ClamAV is a long-established open-source antivirus toolkit. Its scanning engine and regularly updated signature database detect viruses, trojans, and malware across files, and it is a mainstay for scanning email attachments on Linux mail gateways as well as files on hosting servers.
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It runs as an on-demand scanner or as a daemon (clamd) for fast repeated scans, and its freshclam updater keeps signatures current. Crucially, ClamAV is the engine embedded in or paired with many higher-level hosting security tools, so even admins who never run it directly often rely on it underneath.
ClamAV is signature-based and general-purpose, so on web hosting it is usually paired with a hosting-tuned scanner (maldet) or a commercial suite that adds web-specific and behavioural detection. On its own it is the free, dependable baseline scan engine.
Category context: Server-side malware detection that scans files independent of the CMS; catches backdoors and webshells signature scanners miss. Used by hosts.
The open-source malware scanner for Linux shared hosting, built around threat data from real-world attacks.
Compare →Behavioural server-side malware detection that catches what signature scanners miss.
Compare →Comprehensive server security suite widely deployed by shared hosts.
Compare →ClamAV is a free, open-source antivirus engine maintained by Cisco Talos. It scans files and email attachments against a regularly updated signature database and runs on demand or as a daemon (clamd). It is one of the most widely used scan engines on Linux and underpins many hosting and mail security products.
ClamAV is a solid free baseline, but its general-purpose signatures miss some web-specific malware and obfuscated webshells. On hosting servers it is usually paired with a hosting-tuned scanner like Linux Malware Detect, or replaced/augmented by commercial tools such as Monarx or Imunify360 for behavioural detection.
ClamAV itself is primarily an on-demand and daemon-based scanner. Real-time, on-access scanning is achieved by pairing clamd with a file-change watcher (such as the inotify hooks in Linux Malware Detect) or the OnAccess feature, which watches directories and scans files as they change.
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