also recommend installing Google Chrome, this web browser has a much better reputation in terms of security and is updated regularly. Finally do not open any dodgy-looking emails or click on any dodgy-looking links on websites, including Facebook.

Have you been affected by malware this year?

As reported from Computer World, Barry McPherson, who is the company’s executive vice president of support and customer service issued an apology to users late last night.

In relation to the problem in which a recent antivirus update wrongly identified a key Windows component file as a virus, he had this to say:

“I want to apologize on behalf of McAfee and say that we’re extremely sorry for any impact the faulty signature update file may have caused you and your organizations,”

Is the apology enough for users though? We are still getting feedback from you, stating that problems are still occuring for you, despite updates by McAfee.

Let us know your thoughts on this. Full article over at Computer World.

As reported from Computer World, computer users have been venting their frustrations over the mistake, on the official support forums, which we understand are no longer available at the moment.

Here is one of the statements in which company spokesman Joris Evers posted on the forums before it was taken offline:

“The problem occurs with the 5958 virus definition file (DAT) that was released on April 21 at 2:00 P.M. GMT+1 (6:00 A.M. Pacific).”

Judging by the response from users, this is turning out to be a crisis for McAfee, a crisis that could of been avoided had certain measures been put in place.

Have you been affected by this in any way? Give us your feedback on this.

McAfee has since admitted that its antivirus program was to blame for identifying the harmless file as a virus. They have now made another update available for download, which you should do now. Once you do a manual update the problem will be gone, that’s according to Yobie Benjamin from SFGate.

This does make you worry; we put so much trust into our antivirus software – only for it to let us down. We just hope that people did not do something stupid and try to format their computers so that they could remove the virus. This was not the first time and will not be the last that your antivirus software will act strangely.