Sunday, July 13, 2008

Antivirus industry: Then & Now

Image Copyright: IKARUS Security Software GmbH.

Source:- Zlob

Antivirus 2008 Pro

Reading the title, one gets the impression that its about the latest antivirus or something. Well, its actually a spyware (for noobs: its a virus, so install a firewall soon).

After completing my industrial training (didn't I made a post for that ??) , most of my time is spent in front of my PC. I'm the guy short on RAM, so, no firewalls or antivirus installed.

This sunday my PC got infected with Antivirus 2008 Pro, and it infected my explorer.exe, first 2 drives were gone(unless manually typed C: in address bar), taskmgr was gone, start-menu was gone too, a privacy protection-named page got active on my desktop, all in all got infected by a spyware/malware, so, obviously first thing I did was googled it, and found some tools which wasted most of my sunday (don't use "spyware doctor", it sux, no let me rephrase it, it REALLY SUX...)

then, I again googled the same thing again and saw a search result of answers.yahoo.com, where 1 reply was hving the link of a thread on cnet forums, i visited there and tried SmitFraudFix, it worked only in safe mode.

Now, I've installed a ZoneAlarm Pro firewall.

Concluding, install atleast a firewall even if you're not an antivirus-guy, there is a nice firewall freeware "Comodo Firewall Pro"
otherwise, use this tool if your PC gets infected - "SmitFraudFix" , its freeware and standalone application.


Download link for SmitFraudFix (thanx SIRI) :-
http://siri.geekstogo.com/SmitfraudFix.php

Download link for Comodo Firewall Pro :-
http://www.personalfirewall.comodo.com/download_firewall.html

Don't be stupid, install a firewall...