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Thread: Virus/Spyware Information

  1. #1

    Virus/Spyware Information

    I have been at AO not as long as some, but longer than others and I continually see a lot of posts about either someone being infected with a virus, or spyware running rampant on their box. We need to fix this. There is no reason to have a million posts that in general have the same basic replies so I am going to address this right now even though I am by no means an expert, but this should be useful for people who are new, or don't use the search function.
    [Rant]
    JUST BECAUSE IT'S ON YOUR BOX DOES NOT MEAN SOMEONE ELSE HASN'T GOT IT! THERE IS NO REASON TO MAKE A NEW THREAD FOR A VIRUS ON YOUR MACHINE!
    [/Rant]

    That said and done here is a general formula (intended for home type users being that I have no experience dealing with large networks).

    1) Get some anti-virus software.
    2) Get ad-removal software.
    3) Get a firewall (software in addition to the one that should be part of your router).
    4) Update then run all of the products you have just gotten.

    Now for a small list of software for this "gargantuan" task..

    Anti-Virus Software
    +Norton Anti-Virus [http://www.norton.com/] [COMMERCIAL]
    +McAfee [http://us.mcafee.com/] [COMMERCIAL]
    +AVG [www.grisoft.com/] [FREE]
    +avast! [www.avast.com/] [FREE]

    Spyware Removal and Defense
    +Spybot-S&D [http://www.safer-networking.org/] [FREE]
    +Ad-aware [www.lavasoftusa.com/] [FREE/COMMERCIAL]
    +Spy Sweeper [http://www.webroot.com/wb/products/spysweeper/index.php] [COMMERCIAL]

    Firewalls
    +Sygate [http://soho.sygate.com/products/spf_standard.htm] [FREE/COMMERCIAL]
    +Zone Alarm [www.zonelabs.com/] [FREE/COMMERCIAL]
    +Blackice [www.networkice.com] [COMMERCIAL]
    +Outpost [www.agnitum.com/products/outpost/] [FREE/COMMERCIAL]

    Other links as provided by ComputerNerd
    -Cheers-

  2. #2
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Apr 2004
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    1,024
    Nice post PM8228, looks good! Why no Norton Internet Security under firewalls though?

  3. #3
    Why no Norton Internet Security under firewalls though?
    They have a suite for that I think. I guess I just forgot, but NAV is there for AV .

    -Cheers-

  4. #4
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Apr 2004
    Posts
    1,024
    Yea, NIS comes with NAV and the NIS firewall. It's a good suite for home users and your neighbors etc. because they usually think what you pay is what you get for, which isn't always true (proved by sygate and AVG) so they trust it and it works great.

  5. #5
    Cool. I may actually have the 2004 professional or what have you. As for NIS, it's what I use for windows. I was wondering if some of the more experienced people here knew of good linux FW's..

    -Cheers-

  6. #6
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Apr 2004
    Posts
    1,024
    I have always heard good things about IPTables... I have also heard of IPCop... That's about all I have really heard of and I haven't played around much with any of them... I can't find a modem driver for my modem, so I can't get on the net from my FreeBSD partition...

  7. #7
    AO's MMA Fanatic! Computernerd22's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2003
    Location
    Miami, FL
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    795
    Nice thread PM8228. Freeware programs like SpywareBlaster and SpywareGuard can prevent spyware from being installed on your computer. You can find them here at

    Spyware Blaster

    www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareblaster.html

    Spyware guard

    www.wilderssecurity.net/spywareguard.html

    I also found this site very useful aswell
    http://securityresponse.symantec.com...er/search.html

    The Symantec Security Response online database contains information on over 60,000 Internet security-related threats. You may search by entering your query into the box below or by clicking on the alphabetical listings for viruses at the bottom of this page.
    Online Free AntiVirus Scans

    www.trendmicro.com
    www.pandasoftware.com
    www.ravantivirus.com
    http://adwarecops.com/
    http://www.stop-sign.com/

    hope this helps, Computerdnerd22

  8. #8
    Thanks ComputerNerd, I added those sites you listed.

    -Cheers-

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