Malware still malingering for up-to-date anti-virus users Having anti-virus software and keeping it up to date is no longer enough to keep from geting infected by malware. A study by Panda Security revealed that 72 per cent of firms with up-to-date security software still had malware on their networks. The data - based on a sample of 1.5m users last year - also revealed that 23 per …
72% of corps VS 23% of home lusers? I've gotta say that comes as somewhat of a surprise. I guess the difference is that once the malware gets past the corporate firewall it has free reign over all the hosts on the LAN, but it it is still surprising.
I would have guessed that the stats would have been the other way around actually.
The only thing we can be certain about is that 100% of the infected PC's will be running Windows of some form or another.
"The only thing we can be certain about is that 100% of the infected PC's will be running Windows of some form or another."
now now, calm down dear, no need for all those extra words..try this:
"The only thing we can be certain about is that 99% of the PC's will be running Windows of some form or another."
Seems I run my computer too securely for Panda's scanner to work. Their little ActiveX control won't load on my PC because I don't run with admin access when I surf. :-)
Expect a mass group of malware copycats to abuse Panda's approach any time, soon. Oh wait... the WinAntiVirus jokers already do this. Never mind.
Panda Software should be chastised for encouraging admin access while surfing the Internet, just to accomodate their little contest.
They should at least get some credit for a Thank-You Captain Obvious moment. Anti-virus scanners were ineffective nineteen years ago! I like to call it, "Melissa's Ultimate Lesson."
So I thought I'd give it a go on my home PC.
I run Avast! there (the only free x64 windows virus scanner when I went to Vista x64).
And guess what - Avast won't let me install Panda's online scanner (finds Win32.CTX).
Is Panda buggered or is Avast! behing creative with customer retention? Not that I'm complaining, mind: it's still free.
"It is advisable to run a complete scan with ActiveScan 2.0 from time to time. This will minimize the chances of infection."
How on Earth will running an online scan minimize the chances of infection?!?! I would have thought that it would *detect* any infections on a machine, but at the end of the day only an anti-virus program installed on a computer is capable of minimizing the probability of said machine becoming infected.
I signed up and ran the scan. About 12% into the scan, it announces that I've got active infections running on my computer. So I wait and let it finish scanning, and the "Active Infections" are tracking cookies placed on my system while I was using Internet Exploder to download Firefox. And it says "We have detected that the AVG 7.5.519 protection on your PC is enabled and up-to-date.
You need better protection for your PC. With Panda solutions you will be protected against more than 3 million viruses, spyware and other threats."
I smell nothing more than marketing BS. @$$holes.
It was coincidental that I happened to have just installed a fresh copy of Vista on a new pc so I thought I'd run Panda just out of interest. After allowing the couple of ActiveX programs and getting a load of 'requires access' warnings from Kaspersky, an hour or so later it finds 93 'infected' files. The final summary said there were 21 (no idea why the difference). Clicking on 'more info' the next page said 'Ooops, there's been an error, we're working on it' & I have to go back to the 'start scan' screen. If there's any better recommendation to steer well clear of Panda then this is it!
The people relying on online scans are probably only running it once a week or so. It may remove malware, but does nothing to prevent you from getting it. I'd like to see what percentage of users of AVG or Kaspersky antivirus get infected, and for how long before it's removed.
i, of course like everyone else intelligent enough to subscribe to the register have very good online practices about website viewing and attachment downloading, im running the scan and almost straight away it says i have 127 virus'... its tempting to do a full system wipe and reinstall xp then jun the scan...bet it would still say 127 or its picking up things using its heuristics which actually i want to have and need unhappy face incase i have 127 virus' and all the lectures i give my friends actually have very little credibility now
Ah, another one of those articles based around 'surveys' released by companies providing information for "the greater good" that coincidentally also demonstrate just how useful their new product is. They're usually a bit more amusing than this, though, running along the lines of "95% of male internet users tug their willies whilst browsing pr0n' says new survey released by Maxi-absorbent Tissues".
If this article was a peice of software it would be classified Ad-ware. I wouldn't mind if this was followed up by a nice set of El Reg field tests to show that Panda was actually providing a useful service - then it could come in as a proper software review rather than as a peice of filler.
On Firefox the active X installer HUNG.
Closed, reopened, all went ok this time.
It starts an update ... error updating, retry .. error updating. close Firefox, re open, tryi again, error updating, what a load of crap!
Open IE instead, oh look active x installed ok, oooh the update page gies me an eror to BUT this time it also shows hat it is trying to install ANOTHER active X .. never asked me for that 1 in Firefox! Accepted it and eh voila scan is running.
So conclusion for panda ... they want you to run it on the very very secure IE as it doesn't seem to like the incredibly well know insecure firefox (sarcasm!).
My verdict? If panda can't get something as simple as this to run on anything other than IE which people worried about security DON'T use then how can they spout all this about security on peoples pc's? It's there bad programming that forced me to use a less secure browser!! Good to have confirmation that I made the correct decision not to use panda software all these years :D
I tried Panda back in 2005 and took it off within a week due to weird crashes and hangs. Since then, Panda have attempted to send me email several times every month. Sometime in sustained bursts of 20+ per day - they are all refused with a 550 by my mailserver. The sending ISP's change regularly so I'm assuming they fall foul of the T&C's concerning spamming and move on to another ISP.
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