Doubling down on this, I do the same and have had maybe 1 instance where Defender didn't catch something in what seems like the last 10 years I've used it almost exclusively for 'virus' protection.
More often then not you'll find some "helpful" changes to your browsing experience, and/or "team.bitcoinz" running at 100% cpu, or your files are encrypted.
Most viruses aren't stealthy, although a few are, and you're right, those you'll have a hard time with if they're well hidden and undetected.
IMO - Something like Glasswire + Windows Defender is pretty robust. Nearly any virus will need network connectivity after all.
Yes? But most viruses don't lay dormant waiting for you to type in a bank account password and quietly send it off (some do for sure).
A lot of viruses sell "installs" - where other less moral software devs will pay per installation of their software. Or they spam ads across your entire computer etc. Or they encrypt your files and demand a ransom. None of these things are quiet or stealthy - anybody with decent IT experience will notice them pretty fast.
It's kinda like regular crime. Sure every once in a while there's a thief that quietly lockpicks his way into somebodies home after spying on them and knowing they've left on vacation, leaving little evidence they took anything at all. Most of the time somebody just does a smash-and-grab, quick and dirty.
I keep running into the same phenomenon everywhere; everyone thinks they know whether they've been infected or not. I suppose everyone is a malware expert, so there's no need to share the data with anyone. I'm quite out of the loop here.
> I keep running into the same phenomenon everywhere; everyone thinks they know whether they've been infected or not.
I mean I get what you're saying. My point is that most viruses aren't trying to be hidden, so they're rather obvious. Of course there's a chance they try to be sneaky, and you're right you have no way of knowing if those are present and well hidden.
But anti-virus only does so much, if you're past Windows Defender you're past a bunch of other tools too. A lot of anti-malware software is very generic, and relies on some rather dumb techniques.
Don't recall what specifically I was doing at the time but was maybe 7 or 8 years ago my computer got a virus and took me close to a week to fully gain control of my machine again. Only time I got actual warnings from Defender about something it couldn't erase.