A new AV service

[nihil]

This is a new one on me

7-day a week monitoring center: Are you infected? Confused about what to do with a tainted computer? Just too new at computing to know what your next step should be? Stop-Sign can automatically communicate the specific problems on your computer directly to our monitoring center, so all you have to do is click a button. Once our technicians receive the information, they will construct a personalized solution to solve the problem. We are also available to do "virtual housecalls" in case you need someone to come to your computer to fix it. With the world's leading computer protection service, you won't have to worry anymore.

The link to their website is here:

http://www.stop-sign.com/se/se046b.p...pin&ver=online

I don't know of anyone else who provides that sort of service?

[Undertaker02]

Hmm I dont think I would touch this one with a barge pole..

Look who it is from

eAcceleration one of the big pigs in Parasite software..

had a battle removing it from a friends PC a year ago..

dont touch.. warning will robinson and all that

[nihil]

Hmmmmmmmmm,

There seem to be mixed emotions out there, I guess the leopard is trying to change its spots?

The main reason I posted it was the concept of 7 day and remote support. I know that several people here either earn or supplement their incomes to some extent by cleaning up and recovering malware hit systems.

If the process gets dumbed down sufficiently then that will have a potential impact on the marketplace? (hell, I might have to buy my own beer)

Supposing Norton, McAfee, Panda, PC-Cillin, Kaspersky and the others start offering a similar service?

You can bet that they would outsource it to somewhere like India?

I guess that over here it would cost around £30 ($55US) to get a machine cleaned, and maybe double that if you want it collected and returned. You could sell this service as an "insurance policy", run it from India and make a handsome profit?

The only positive thing that I can see from such a development is the AV boys would beef up their products to cut the helpdesk costs?

Pure speculation right now, but I thought it worth a mention................probably just my paranoia?

[rapier57]

I have to agree with Undertaker02 on this one, Nihil. This stuff is worse than the diseases they claim to cure. One of our students, some time ago, started downloading and installing these on some of our student machines. We had to completely re-image to get the junk out. Fully hosed the network connections, flooded the bandwidth, and who knows what other damage was being done. Nasty stuff. Banned on my network!

[nihil]

Hi Rapier~

Where have you bin hiding?

Sure, I was not recommending the company or their products.................I was intrigued by the extension of service they purport to offer.

My point for discussion is what would the impact on the industry be if some of the big boys (who can cut proper code) join in?

Cheers

[rapier57]

Some of them actually do something similar to this. Symantec has a site open to anyone for scanning and for information. AVG's site is pretty good. And, whoever now owns McAfee probably inherited that site.

If they actually put up all-inclusive, useful tools, they would be a huge and valuable service. Educating the average user is the key.

I think the key would be getting computer makers, vendors and such to actually point, direct, or drag new users kicking and screaming to these services. Left on their own, new users will find sites like the above and contribute to the problem, or cause headaches for a sys admin

I've been kinda in and out lately. Very busy, personally and at work.