Microsoft’s “Morro” anti-virus software is coming soon, according to an article in PC World by Ian Paul. A public beta should be in place before long, after months of in-house testing. If you’re using Windows 7, Windows Vista, or XP Service Pack 3, you’ll be able to take advantage of this new software. And that’s good if you’re a Microsoft anti-virus user because the company is discontinuing Windows Live OneCare as of the end of June.

Paul said that many tech journalists believe that a free anti-virus application means trouble for paid anti-virus products from other manufacturers, but he thinks that Morro will be a very basic solution and that users who are truly worried about protecting their computers from malware will want to buy something more comprehensive. He mentions the free anti-virus products offered by AVG and Panda, pointing out that they haven’t stopped people from spending more on other products.

Frank Ohlhorst, also of PC World, said that Morro will be hosted as Panda’s new cloud anti-virus software is. In fact, he said, Microsoft is calling it “real-time anti-malware” software. Unlike software you download and install on your computer itself, Morro resides on servers in the cloud, so everything that goes to and from your computer goes through Microsoft’s Internet servers first.

Ohlhorst thinks that offering the service will also affect sales of Windows 7 when it releases later this year. And, he said, Morro would force users to keep their security patches up to date. I don’t know about that. People are awfully trusting about their anti-virus software, or at least, a lot of them are.

As for me? I’m writing this post on our TechStuff test machine running Ubuntu, so my virus worries are, for the moment, nonexistent.

You can read more about malware at HowStuffWorks.com:

How Computer Viruses Work
How Zombie Computers Work
How to Remove a Computer Virus