free virus scanner

Ooh patience is a virtue

it’s risky. i don’t wanna take any chance to mistakenly activate both AV’s realtime shield

so is it good? should i have it? let say i’m infected by a new virus, would this threatfire catch it?

You are SO helping me! thx a LOT. any reply would be appreciated. maybe this sounds too dramatic, but the most desperate/horrible/sad moment in my life was when my computer infected by a virus/worm (Rontokbro). so now i’m sooooooooo paranoid.

so, should i go with Bitdefender or maybe i just go with threatfire (sounds promising)? or should i have them both?

Ganda

Surely you already know the answer: it may, it may not. Sorry but that’s the way it works, 100 per cent security doesn’t exist, even if you had so paranoid an AV that it showed dozens of false positives every time you used your computer, there might exist a virus that managed to get through. :stuck_out_tongue: Then again more than 95 per cent of infections are about old viruses.

I would watch out with threadfire, it’s only an other resident shield, not an ond-demand scanner (at least not in the free version)

but the website said it’s fine. just like CBO, additional layer of security. and interesting too, “detects zeroday threat”, “detects malicious behavior”,etc.

that’s a bitter fact :-[ cursed virus maker
but i mean, is this threatfire really that good? or if i go with bitdefender, the threatfire would be just a waste of resource?

edit :
[to XAN] hey, i’ve got this from your reply in another topic :
[i]if you are running avg-antimalware in realtime, it is possible that there could be a “conflict” from simply having too many programs running together in realtime… windows has limitations on how many programs-programs like BOC, avg-antimalware, your antivirus program, your firewall-can run in realtime…

kevin mcaleavey tried to explain it to me, one time… (kevin mcaleavey is the creator of BOClean)… windows has something like “eight nodes”, eight “slots” for programs like your av, your firewall, and your other similar programs that run in realtime… if you run over the limit, some programs will get booted out of the “slots” that they are using in order to make room for other programs to use the “slots”… then, when a program like BOClean is booted out from the “slots”, it will not function the way that it is suppose to ie it will not flag malware the way that it is supposed to… so, you need to be careful about not having too many programs like BOC and avg-amtimalware running together in realtime…
[/i]
then how many realtime apps can be activated at the same time?
these are my security apps :

  1. CAVS (realtime on, HIPS off)
  2. Spyware terminator (realtime on,HIPS on)
  3. CBO
  4. CFP 2.4
  5. Spyware blaster
  6. Comodo Verification Engine
  7. CMG
    i have two computers :same OS,same security apps (except for the ST, i use SaS on the other one).

so may i add this threatfire to my army ;D

Ganda

First in the free version, Threadfire is just let’s say a defender not a scanner. The ability to scan is only in the full version :-.

Secondly, I would watch out with the slots, but it is possible to load the things out of the slots but then there could be some problems with malfunctioning.

So, IF you choose it it’s your decision.

Hope I could help ya

Xan

i know that, i just wanna know if threatfire would be a good extra layer of security, coz i’ve read somewhere that threatfire is a kind of HIPS, a smart one. rather than blindly ask us to allow or block, it analyze the apps.

ok, threatfire out ;D
thx a lot everyone, i’ll try bitdefender.
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Ganda

hey Ganda, i think u r a lil bit paranoid… i blieve theres lil chance 4 ur comp 2 get infected.

I’m very high demanding in speed. ur security suits now seems overload 4 me. i would get rid of ST &CMG

for on demand, i suggest a2, bitdefender, clamav,avgas,avg. for avg case, u can instal w/o resident shield which wat i did.

a lil bit!? how dare you! ;D
i’m fine with this setting. the startup/reboot takes ages though, but that’s OK. i use my laptop as a user (work session) for a small LAN & it’s the only computer connected to internet,and the only removable disks allowed to be plugged in all my computers are mine,so this laptop is the source of everything, either the risks & the informations therefore i need total protection for this laptop.
thx aladinonl

ganda

edit :
this is the info about HIPS & threatfire i’ve got :
[i]the term HIPS stand for Host Intrusion Prevention System.

The problem here is different people and companies use it in different ways.

At the broadest level, If you take the term literally, Host = security software running on desktops (as opposed to on the gateway), and intrusion prevention system refers to any security measure basically.

As such arguably, pretty much every security software that runs on your machine including antivirus, firewalls count as HIPS. Though this definition isn’t that popular, this is what Gartner does. They have a 3x3 matrix defining the 9 different styles of HIPs which includes both network level protection (firewalls), application level (antiviruses) and execution level (this is what many new standalone HIPS offers) and divides each layer into 3 classes depending on whether they use whitelisting, blacklisting or others…

I think though when most people say HIPs they are excluding conventional antivirus and firewall security.

But this still means you are talking about a very very wide range of technologies available.

One technique that is very popular nowadays is commonly called “anti-executables”, “execute/process control”,
“process firewalling/filtering” , “process whitelisting” etc. This is basically what Comodo AV offers. You have to approve a process before it can start running. If something not approved wants to start, you will be prompted to allow or block it. I have already mentioned the advantages and disavanatages of this technique already.

However, some people are confused into thinking that HIPS is just this technique alone. This is FALSE (in fact some argue process filtering/whitelisting is not HIPS, but we shall ignore them// :)) There are “hips” that only do this, “hips” that don’t do this at all, and hips that do this and more.

In fact, I feel the major aspect of HIPS is that it focuses on watching change in system states and/or process behavior (there’s actually a subtle technical difference between the two, but we shall ignore that). This covers more than just noticing a process starting…

A common example is the HIPS monitoring and blocking attempts by processes to terminate other processes, or changes to registry that might be suspicious (e.g adding a registry key so a process autostarts every time you boot up).

Typical dumb HIPS or classic hips will warn you when this is happening and giving you a chance to approve the action or not. Of course you can whitelist or “trust” a process so it can be free to do whatever it wants…

e.g. System Safety Monitor.

The problem with this kind of HIPS is that it is very intrusive with a lot of prompts. Also it relies a lot on the user to make the right decision on what to allow, what to trust etc.

Then their are “smart” HIPS, behavior blockers that try to determine on its own (using complicated rule based systems etc) whether a certain process is malicious by taking into account several factors together instead of each action indidivually… (e.g. threatfire , again some people don’t consider this HIPS though…lol ).

e.g threatfire.

HIPS also includes sandboxing technology. You run suspicious programs or programs that are likely to be exploited (web browsers!) in a sandbox. The sandbox restricts programs running in them so that even if they are infected or exploited, they cannot spread to the rest of the system because they are restricted in the sandbox.

If you think about it, they are in many ways very similar to classic HIPS, except they are focused on monitoring and blocking only programs in the sandbox as opposed to monitoring ALL programs system wide. Also sandboxes typically block silently instead of prompting the user on what to do like a typical HIPS.

The main advantage as I said is that it is much easier to use than a classic hips. But because programs are given restricted rights in the sandbox (if they were not, they would break out of the sandbox), some programs will not run in them. And if the user then decides to run the program outside the sandbox…

e.g GesWall

Sandboxes can also incorporate so called “virtulization” technology… This extends the flexibility of sandboxes, by allowing sandboxed programs to make temporary changes so if they turn out to be malicious, these “fake” change can be easily removed.

e.g Sandboxie

[/i]

Lord almighty!!! Visit a lot of porn sites, do you? :smiley: ;D

If you are still looking for additional, on demand protection, here is another option.
http://www.clamwin.com/
There even is a portable version (that won’t mess up your system, in case you don’t like it)

lol, ok I see. If my laptop dare to take ages to boot/run to me? 1st thing, I’ll take out those slowing it down;2nd, do total maintenance. Stil slow? reinstal XP!

Just to stick my two pence in here… I suggest Antivir PersonalEdition Free. It does have an annoying large popup screen when you update and doesnt scan emails but it has one of THEE best detection rates and has done for awhile now. The full version is only £14 or something like that. It doesn’t affect system memory that much either. It’s brilliant as an On-Demand Scanner just disable the AV Guard. P.S. Also detects Rootkits, some spyware and other programs. Just Switch to advanced mode in the configuration and click on General. SOmewhere below that is the additional protection page and just click “Select All”. You will also want to click on Scan and click Check Rootkits / hidden objects as part of the system scan. I have a 60 gig HD and it takes about 30 minutes to do a full scan on my laptop

As I’ve been telling here many times ago, you can easily disable the annoying Avira POPUP SCREEN by simply disallowing it using almost any of them HIPS out there.

Without this nag screen, it is simply the best free AV around, no question.

cheers.

if i do that, then i don’t need CVE (verification engine). (:AGL) and my ST has ClamAV integrated.
maybe i’ll get rid of some of them (spyware blaster is one best candidate, since i have ST immunizer)
ok, thx for the replies guys,
maybe i’ll stick with CAVS2 for the next 2 months and consider switching to Avira then. ( i hope CAVS3 will come out soon, i love my CAVS)

Ganda

someone out there will always have his or her last word…for AVIRA…

pardon me :slight_smile:

;D

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