Inside AVG's virus lab (photos)

The city of Brno in the Czech Republic is a place where people go to learn. Situated about 130 miles southeast of Prague, its 11 universities host about 80,000 students, many of whom are computer engineers. So it's no surprise that while AVG's corporate offices are headquartered in Prague, its Brno that hosts the lifeblood of the company: its virus lab.

The only indication that you've arrived at the virus lab area of the office is the raft of warnings plastered to the door. Yellow caution tape and printed fliers emblazoned with the biohazard icon make the lab stand out from the rest of the conference rooms and offices.

The virus lab is restricted, although computer viruses are not a biohazard. Yet.

Virus lab analysts work in a space not much different from anybody else. AVG's sit in high-backed chairs at Dell computers running Windows 7, and except for what's being displayed on their screens, the scene again returns to one of abject normality.

AVG wouldn't let us show you screenshots of precisely how they take down a virus, but here's the threat map that their analysts see.

AVG's chief scientist, Karel Obluk. "The cyber criminals go for profit; it could equally be the whole economy or one country's profit. When there were several spearheaded, targeted attacks against Boeing infrastructure, was that industrial espionage or cyber warfare?"

Pavel Krcma heads up AVG's virus lab. "We see an incredible amount of new virus samples. Our goal is to identify how those [viruses] work, analyze the sample, and create a signature to push to users and to the cloud."

Jiri Bracek is AVG's director of security engineering. "[AVG's] Resident Shield is a fully native process, which means that it starts very, very early in the boot phase."

AVG's offices look out toward Brno's Spilberk Castle, which dates back to the 13th century.

AVG's Brno office is located in a complex that also hosts TrustPort, another computer security vendor, as well as a home appliance manufacturer. In most ways, the AVG offices could be the offices of any software company. There's a small library with muted lighting; a playroom for the children of AVG employees; and relaxation spaces designed to resemble places not often seen in the heart of central Europe, like beaches festooned with hammocks. The walls of one of the eating areas has been painted to resemble a Starbucks, complete with a massive Starbucks logo.

Here, AVG evangelist Tony Anscombe plays table hockey with CBS Interactive's Peggy Yu in the company's game room.