KnoxHarrington
11-11-2008, 07:27 PM
So, apparently, the AVG anti-virus software package has found a unique way to protect your system from viruses: preventing you from booting up your system at all. (http://tech.yahoo.com/news/cnet/20081111/tc_cnet/8301100931009387583)
On Tuesday an update for AVG 8 suggested that a Windows system file is a Trojan horse, and users who delete the file form the system could leave their Windows XP systems endlessly rebooting or unable to reboot at all. The problem only affects users of AVG 8 products running the Dutch, French, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish language versions of Windows XP. AVG immediately sent out a corrected update to its customers, including those using the free editions of AVG
This isn't the only fuck-up AVG has had lately: a previous update trashed ZoneAlarm by declaring some of its files to be Trojans. Also, a tool they introduced to scan web sites for malware caused real problems for some sites.
I myself have switched to Avast. (http://www.avast.com/) It's worked great so far. But I'm wondering if AVG's woes point out a bigger problem for AV software. The scumbags who make viruses and spyware are getting really damn sneaky about it. So AV programs have to be more vigilant and try to catch things it's much harder to detect. But how do you differentiate between suspicious activity and legitimate systems processes? How do you strike the balance between being too aggressive and being too careless?
It'll be interesting to see what happens.
On Tuesday an update for AVG 8 suggested that a Windows system file is a Trojan horse, and users who delete the file form the system could leave their Windows XP systems endlessly rebooting or unable to reboot at all. The problem only affects users of AVG 8 products running the Dutch, French, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish language versions of Windows XP. AVG immediately sent out a corrected update to its customers, including those using the free editions of AVG
This isn't the only fuck-up AVG has had lately: a previous update trashed ZoneAlarm by declaring some of its files to be Trojans. Also, a tool they introduced to scan web sites for malware caused real problems for some sites.
I myself have switched to Avast. (http://www.avast.com/) It's worked great so far. But I'm wondering if AVG's woes point out a bigger problem for AV software. The scumbags who make viruses and spyware are getting really damn sneaky about it. So AV programs have to be more vigilant and try to catch things it's much harder to detect. But how do you differentiate between suspicious activity and legitimate systems processes? How do you strike the balance between being too aggressive and being too careless?
It'll be interesting to see what happens.