You'll find a recommendation to install software to detect and clean up malware in almost any security guide. Although a single product isn't sufficient to defend against all modern security threats, the general recommendation persists because the technology remains effective in blocking categories of known threats and cleaning up malware infections if they find their way onto your computer. Since resolving a malware problem is a little bit different each time, we're committed to working with our partners to give people on Facebook the help they need in keeping their information secure.

Our goal is to make it easier for people to find and use the right technology to better protect their devices. We've worked with F-Secure and Trend Micro to incorporate free anti-malware software downloads directly into our existing abuse detection and prevention systems. These are the same systems that help us block malicious links and bad sites from among the trillions of clicks that take place every day on Facebook.

Free anti-malware downloads from F-Secure and Trend Micro

Here's how it will work when we detect that a device interacting with Facebook is behaving in a suspicious way that we believe is related to a malware infection:

• When logging in from the infected device, you'll see a notification screen about a malware infection, along with a recommendation to use F-Secure's malware scanning and cleanup technology or HouseCall from Trend Micro. Each product contains distinct malware signatures and is suited to different kinds of threats, so we recommend trying the suggested product even if you already have an anti-virus or similar program running on your machine. You won't have to worry about maintenance; these versions are up-to-date and will remove themselves once they're done running.
• You can choose to skip the malware removal process and decline to download the recommended scanner. If you skip removing the malware, you may be prompted again later.
• You'll download and run the scanner, during which time you can continue to use Facebook and other services. When the scan is complete, you'll receive a notification through Facebook and you'll be able to review the results of the scan. 

We expect to offer additional software options in the future.

To learn more about products from F-Secure, please visit www.f-secure.com. You can read about how Trend Micro protects against online threats at www.trendmicro.com.

Chetan Gowda is a Software Engineer on the Site Integrity team.