After my battle with sys defender, I realize I need better protection. Please tell me what you recommend for both spyware and antivirus protection.

Sounds cheesy but here's my preferred ones :

Common Sense(tm) V1.0
Experience(tm) V36.1

Honestly, I found no Software Package could ever beat above combo and essentially, they're the only ones who actually work.
For everything else, I recommend a blend mix of the following :

- Anti-Rootkit (multiple)
- Anti-Spyware (multiple)
- Anti-Virus (multiple)
- Anti-Malware (multiple)
- Anti-Trojan (multiple)

Since all existing Antivirus Programs utterly fail at doing their job right (fully cleaning and restoring a functional system) since many years now, salvation of Data and a following new Windows Installation is often the quicker way.
When typical AntiVirus software reports a problem, it's usually too late as the system is already infected and therefor compromised.

The times where a user would read "Virus found and destroyed, have a nice day" are long over; modern Antivirus suites more and more often can't even quarantine and contain the threat anymore.

To add to injury, a system left "clean" by any AntiVirus scan typically is not clean and few Antivirus programs even work - let alone excel - in all six required categories (Rootkits, Worms/Viruses, Spyware, Malware, Trojans, Exploits).

With recognition rates far below 100% accross the board, they're effectively useless except for signaling "Congratulations, your System is ready to be re-installed" (compared to what their Advertising claims it could do).

Everything else is manual hand-work, i.e. identifying the premier problem, downloading and running dedicated removal tools etc. Still the system may easily be still compromised and no trust should be given in it until a known clean backup is restored or it is reinstalled from scratch.

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Consumer Reports magazine for June says that the three separate programs "Avira Antivir Antivirus Personal" (free-av.com), Microsoft "Windows Defender" (microsoft.com/defender) and "Spamfighter Standard" (spamfighter.com/download.download.asp) is the best security combination now. Besides, it's FREE. One shortcoming, but a minor one, per "CR", is that e-mail is not scanned.

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Also, as Ned mentioned, if you know what you are doing malware isn't much of a problem, even on Winboxes.

It isn't even that. We as a society tend to look at things and say "this is exactly what it appears to be." We seem to assume that everyone is honest.

Currently, the truly successful viruses are not viruses at all. They're trojan horses. They propagate because people get an E-Mail that says "We at the FBI have seen you visiting illegal websites -- open the attachment NOW!"

... and if you actually read and pay attention, the author is clearly not a native speaker of English. I'm not being critical on non-native speakers, just saying that the FBI does not hire foreign nationals for these jobs.

E-Mail is anonymous. Anyone can impersonate anyone on the 'net.

Most people who are infected with viruses would have been protected if they'd just asked "what if...."

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• AV is Avira Anti Vir Premium
  
• Anti Malware is Spybot Search and Destroy & Spyware Blaster
  
• also common sense and a healthy dose of paranoia
  

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Old enough to know better(but)still young enough not to care

I currently pay for Eset's NOD32 antivirus. Norton lost me as a customer with a totally fouled up renewal process (and sealed the loss with an even more fouled up uninstall).

I currently run COMODO firewall (free version). After many years of running ZoneAlarm free version, I had two serious loss-of-internet service issues within a few months (one or both were associated with Windows XP updates from Microsoft).

I also regard my router as something of a partial hardware firewall, as the IP's of my hosts don't appear directly on the Internet, which protects them from some of the random address generating class of attacks.

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When the virus and malware problems ramped up in the days when I used WinXP, I found it easier to discover Linux than to work through the anti-virus silliness. Various application names were different but the general layout and features were similar enough as to be no problem. Some aspects were much cleaner and neater and there was none of the IN YER FACE MATE THIS IS THE OPERATING SYSTEM DEMANDING YOUR FULL ATTENTION stupidity. A complete absence of 'security threat' pop-ups was a beautiful piece of tranquillity.

It was very good to be able to just try two or three distros and stay with the one I liked. A big plus was that of having multiple desktops as "normal" instead of a buggy "power" add-on as with Windows at that time.

s@h-classic even ran faster under WINE on the Linux than it did on the native WinXP!

And no more anti-virus silliness.

Since then, I'm left wondering why people put up with such an insecure and time-wasting mess when computers should just work, simply. No need to waste time jumping hoops!


Your opinions may vary ;-)

Happy (virus free) crunchin',
Martin

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See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)

When the virus and malware problems ramped up in the days when I used WinXP, I found it easier to discover Linux than to work through the anti-virus silliness. Various application names were different but the general layout and features were similar enough as to be no problem. Some aspects were much cleaner and neater and there was none of the IN YER FACE MATE THIS IS THE OPERATING SYSTEM DEMANDING YOUR FULL ATTENTION stupidity. A complete absence of 'security threat' pop-ups was a beautiful piece of tranquillity.

It was very good to be able to just try two or three distros and stay with the one I liked. A big plus was that of having multiple desktops as "normal" instead of a buggy "power" add-on as with Windows at that time.

s@h-classic even ran faster under WINE on the Linux than it did on the native WinXP!

And no more anti-virus silliness.

Since then, I'm left wondering why people put up with such an insecure and time-wasting mess when computers should just work, simply. No need to waste time jumping hoops!


Your opinions may vary ;-)

Happy (virus free) crunchin',
Martin

just an FYI http://www.clamav.net/
linux/unix AV there is still a need for a linux AV not much of a need but a need. and the thread wasnt looking for alternatives to WIndows it was looking for the best AV/antimalware products

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

Guess it can happen to anyone... Computer virus strikes U.S. Marshals, FBI...http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30882735/

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PROUD MEMBER OF Team Starfire World BOINC

they had 'protection' but it wasn't updated in 3 years.
Another common problem. People install something and don't do updates.
Or they do not know their software.
They get a message and just believe it and click away.

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Mike Bader
BOINC V7.16.5
http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/team_join_form.php?id=5 - Join Our International Team
[img]http://boinc.mundayweb.com/one/stats.php?

Your opinions may vary ;-)

Martin,

I'm sorely tempted to buy you a copy of "The Art of Deception" by Kevin Mitnick.

That (and "Takedown" by Tsutomu Shimomura) are must-read for anyone doing computer security.

Kevin Mitnick is the most notorious hacker of all time. He's the only person I've ever heard of that hacked his way out of prison.

As it turns out, he really isn't much of a technologist. Instead, he attacked the most vulnerable link in the system, and it's the one component that is truly "common" between *nix and Windows.

His gifts are in social engineering, not technology. He targets the users, not the systems.

-- Ned

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Local IT urban legend: One guy tried to install a Win XP, while he had his computer directly connected to the dormitory's LAN. 15 minutes later he had an infected comp. :D So, unplug unless you had firewall.

Its not urban legend, I had seen it with my eyes maybe 3-4 years ago. Forgot to unplug the LAN, installed Win XP (from the Dell provided installation disk), and while installing win updates, found that it is already infected with a strange process. OK, since my pc is on a new hdd, just boil some water, drink a cup of tea, then unplug the lan cable, reboot into DOS (yeah, still had a floppy then) and killed the whole partition. And run antivirus on my trusty bootdisk on another pc before attempting another install.

Yeah, only if one is dumb enough to not disable NBT before going online to get the first round of updates if you have an original XP install disk, and/or don't have a router or firewall appliance.

Come to think of it, the very first thing I do on any Windows reinstall before connecting the network cable is disable NBT on all network interfaces. If the machine has no need for Windows File and Print Sharing it stays disabled.

Alinator

Your opinions may vary ;-)

Martin,

I'm sorely tempted to buy you a copy of "The Art of Deception" by Kevin Mitnick.

That (and "Takedown" by Tsutomu Shimomura) are must-read for anyone doing computer security.

Kevin Mitnick is the most notorious hacker of all time. He's the only person I've ever heard of that hacked his way out of prison.

As it turns out, he really isn't much of a technologist. Instead, he attacked the most vulnerable link in the system, and it's the one component that is truly "common" between *nix and Windows.

His gifts are in social engineering, not technology. He targets the users, not the systems.

-- Ned

Agreed, but that wasn't the most humorous part of the post.

Work simply!!??

I don't think that's ever been in the nix lexicon. Powerful, yes... Simple, No. ;-)

Alinator

I can easily beat that, personal record witnessed on someone installing WinXP (directly connected to the Internet) getting infected was 3 Seconds after System startup.

Security and Windows just doesn't mix, never meant to.

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I reinstalled XP for a friend, he had dial up, and like a moron, I am behind a router so theres a little protection, but he had dial up, so I connected to get updates, and a few seconds after it got done dialing, the PC rebooted, I was like WTF?!??!!

and sure enough, it crawled....heh

Lesson learned....

I use NOD32 security suite for kids PC, and just NOD32 virri scanner for mine....

No worries...heh

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I think the best thing I ever did was to get a router. It cut down the kids on my lawn to almost nothing.

I have used some of the free anti viruses mentioned and they worked fine,

I've got Kaspersky Internet Security running now and it seems to play nice with BOINC. It also comes with multiple licenses.

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I've used AVG free for about a year now and have had no problems. It's biggest footprint is it puts a "no virus found in incoming message" tag on all of my incoming e-mails". Plus a once a week sweep with spybot search and destroy.

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I personally use Bitdefender. This website should be of some help.
______________

This website should be of some help.

I suggest not to use commercial sites that live from advertising. I own an advertising agency and it works that way: if you advertise at us we'll promote your product.
Use some independant sites like

• av-comparatives.org
  
• av-test.org
  

especially these two are dedicated only to antivirus testing

Your opinions may vary ;-)

Martin,

I'm sorely tempted to buy you a copy of "The Art of Deception" by Kevin Mitnick.

That (and "Takedown" by Tsutomu Shimomura) are must-read for anyone doing computer security.

Kevin Mitnick is the most notorious hacker of all time. He's the only person I've ever heard of that hacked his way out of prison.

As it turns out, he really isn't much of a technologist. Instead, he attacked the most vulnerable link in the system, and it's the one component that is truly "common" between *nix and Windows.

His gifts are in social engineering, not technology. He targets the users, not the systems.

-- Ned

Agreed, but that wasn't the most humorous part of the post.

Work simply!!??

I don't think that's ever been in the nix lexicon. Powerful, yes... Simple, No. ;-)

Alinator

Several decades ago, I used a text editor called TECO.

The interface is best described as baroque. Commands in TECO looked like line noise. All of the commands were single letters, and "Y" meant read file ("yank" the file into the buffer).

... and yet, it was powerful and "simple" once you learned it.

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... Commands in TECO looked like line noise. All of the commands were single letters, and "Y" meant read file ("yank" the file into the buffer).

... and yet, it was powerful and "simple" once you learned it.

Similarly so for EMACS and Vi/Vim. You can navigate the text and functions faster than moving your fingers from the keyboard to the mouse.

But then... That's just like the "shortcut" keys or "power features" you get on the GUI editors...


It all depends on what sort of interface you prefer for what you are doing, and whether or not you have a choice. I moved from EMACS to Vim to avoid twisted fingers! On one extended occasion for a certain task, I've also edited LaTeX using MSWord!! (The LaTeX typesetting proved to be awesome and way beyond anything that might be hoped for from the MSWord at the time or likely now.)

LaTeX is in itself a very good example for comparing 'commandline' vs 'WYSIWIG' and for how best to work depending on the task at hand. Some GUIs are just a recipe for RSI! But then, some commandline environments require far to much abstract thought to follow what is happening. I can well see why the more 'intuitive' type people view the commandline as "obscure" and "alien". (Sorry for the bad multiple puns there... :-p )

But this is veering off for another thread...

Regards,
Martin

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See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)