Windows 8 will ship with built-in antivirus protection

Here’s good news for consumers but bad news for the antivirus industry - Microsoft will be shipping antivirus protection as standard with the Windows 8 operating system.

That’s right. Microsoft is adding features from its Security Essentials program, which is currently available as a separate download for Windows users, to the Windows Defender package already built into Windows. This means that Windows 8 users will get out-of-the-box protection against malware, along with firewall and parental controls from within Windows without requiring users hunt down a separate download or buy new software.

But wait, there’s more! Another new security feature being baked into Windows 8 is protection from bootable USB drives that are infected with malware.