Finnish security vendor F-Secure has released the 2012 editions of its flagship antivirus package and security suite.

As updates go, it’s relatively minor, with most of the changes being beneath the surface. Still, there are some worthwhile improvements on offer.

F-Secure say they’ve upgraded the behaviour monitoring, scanning performance and malware removal capabilities in this edition, for instance.

Improved automation in the handling of malware samples means F-Secure’s cloud-based protection network can offer an even faster response to the latest security threats.

And F-Secure’s Internet Security 2012 now allows you to set custom browsing protection settings for every user account on your PC, a very flexible and convenient approach.

Not every change is quite as successful. The “Launch pad”, for example, is a small toolbar or gadget-type application with buttons to access your local computer security options, online settings or the F-Secure site. This is supposed to make the packages easier to use, apparently, although perhaps a better way to achieve that aim might be not to split core functionality across multiple interfaces in the first place.

That aside, though, F-Secure offer a capable antivirus engine which generally does well in independent testing (in August AV-Comparatives awarded the previous edition their highest Advanced+ rating). The 2012 edition offers further meaningful improvements in all the main areas, and while there may not be enough features here to win over many new converts, if you’re an F-Secure fan then you should definitely give its Antivirus 2012 or Internet Security 2012 builds a try.