Steve Jung
Explorer
Virex 7.7 for Mac. I got it free through my university.
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What Anti-Virus are you Using? And an Off-topic Question
- Thread starter Rl'Halsinor
- Start date
DethStryke
Explorer
Background: Currently working in IT, specifically in security at very high levels. 12+ years in IT with a strong background in workstation tech (both stand alone, networked, corporate and home user). What that means is while I'm not the end all, be all of IT by any means, I have a significant amount of background and experience in this topic.
Many people mix Anti-Virus, Spyware Protection/Cleaning & Firewalls (intrusion). Many programs try to do it all, and for a comprehensive solution you require all of these things, but the best solution (unfortunately) involve different programs/hardware for each part. 99% of the time, if a program tries to do it all, it fails at it. Below is a fairly comprehensive plan of defense that I recommend to any person... no matter who you are, what you do with your computer, or how much you THINK you need.
Anti-Virus:
-Trend Micro is currently top of the heap by most accounts. To note: Hotmail as a service switched all of their network scanning to Trend Micro Products. No matter what you think of Hotmail, that's a HUGE corporate account and I'm sure millions of dollars in revenue alone.
-Symantec Corporate Anti-Virus is second. This is an important distinction though, as "Symantec" is the corporate version and MUCH cleaner with little bloat in terms of programming. "Norton" is the home-user version, and is bloated more than a week-dead cow. Avoid Norton products as best as you can, and if you have no choice, get ONLY the Anti-Virus stand alone. AVOID AT ALL COSTS Internet Security or other "bundle" versions... As of this typing, they are all horrible.
-Mcafee is not very good and has not been for a while. It's better than nothing, but I would highly recommend going with a TM or Norton product.
Whichever product you get, take the time to read the instructions and help files to figure out how to configure the update program to run every day. You can usually set the programs to download and update without every bothering you with a question or prompt, which takes the aggravation out of the whole problem.
Firewall:
You have two choices and only one good one: Hardware and Software versions.
Hardware = A physical little box that you connect between your internet connection and the switch / hub / single computer you're connecting. Typically the Router acts as a firewall as well.
Software = Windows Firewall, or any other program that you run on a computer itself.
The reason you want a hardware firewall is that if someone hacks into your network for whatever reason, they have only compromised the little box, and not your whole computer. Also, it is one less program chewing up resources on your computer, which is a much better reason for the average person. Additionally, they tend to work better with your programs and networked games.
And if you think no one is going to hack you, think again. It's not a matter of "they are out to get you". They don't even know who you are, nor do they care. What happens is that EVERY IP on the network (read: Internet) is getting pinged just to see if it responds. If it does, then it gets attacked and attempts to compromise the machine are made. Many times, this is done automatically by a series of programs or scripts to automate the process. I've actually had my roommates hacked this way, and they took down his whole machine (corrupted every system file and we had no choice but to reformat. He lost everything). My machine, which had these safeguards in place, had no problem.
Spyware Protection:
Helpful Browsing Tips... OR... an Ounce of Prevention is worth a Pound of Cure:
Remember that Spyware programs do not have a constant program running to watch your internet activity... if you go to infected pages or browse strange websites, you will probably still get infected with spyware in general. Just because you have a program installed or run it weekly/daily, if you get something on your machine through sloppy browsing or not paying any attention, and it damages your files, then you can't RUN the scanners to help you anyway! The damage is already done, and no subscription in the world will help you then.
KEEP Automatic updates for Windows ON! Configure the settings on it (which you can get to from Control Panel) to Automatically download and install all critical updates. These are the flaws that programs and spyware use to infect you! Keeping your machine updated every week is actually 90% of the fight. Important to note, for those of you with "borrowed" or "downloaded" versions of windows... even if you cannot use Windows Update, the Automatic Updates will still run and not get you "busted". While I never encourage piracy (support your programmers!), Microsoft is more interested in keeping viruses and spyware down than busting some guy in his basement running an illegal copy of XP.
Ad programs will get stealth installed unless you learn to look for the signs of what is generally safe and what is generally not on the internet. Don't let anything run ActiveX commands if you don't know what they are. Watch for "warning" windows that come up.... if they have a browser box "around" them, they are FAKE! Use the red X at the top right most corner to close the box.
The bottom line is that the worst (or best, depending on how you look at it) of the spammers and bad programs are made specifically to FOOL you into clicking on things. The text of what you are clicking on and the actual command it executes can and will be two different things! One way to help you realize this is to make sure you have a status bar on the bottom of the browser window (can be found under "View-->Status Bar") and simply hover the cursor over a link... it will show the "target" for clicking that on the bottom left (at the status bar). Does it match where you think it should go? Is the name of the website it is going to something different or weird? There is a huge difference between ebay.clicks.com and ebay.com. The name of the website is the name DIRECTLY BEFORE the .com / .net. If something else is between the name you expect and the .com / .net, it is FAKE!
Also, while in a perfect world we don't have viruses, you can't throw your head in the sand and pretend it doesn't exist either. It's annoying to do, but if you want to be as secure as possible, this is how you do it right.
Also, please spare me your "my OS is better than your OS" bull because the bottom-real-world-line is that if your OS was as popular and widely used, believe me, you'd get just as many viruses... Macs are finally starting to get a taste of that because they are finally getting as popular as they deserve to be. Yes, I like Macs.
The reason the OS gets viruses is that it has the market share. EVERY OS has a way to exploit it. The only reason any OS doesn't have any or many viruses is because the best makers of these programs/scripts are not going to waste their time with something that MAY effect 100 people when they can write something that potentially effects billions instead. When your other OS is in the billions, then you'll get the ugly attention.
Many people mix Anti-Virus, Spyware Protection/Cleaning & Firewalls (intrusion). Many programs try to do it all, and for a comprehensive solution you require all of these things, but the best solution (unfortunately) involve different programs/hardware for each part. 99% of the time, if a program tries to do it all, it fails at it. Below is a fairly comprehensive plan of defense that I recommend to any person... no matter who you are, what you do with your computer, or how much you THINK you need.
Anti-Virus:
-Trend Micro is currently top of the heap by most accounts. To note: Hotmail as a service switched all of their network scanning to Trend Micro Products. No matter what you think of Hotmail, that's a HUGE corporate account and I'm sure millions of dollars in revenue alone.
-Symantec Corporate Anti-Virus is second. This is an important distinction though, as "Symantec" is the corporate version and MUCH cleaner with little bloat in terms of programming. "Norton" is the home-user version, and is bloated more than a week-dead cow. Avoid Norton products as best as you can, and if you have no choice, get ONLY the Anti-Virus stand alone. AVOID AT ALL COSTS Internet Security or other "bundle" versions... As of this typing, they are all horrible.
-Mcafee is not very good and has not been for a while. It's better than nothing, but I would highly recommend going with a TM or Norton product.
Whichever product you get, take the time to read the instructions and help files to figure out how to configure the update program to run every day. You can usually set the programs to download and update without every bothering you with a question or prompt, which takes the aggravation out of the whole problem.
Firewall:
You have two choices and only one good one: Hardware and Software versions.
Hardware = A physical little box that you connect between your internet connection and the switch / hub / single computer you're connecting. Typically the Router acts as a firewall as well.
Software = Windows Firewall, or any other program that you run on a computer itself.
The reason you want a hardware firewall is that if someone hacks into your network for whatever reason, they have only compromised the little box, and not your whole computer. Also, it is one less program chewing up resources on your computer, which is a much better reason for the average person. Additionally, they tend to work better with your programs and networked games.
And if you think no one is going to hack you, think again. It's not a matter of "they are out to get you". They don't even know who you are, nor do they care. What happens is that EVERY IP on the network (read: Internet) is getting pinged just to see if it responds. If it does, then it gets attacked and attempts to compromise the machine are made. Many times, this is done automatically by a series of programs or scripts to automate the process. I've actually had my roommates hacked this way, and they took down his whole machine (corrupted every system file and we had no choice but to reformat. He lost everything). My machine, which had these safeguards in place, had no problem.
Spyware Protection:
Tarek noted a few good ones above and pointed to an important point: While all of these programs are good, and will work well, no one program will get all of threats. I personally use Ad-Aware, Spybot & the Microsoft Remover. All of these are free, and are updated constantly. The key is to use more than one, and keep it updated.
Helpful Browsing Tips... OR... an Ounce of Prevention is worth a Pound of Cure:
Remember that Spyware programs do not have a constant program running to watch your internet activity... if you go to infected pages or browse strange websites, you will probably still get infected with spyware in general. Just because you have a program installed or run it weekly/daily, if you get something on your machine through sloppy browsing or not paying any attention, and it damages your files, then you can't RUN the scanners to help you anyway! The damage is already done, and no subscription in the world will help you then.
KEEP Automatic updates for Windows ON! Configure the settings on it (which you can get to from Control Panel) to Automatically download and install all critical updates. These are the flaws that programs and spyware use to infect you! Keeping your machine updated every week is actually 90% of the fight. Important to note, for those of you with "borrowed" or "downloaded" versions of windows... even if you cannot use Windows Update, the Automatic Updates will still run and not get you "busted". While I never encourage piracy (support your programmers!), Microsoft is more interested in keeping viruses and spyware down than busting some guy in his basement running an illegal copy of XP.
Ad programs will get stealth installed unless you learn to look for the signs of what is generally safe and what is generally not on the internet. Don't let anything run ActiveX commands if you don't know what they are. Watch for "warning" windows that come up.... if they have a browser box "around" them, they are FAKE! Use the red X at the top right most corner to close the box.
The bottom line is that the worst (or best, depending on how you look at it) of the spammers and bad programs are made specifically to FOOL you into clicking on things. The text of what you are clicking on and the actual command it executes can and will be two different things! One way to help you realize this is to make sure you have a status bar on the bottom of the browser window (can be found under "View-->Status Bar") and simply hover the cursor over a link... it will show the "target" for clicking that on the bottom left (at the status bar). Does it match where you think it should go? Is the name of the website it is going to something different or weird? There is a huge difference between ebay.clicks.com and ebay.com. The name of the website is the name DIRECTLY BEFORE the .com / .net. If something else is between the name you expect and the .com / .net, it is FAKE!
Also, while in a perfect world we don't have viruses, you can't throw your head in the sand and pretend it doesn't exist either. It's annoying to do, but if you want to be as secure as possible, this is how you do it right.
Also, please spare me your "my OS is better than your OS" bull because the bottom-real-world-line is that if your OS was as popular and widely used, believe me, you'd get just as many viruses... Macs are finally starting to get a taste of that because they are finally getting as popular as they deserve to be. Yes, I like Macs.
The reason the OS gets viruses is that it has the market share. EVERY OS has a way to exploit it. The only reason any OS doesn't have any or many viruses is because the best makers of these programs/scripts are not going to waste their time with something that MAY effect 100 people when they can write something that potentially effects billions instead. When your other OS is in the billions, then you'll get the ugly attention.
Last edited:
AdamBomb
First Post
Microsoft's OneCare is relatively new to the market, but I participated in the beta program and was quite impressed: http://www.windowsonecare.com/
It's cheaper than Symantec, and they give you a license to install it on 3 machines at home, not just one like most vendors.
I'm really surprised by the number of people here having regular spyware issues. Stop running as Administrator! Create a new user account that's not in the administrators group, and use that for your day to day browsing (you can still use the runas command to launch programs that require Admin, like WoW).
I used to have to rebuild my kids'/wife's machines every few months, regardles of the antivirus/spyware software installed. No rebuilds since taking admin permissions away.
It's cheaper than Symantec, and they give you a license to install it on 3 machines at home, not just one like most vendors.
I'm really surprised by the number of people here having regular spyware issues. Stop running as Administrator! Create a new user account that's not in the administrators group, and use that for your day to day browsing (you can still use the runas command to launch programs that require Admin, like WoW).
I used to have to rebuild my kids'/wife's machines every few months, regardles of the antivirus/spyware software installed. No rebuilds since taking admin permissions away.
Thanee
First Post
The easiest way to reach a good level of security:
- get a router to connect to the internet
- set up your Windows XP standard account without administrator level permissions
- keep your Windows XP up to date
- don't open e-mail attachments, unless you know their content and that it is not harmful
- don't download all crap from the internet and run it on your machine
- don't use Internet Explorer and Outlook (instead use Firefox and Thunderbird, or Opera)
Bye
Thanee
- get a router to connect to the internet
- set up your Windows XP standard account without administrator level permissions
- keep your Windows XP up to date
- don't open e-mail attachments, unless you know their content and that it is not harmful
- don't download all crap from the internet and run it on your machine
- don't use Internet Explorer and Outlook (instead use Firefox and Thunderbird, or Opera)
Bye
Thanee
Last edited:
caudor
Adventurer
Thanee said:
Since security is what I wanted for my everyday work stuff, I ditched XP and got a Mac. I'm very happy with it too. I do run boot camp, so the above still applies with my Windows partition...which I only use for games. I use NOD32 on my Windows partition and it is great.
In my view, Windows + Security is an oxymoron.
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