Haha what an irony, I am trying to raise some awareness about the words “secured” and “secure” out of concern but get a pseudo lesson in English instead. I think we are talking about contemporary English usage now, to prevent confusion or ambiguity. No matter, but let me cite some examples:
A sign that invites people to enter a cafe or eatery says, “Everyone is welcomed”. Is that right? I say the sign should be “Everyone is WELCOME”.
An old lady tells a thankful girl scout who just sold off some brownies for a good cause: “Glad I can help, and you’re most welcomed!”
A couple in love are chatting. The girl says, “When I am around you, I feel secured.” Please don’t tell me that is PROPER ENGLISH!
I humbly assert that the correct meaning of what the girl is saying is, “When I am around you, I feel secure.”
Finaly example: An army sergeant rushes up to his superior officer and announces: “The enemy territory has been secured, Sir!”
This means the officer and his men had just taken over an enemy stronghold. The word “secured” in this context means something has been taken or captured, against the will of the people initially holding the turf. This is in distinct contrast to the usual meaning of “secure”, which means, something is now safe and resistant to harm from third parties. When the word is used as an adjective in a present tense, it means “the system is secure, and will be secure.” When we say something “is secured”, do we mean it is no longer secure (barring the jarring use of “is” when it should be “has been” or “was”)?
In fact, in the form “is secured”, the word secured is now a verb in the past tense, meaning that Avast has secured the system. It is not used as an adjective, and so is incongruent if used in the past tense right after a present-tense word such as “is”. Therefore, a better way to say the same thing, but in a grammatically correct way, could be “Avast has secured your system”. Using the traditional passive voice which the erudite George Yves prefers, would be something along the line of “Your system has been secured” (which is equivocal because it doesn’t refer to Avast, but could mean that something else has secured my system". To paranoid users, it does matter WHO secured the system!)
And if I know anything about the passive voice, it is that we should avoid it (and switch to the active voice) when the the former could possibly lead to any ambiguity or doubt.
So, for the statement in question, regardless of what some people here are insisting, can we take a poll just for fun?
Which sounds grammatically and logically correct: Your system is SECURE, or Your system is SECURED?
