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Antivirus

Antivirus software often foxed by malicious URLs

by Shanmuga

"Many malicious URLs are now invisible to URL filters and antivirus software alike, a web security company has found after conducting its own tests.

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Microsoft Security Essentials – Real-time protection, Alert levels and Actions

by Shanmuga

This is Part Three of our series on Microsoft Security Essentials, earlier parts dealt with How to download, Install and Update MSE in Part one and How to Set-up Microsoft Security Essentials in Part two. This final part explains the real-time protection, various levels of alert and the actions recommended by Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE)

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Antivirus Uninstallers – Remove security software cleanly

by Shanmuga

Computer security software like anti-virus and firewall programs are notorious for leaving behind file and registry traces when uninstalled. I have found that using the in-built uninstaller via Start > Control Panel > Add\Remove Programs first and then followed by the official clean-up tool released by the respective vendor is quite effective in removing the

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Rogue antivirus: a growing problem

by Shanmuga

"Rogue antivirus programs pretend to detect malicious programs on a user’s computer and then offer to “treat” them for a fee. Needless to say, the money ends up in a cybercriminal’s pocket. The chances of being infected by this type of malware have increased dramatically over the last few years. The article examines how rogue

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Internet Antivirus Pro Analysis and Removal

by Shanmuga

Belonging to the family of Personal Antivirus, General Antivirus etc., this scareware first appeared on the scene in the later half of the year 2008 and is still going strong. It is identified by various antivirus engines as Adware.InternetAntivirusPro, RogueAntiSpyware.InternetAntivirus, Win32.InternetAntivirusPro.m, Win32.Banker and Win-Trojan/Fakealert. As a typical scareware it displays misleading alerts about non-existent infections

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Anti-virus Rescue CD/DVDs

by Shanmuga

An antimalware rescue cd or dvd is essentially a portable operating system along with a portable version of an anti-malware software application. They run completely from the CD/DVD media and allows access to your computer’s operating system and hard disks. This makes it possible to use them to scan the system for malware infections, recover

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Is Antivirus Dead?

by Shanmuga

"…antivirus programs have been getting less effective as new viruses are more frequent and existing viruses mutate faster. Yes, antivirus companies are forever playing catch-up, trying to create signatures for new viruses. Yes, signature-based antivirus software won’t protect you when a virus is new, before the signature is added to the detection program. Antivirus is

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Free Kaspersky Virus Removal Software

by Shanmuga

Not many would know that Kaspersky Labs the publishers of the Kaspersky antivirus provides an excellent freeware tool for removing all kinds of Malware. Kaspersky Virus Removal Tool is a fully functional, on-demand and frequently updated utility that can detect and remove viruses, Trojans, worms, Spyware, Adware and rootkits from a PC. This tool is

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Find and Remove Zeus (Zbot) Banking Trojan

by Shanmuga

According to Trusteer a security company, “Zeus is the #1 botnet, with 3.6 million PCs infected in the US alone (i.e. approximately 1% of the PCs in the US)…Zeus is a financial malware. It infects consumer PCs, waits for them to log onto a list of targeted banks and financial institutions, and then steals their

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New BIOS attack renders antivirus useless

by Shanmuga

"A new form of attack that installs a rootkit directly onto a computer’s BIOS system would render antivirus software useless researchers have warned. Alfredo Ortego and Anibal Sacco of Core Security Technologies explained that the attack was possible against almost all types of commonly used BIOS systems in use today.

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AVG antivirus update accidentally cripples Windows XP PCs

by Shanmuga

"According to messages on AVG’s support forums and its own support site, an update released late Saturday for the company’s security software fingered the "user32.dll" file as a Trojan horse. As per the program’s settings, the AVG software, including the newest version 8.0 and its predecessor 7.5, shut the .dll away in quarantine. The result:

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Spyware then and now

by Shanmuga

Google brought back its oldest available index from the year 2001 on the occasion of its 10th birthday. It brought back certain nostalgic memories…I was into my second PC, a Compaq. That was the year I first got the internet connection at home through a 56kbps dial-up connection and that was the year I truly

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Growth of Anti-Botnet Startups Points to AV Deficiencies

by Shanmuga

"A slew of software companies new and old are shipping tools aimed at slowing the botnet epidemic, but the emergence of this new market is seen by some analysts as an indictment of the existing anti-malware industry. With reliable statistics showing a dramatic rise in botnet-related computer infections, venture capitalists are now pouring money into

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Antivirus Inventor: Security Departments Are Wasting Their Time

by Shanmuga

"Peter Tippett thinks it’s time for security professionals to wake up and stop wasting their energy. In a presentation here yesterday, Tippett — who is vice president of risk intelligence for Verizon Business, chief scientist at ICSA Labs, and the inventor of the program that became Norton AntiVirus — said that about one third of

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Antivirus firms, testers form standards group

by Shanmuga

"Nearly two dozen companies announced on Monday the creation of an organization to set best practices and standards for the evaluation of antivirus software. As previously reported by SecurityFocus, more than 40 researchers met in Bilbao, Spain, last month to finalize the details of the group, dubbed the Anti-Malware Testing Standard Organization (AMTSO).

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Malware: Malware Evolving Too Fast for Antivirus Apps

by Shanmuga

"If you think that the latest security suites afford complete protection against malware attacks, think again. Today’s for-profit malware pushers use dedicated test labs and other increasingly professional techniques to improve their chances of infecting your computer. And the techniques they employ to outpace security software makers appear to be working.

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Malware: How Antivirus Programs (Don’t) Work

by Shanmuga

"For over 25 years, the computer community has been dealing with malicious software. These little pieces of malware started as minor pranks and theoretical explorations into subverting security controls, but soon developed into more malicious programs that have left a significant impact on the computing community. Over the last decade we have seen viruses/Trojans/worms wreck

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Vulnerabilities: Antivirus software as a malware gateway

by Shanmuga

"Critical vulnerabilities have been found this year in virtually all antivirus products. But the danger of protective software, of all things, mutating into a gateway for pests is still largely underestimated. Antivirus software is not only the most important protection against pests arriving from the Internet, it could also be one of the most dangerous

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