Symantec Exec Warns Against Relying On Free Antivirus 459
thefickler writes "Clearly, the rise of free antivirus is starting to worry Symantec, with one of their top executives warning consumers not to rely on free antivirus software (including Microsoft's Security Essentials). 'If you are only relying on free antivirus to offer you protection in this modern age, you are not getting the protection you need to be able to stay clean and have a reasonable chance of avoiding identity theft,' said David Hall, a Product Manager for Symantec. According to Hall, there is a widening gap between people's understanding of what protection they need and the threats they're actually facing."
McAfee false-positive glitch fells PCs worldwide (Score:5, Informative)
Re:McAfee false-positive glitch fells PCs worldwid (Score:4, Funny)
Symantec products are apparently the same. (Score:5, Informative)
Or, Multiple serious problems with symantec endpoint 11 - Please help [symantec.com].
Or, Norton Internet Security 2009 has caused me problems [norton.com]. (Norton.com is owned by Symantec [symantecstore.com], of course.)
You know there are problems when Symantec provides a Removal Tool [norton.com].
Re:Symantec products are apparently the same. (Score:5, Informative)
Symantec provided a removal tool because their idiot programmers couldn't be assed to write a proper uninstaller for their shite product.
Re:Symantec products are apparently the same. (Score:5, Insightful)
Malware? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Symantec products are apparently the same. (Score:5, Interesting)
You don't want the uninstaller resident, that's a point of weakness for attack.
How do you know you need anti-virus? (Score:4, Insightful)
Rather than advocating a specific anti-virus product, I feel that the question is how do you know you need anti-virus. I would recommend choosing two anti-virus product and keep them up to date for the shortest subscription period allowed. During this time, work as usual, and take note of any virus alert you get, and how that happens. Get rid of one of the anti-virus that doesn't appear to be as effective (and recommend the remaining one to other people). Also adjust your computer using habit until you get no virus alerts. Then make sure you keep your habit within the confines of rules you find working well for you, so you don't get virus alert. Then get rid of the anti-virus software altogether.
I regard anti-virus software as some sort of potty training. You only need it until you find out what behavior will get you into trouble.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Bullshit, the idea that you only get viruses if you do something wrong is utter utter bullshit.
Doing things wrong certainly means you get more, but the only way to avoid them entirely is to disconnect your internet and refuse to use any kind of rewritable media.
Re:How do you know you need anti-virus? (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't need anti-virus because I use Linux (Ubuntu, Puppy, PCLinuxOS)! "Malware", Virus, Worms, Trojans, etc., do not effect my PCs.
I run Linux as well, however what you just said applies to a Linux user not running as root. Unfortunately many people I know who should know better are quite happy logging in as root and this can lead to issues not unlike those affecting a Microsoft OS. All machines I set-up or even manage are set-up such that you cannot login as root either via telnet (now depreciated) or ssh. Of course that won't stop people logging in as root on the console in the case of a personal computer or workstation.
From personal experience Linux in the enterprise requires Anti Virus protection at least for those machines that are internet facing not because Linux is actually affected by mall-ware associated with Microsoft OS's and applications but because you need to protect any Microsoft products that may connect to the Linux machines. It has never ceased to amaze me that many businesses see this as normal and it is utterly pointless to try an explain to them what is wrong with this picture.
Re:Symantec products are apparently the same. (Score:5, Informative)
Unless, of course, you make the antivirus itself pop up a simple "Yes/No" dialog when its attempted to be uninstalled, warning that malware could be the one behind it. That's what Avast! did last time I uninstalled it, its simple, efficient, and the antivirus app doesn't get classified by *me* as malware unlike dear old Norton.
Right. because there is no way malware could click 'yes'. Hate to break it to you, but there is all kinds of software out there to do this.
Its one of the reasons Vista's UAC prompts are so 'intrusive', because it tries to shunt the dialog box into a 'secure safe mode'... specifically so that other programs, services, etc can't send windows messages, keystrokes, etc to the dialog box and press "allow" for you.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Right. because there is no way malware could click 'yes'. Hate to break it to you, but there is all kinds of software out there to do this.
And malware can't just include the Norton Removal Tool and run that? If it works for Norton's tool (the captcha) then it would work just as well being part of the install.
Besides, both McAfee and AVG (and even Norton!) include uninstallers in their installs. The only difference is that Norton's uninstaller is the only one that is significantly prone to failure.
Re:Symantec products are apparently the same. (Score:5, Insightful)
Symantec provided a removal tool because their idiot programmers couldn't be assed to write a proper uninstaller for their shite product.
So basically what you're saying is that the idiot programmers used their ass to write a shoddy piece of code that you need a third party uninstaller to remove?
Yeah that sounds about right actually. And I'm finding the whole of the article, including Hall's bullshit spew to be absolutely hysterical, given that their product runs like a 5,000 pound pig in a 300 pound pig pen. Perhaps if they weren't so bloody quick to obsolete their products on a year to year basis, and trying to push out a new version every year that has even more bloat in it than the last year -- perhaps people wouldn't be so quick to rely on "free" anti-virus solutions as an alternative
Re:Symantec products are apparently the same. (Score:5, Insightful)
"Symantec provided a removal tool because their idiot programmers couldn't be assed to write a proper uninstaller for their shite product."
Symantec products used to be good in the DOS early windows 95 days, now they are just garbage and add no real value, I could never defrag my hard drive in XP using later versions of norton defrag, etc, because of hard disk locking issues because the way their clueless programmers could not figure out NTFS.
I also hate what they did to partition magic when they bought out powerquest. It seems to me anything that gets aquired by symantec turns to shit.
They used to be a good company, now one only uses their products "at arms length" I hate installing their anti virus software and usually only run it from CD/DVD.
They had a few good programs: Their old dos norton utilities and the DOS versions of Ghost - quick, clean simple utilities, what I wouldn't give for someone to make good utilities again.
Re:Symantec products are apparently the same. (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Symantec products are apparently the same. (Score:5, Interesting)
Most of those posts aren't current, but let me assure you that Symantec Endpoint Protection still does this shit.
We use it at work, and I've discovered the suite does something really retarded:
There's a part of it they call "network threat protection"; because of the overblown name, it took me a bit of googling to figure out that the thing is literally nothing more than a cheap little firewall. However, unlike real firewalls, if you do something it doesn't like - run the FTP client that comes with Windows, run the Windows wget binary, try to install a program over the network, try to use certain software - it will crash. And when it crashes, it will take down the entire Windows network stack. And when the Windows network stack goes down, the computer becomes unusable and you have to cut the power.
Note that this isn't some sort of retarded blocking behavior; although NTP is installed, the traffic rules are set to basically "block two or three inconsequential things, allow otherwise". We ended up having to uninstall it on the computers of the people who were most affected.
Re:Symantec products are apparently the same. (Score:5, Funny)
You have to admit that taking down the Windows network stack does mean your endpoints are indeed protected. At least the ones on your PC.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Symantec Exec to board members: "Holy underwear! Free Antivirus! From Microsoft! We have to protect our phoney baloney jobs here, gentlemen! We must do something about this immediately! Immediately! Immediately! Harrumph! Harrumph! Harrumph!
Re:McAfee false-positive glitch fells PCs worldwid (Score:5, Interesting)
If you make a product and then make a new version how can the new version freakout and break because you once had the older version made by the same company?
That's a pretty easy question. You skip the regression testing phase. Or maybe they trusted the OS too much, moved a function from one dll to another, changed how the function worked, and forgot to have the update script remove the dll from the OS. If the program gets the invalid response from the older function, it might cause problems. Anyway you work this, it all comes down to them not testing enough.
Re:Don't Worry (Score:4, Informative)
I used Norton Antivirus for a while (made by Symantec).
number of times it stopped me from getting a virus: 1
Number of false positives: 7 (security tools and a Y2K joke program)
Number of times it screwed up my computer: 2 (Once randomly and once when I went to uninstall that piece of crap)
honestly Id be better off with no protection than with their product.
Re:Don't Worry (Score:5, Interesting)
Exactly. Isn't this just like a wolf warning that the chicken coop should have a free and open society with no fences?
Or to put it another way: Is there any answer that you're going to give that doesn't recommend I spend dump trucks full of cash at your company?
Symantec is saying this? (Score:5, Insightful)
If there were any high-quality for-pay alternatives, I'd say he might have a point.
Unfortunately, most antivirus software sucks, with Symantec more or less epitomizing how good ideas on paper can turn into terrible/buggy/bloated security software that actually increases your exposure [msn.com] since it adds another node malicious code can attack. Symantec's argument-from-assertion notwithstanding, there doesn't seem to be any correlation between antivirus software being for-pay and higher quality.
From my experience, there's really bad antivirus software (such as Norton, which I have zero confidence in and would never let touch my machine), and slightly less bad antivirus software. What went wrong? Why does this industry suck so badly? Anyone have any insight?
Re:Symantec is saying this? (Score:5, Insightful)
Personally I have a lot of respect for ESET's AV (specifically NOD32) because it's fast and does the job.
But since they don't target consumers so aggressively (unlike Symantec with Norton, who manage to get difficult-to-remove trial version on tons of laptops at the point of sale) they don't exactly have a very big following. In fact, outside of business and tech circles, I assume they're completely unknown. So I suppose what went wrong, is that AV companies had to dump ethics to get well known. The decent ones who respect the end user and state of the machine (as opposed to "sticky" trial software and the like) end up at the bottom of the barrel. The industry is "upside down"
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I wouldn't count E-SET out so quickly.
They are priced competitively and have boxed software available at Best Buy and a few other retail outlets. I don't believe I have ever seen them at wally world unfortunately.
I think they really shine in multi-installation licensing and I'm not sure if any other vendors are really discounting heavily in that area.
The fundamental problem is sloppy code in Windows. (Score:5, Informative)
The fundamental problem is that Microsoft makes more money if there are security problems in Windows.
OpenBSD [openbsd.org] doesn't require anti-virus and anti-spyware programs partly because it was written to be secure. Apple's Mac OS X [apple.com] is based on BSD, and users rarely have problems with that operating system being insecure.
Amazingly, Microsoft is not only supplying insecure software, it is charging for programs to fix the insecurities!!! See Windows Live OneCare [live.com].
Microsoft charges Microsoft Windows users $50 for software to fix problems in Windows! Windows Live OneCare has "Antivirus and antispyware all in one" [live.com]. More: "Two-way firewall helps stop hackers in their tracks". Hmmm, Microsoft, if Windows needs a "Two-way firewall", and it certainly does, why do you supply a one-way firewall with Windows???
See Windows Live OneCare Gripes [computergripes.com]. Quote: "Create the problem, then charge people money to solve it." Another quote: "Why should Microsoft profit from the plague of viruses and Spyware? Shouldn't it have designed Windows better to begin with? And if it has indeed found a way to protect Windows, isn't it a tad exploitative to charge for it? Microsoft has no convincing answer for these questions . .
Another quote: "McAfee, Symantec and Microsoft (with Windows Live OneCare) all set your credit card up for automatic renewals when you purchase their security software on-line.
To me, it seems like this: Testing... Testing... How much abuse will computer users accept?
Re:The fundamental problem is sloppy code in Windo (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Maybe its because Linux and BSD aren't popular platforms for most home users. OSX is 8% - which is large, but considering the rest of that is Windows (most people pin Linux at around 1% on the desktop it seems).
Even then - there are viruses for the Mac [slashdot.org]
There's also plenty of evidence to suggest OSX really isn't all that secure [cnet.com].
Re:The fundamental problem is sloppy code in Windo (Score:4, Interesting)
Your facts are so bizzarely wrong its hilarious.
OneCare has been discontinued. The scanning engine it was based on, along with definition updates, are now available free. If you'd even bothered to read *anything* about the product related to this article, you'd know that.
Windows does ship with a two-way firewall, and it's remarkably powerful and versatile. OneCare was basically a giant patch for those fools still running an 8-year-old OS.
"designed Windows better..." You can't fix stupid. The OS itself is pretty damn secure these days, much more so than (for example) OS X - see the Pwn2Own contests and the competitor's comments for an interesting case study. Actually exploiting Windows pretty much requires third-party software, and even then you have to deal with security features that no other os *except* OpenBSD has fully implemented (DEP, ASLR, etc.). What most malware for Windows (and usually for other platforms too) is, these days, is Trojans. Not a lot your OS can do to protect you from those. See the Dancing Pigs [wikipedia.org] (or Bunnies [msdn.com]) Problem. Pop up a warning dialog? Users will click right through it. Make them run as non-Administrators? They'll gain whatever rights the program says it needs (in the case of Trojan-infected installers, you would probably need admin rights anyhow). Antivirus provides only a very small amount of protection against this, but I suppose if you're going to have that kind of person online anyhow they should have that protection. If a company wants to charge more to protect against that stupidity, though, I don't see that as being so evil.
Re:Symantec is saying this? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I called ESET (US) to buy their product, they couldn't sell it to me. Pretty typical, they referred me to some shitty online retailer. I called my CDW rep (as I often do spending larger $ amounts), and I actually had to introduce him to their product. They got it worked out, and now CDW sells ESET products. Anyway, it was ridiculous... CDW has pretty much everything, (they're just usually not the cheapest), but they had nothing for ESET in the DB, which I found amazing.
In the end I'm really happy that I
Re:Symantec is saying this? (Score:4, Interesting)
+1 for NOD32.
Best combo of fast and accurate out there.
I will say that turning off "scan on write" on older computers in any virus engine often gives a great speed boost, NOD32 included. I have found that speed/security tradeoff to be worth it, as files are still scanned on read, and on scheduled full scans.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Scan on read is the important one, because you get virus updates every day, and a month from now you may detect something you didn't detect on write.
Really though, the important one is it do in-depth scans periodically, as most scanners find many more things on a scheduled scan as the real-time scan.
Re:Symantec is saying this? (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree that most for-pay software sucks in this regard, just look at any corporate network. Most computers have terrible performance and still wind up spreading worms and viruses.
I think the key here is that the company is telling us we need his product. In other news, a consultant came to the conclusion that we need more consulting, GM told me I need a new car, and McDonald's told me I need a McBurger. No shit, a company telling me I need their products? Nothing to see here, move along, look for an unbiased neutral party.
Re:Symantec is saying this? (Score:5, Interesting)
look for an unbiased neutral party.
Unfortunately, these have become hard to find in our pay to play economy. And being able to tell who is a good unbiased source of information is a monumental challenge. So far, the only thing that seems to be for sure is that the louder and more often someone says that they are unbiased and neutral the less they are. I would throw out some names and advertising slogans but, I'm not wearing my flame-proof underwear (AC).
Re:Symantec is saying this? (Score:5, Informative)
Virus Bulletin [virusbtn.com] unbiased enough?
Dunno if they have a more recent test, that's the one I had bookmarked. I get about the same results in my tests, btw.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
uninstall Norton
I've seen a number of computers that appear to be setup right but will not work until you uninstall Norton.. I'm not really sure how/why that could happen but it's not a settings problem.
O and if that doesn't work, lspfix found here http://www.cexx.org/lspfix.htm [cexx.org] if you don't already know as it will save you a lot of time and I know in your type of job your boss is up your ass about getting people off the line but the problem is though you are trying to fix it over the phone so how do you get the program to
Re:Symantec is saying this? (Score:5, Interesting)
It's not just AV software. The entire software industry operates this way.
1. Shovel feature-rich bug-ware onto unsuspecting schlubs to build "brand" (especially in the enterprise/IT market where the person purchasing the software is often not the person who has to use it, so they make decisions based on feature list and brand name rather than quality)
2. Wait for hobbyists, researchers, or smaller companies to figure out how to do it right
3. Buy their companies
4. Repeat
Remember when Norton was actually decent? It was before Symantec bought them. After the acquisition, Symantec went back to Step 1 and gradually bloated and encrapified the antivirus. Now they are on Step 2. I wouldn't be surprised if they bought up someone like TrendMicro soon, spouting promises of a glorious and euphoria-inducing Norton/PC-cillin integration.
-- 77IM
Parent=Outdated information... (Score:3, Insightful)
Symantec has cleaned up their performance and bloat issues in internet security 2009. I have some machines running Norton, some running McAfee, using freeware stuff like Spybot, AVG and NoScript as additional lines of defense. Norton is definitely faster and smaller than McAfee this year and doesn't put perceptible overhead on any of the machines where I have it installed, including the old Athlon single core. McAfee chews up a full core of a CPU for a minute or so when it installs updates and the full scan
Re:Symantec is saying this? (Score:5, Insightful)
What went wrong? Why does this industry suck so badly? Anyone have any insight?
Disclaimer: I'm not any particular expert.
My guess is that at least part of the problem is that the only thing that AV software seems to do well is basically signature-based detection, which they had down pat a couple decades ago. So for the past few decades, mostly AV software only needed updates to work with new operating systems, bug fixes, and new signatures.
Now the only real problem with that is that these companies all want to release a new version of their software every year and have everyone re-buy it, because (for psychological reasons) people will pay more for that (or a subscription to receive "free" updates) than they'll pay for signature updates. This puts the companies in a position where it makes sense to throw some new bells and whistles into their product every year, whether or not they're sensible or effective. That leads to bloat.
Re:Symantec is saying this? (Score:5, Funny)
WTF man. You actually get viruses often enough on your personal system and your mom's system that you can draw comparisons?
I think you are doing something horribly wrong. I haven't had a virus in 15 years or so.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes it is better than older versions but .... you're doing it wrong
download and run this - http://secunia.com/vulnerability_scanning/personal/ [secunia.com]
It will tell you what programs you need to update. It will tell you every 1 to 3 days that you have a problem with Word, Excel, IE, Flash, Adobe Acrobat, etc, etc and really need to download the update from which ever companies website. It's made me decide to switch to Linux just out of shear annoyance... It's really funny how the update programs that litter my proces
Re:Symantec is saying this? (Score:5, Informative)
I don't even use antivirus... (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
You mean the 39+ at virustotal.com when you encounter a suspicious file....
Predictable much? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Exactly, they'd say exactly the same even if Microsoft's solution was wonderful and Symantec was left selling rocks to keep tigers away. I think it's a smart move by Microsoft in crunch times, it's lowering the cost of using the platform without lowering the income of Microsoft. Also, analyzing viruses gives them lots of information on bugs they ought to sort out and patch in the source software anyway. By baking it into the cost of Windows they're basicly giving themselves free market share, and there's no
Re:Predictable much? (Score:5, Funny)
And Sony exec says all the movies on TPB are horrible quality. Ubisoft claims playing cracked games can cause skin rashes and your nuts to fall off.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
And you just hit right on the head the biggest security measure you can do-get them off IE!
What - precisely - are the problems you see with IE 8?
Firefox has not been proven immune to attack. Security Advisories for Firefox 3.0 [mozilla.org]
Is the technology of the browser still the most significant line of attack?
Does IE 8 Equal Safer Surfing? [itsecurity.com]
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
FF3.5: 0, currently (it just came out 2 days ago)
FF3.0: http://secunia.com/advisories/product/19089/ 81 vulnerabilities
FF2.0: http://secunia.com/advisories/product/12434/ 154 vulnerabilities
IE6: http://secunia.com/advisories/product/11/ 154 vulnerabilities
IE7: http://secunia.com/advisories/product/12366/ 84 vulnerabilities
IE8: http://secunia.com/advisories/product/21625/ 8 vulnerabilitie
Lies, damned lies, and statistics (Score:5, Insightful)
And *that* is a crap statistic; it does nothing to describe the severities of the vulnerabilities, the vendor response, or the amount of time each was left unpatched. Who cares if FF had 184 vulnerabilities and IE 1, if the FF ones were hard to exploit and patched within a few days and the IE one was left open all year and readily attackable by script kiddies?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
But in almost every severe case of a worm or trojan infecting Windows, at least ones that got large enough to gain media attention (Code Red, Blaster, Storm)--the vendor had a patch out that was available long before the worms existed.
This is proven and very well known. Even Storm's exploit was fixed in October of 2008, many months before the botnet gained media attention.
There are Windows installation methods and procedures that people on Wind
Re:Lies, damned lies, and statistics (Score:4, Insightful)
In the end it boils down to what actual malware is out there in the wild.
"exploit statistics" are just numbers that are abused by people that need
to make up excuses for not being willing to dump crap and just use a better
product.
It's not the number of buffer overflow bugs in Firefox, it's the number of
actual trojans in the wild for Explorer.
Microsoft for a long time has suffered from this strange idea that they
can enhance the end user experience by allowing and piece of crap code
from any untrusted source to execute by default and run amok in the system.
Apple doesn't do it.
The Unixen don't do it.
Other Windows app vendors don't even do it.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Here's their problem - the malware/virus guys have been working against their products for so long now, they KNOW how they work, and with the level of embededness these programs have in the operating system, the m/v guys have figured out now all they have to do is exploit the security software - they can handily shut it off while making it appear to the user it is still on ... ahem... and do what they want. Having cleaned some very nasty stuff off of both Symantec's and McAfee's premiere CONSUMER products t
Antivirus-free for 15 years (Score:2, Insightful)
Free of free antivirus, paid antivirus and viruses, because I want my computer's CPU to do something useful.
In other news (Score:5, Funny)
Microsoft warns against free operating systems. "They're so inferior! Look at ours, it runs the London Stock Exchange...oh wait."
--
BMO
Re:In other news (Score:5, Funny)
Some sources say that over 80% of desktop computers are infected with a virus called Windows.
Re:In other news (Score:5, Funny)
Some sources say that over 80% of desktop computers are infected with a virus called Windows.
It was 90% ten years ago. Virus removal takes a very long time. Just ask Symantec
Be Afraid! Buy Our Product! (Score:5, Insightful)
If Symantec's "security" security programs were worth a damn, the "free" products wouldn't stand a chance. So far, that hasn't been the case eh?
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I disagree as even if they were good, there are still people that want OSS solutions, especially in the security area, so they can audit the code.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
You are mixing stuff. On Windows, ClamAV is the only OSS solution, and it doesn't (yet) have decent support for on-access scanning (It is possible to use WinPooch to do it, but WinPooch is unmaintained and not compatible with Vista or XP SP3). This is mostly because the developers of ClamAV are more focused on using it for server side email scanning and so forth.
So sure, an OSS solution for on-access scanning on workstations would be attractive for lots of reasons, but there isn't one right now, so it doesn
Re:Be Afraid! Buy Our Product! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Be Afraid! Buy Our Product! (Score:5, Funny)
two criteria:
a) If made by Norton, Symantec, or is sold at PC World, I wouldn't touch it with a barge-pole.
b) If it costs money, I won't touch it with a barge-pole.
c) It I install it, and it sucks, it goes out.
I have a large stock of unused barge-poles, please see my e-bay shop.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
c) It I install it, and it sucks, it goes out.
You obviously never tried to uninstall Norton Antivirus. :)
Although, I have to admit, their product improved considerably over the last 2 years. Instead of just saying "They got a really good looking box" (because I should not say anything bad about them), I can now also say "and you can easily get rid of them now too!"
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Of course... (Score:3, Funny)
they would know since they are the major malware authors. Duh.
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As much as it makes sense from a tinfoil hat perspective, I don't think Norton/Symantec writes any viruses at all.
Why?
Because if they did, you would expect their security software would actually be at least marginally functional.
We all know it's not.....
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Re:Of course... (Score:5, Insightful)
I know that myth stays in circulation, but trust me: AV companies do not write malware. For two reasons:
First, AV companies do talk a lot. Not only at conferences. There's a well built and solid network of sample exchange between them. Of course, you delay it a few hours or a day before you forward your new samples to the others so you can have a 'first', but a global malware detection array is in nobody's budget possible. So they split the world and detect together. Should it become known that you spew malware yourself, you're OUT. And that means you're dead.
And second, why bother the cost? You get the malware for free anyway. There are people who make it their (illegal, but who cares?) business to write and spread it. Why should I invest money into something I get free of charge?
Bloated (Score:3, Interesting)
Rock and hard place (Score:5, Insightful)
Fortunately, there are many free anti-virus products that work better than Symantec. It's a no-brainer choice. Free is cheaper and better.
I have no understanding of how Symantec remains in business. There's something deeply wrong with that.
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FUD, they are good at it. Must have learned that from someone else...
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I wish they were as good at creating AV software as they were at FUD. Symantec is an industry-wide joke, and the only reason I know of that it's still used is because of its management tools.
I was looking at the email server security plugin for Exchange, and was just amazed at what a shitty product it was. It was like a brain-dead version of Postfix. It's very clear that whoever wrote it had little understanding of email security beyond scanning email for viruses. It was just a joke, but an incredibly e
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
That's easy - software bundle contracts with all major computer vendors, branding and market exposure, plus they seem to always be available for interviews with '60 minutes' every time there's a trojan/virus outbreak like Conficker. This all culminates into ordinary people looking at anti-virus boxes on retail store shelves, seeing 'Symantic' and triggering that name from wherever they heard or saw it befor
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symantec and microsoft, joined at the hip, imo...
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and here i thought symantec was a virus, one that no pc maker seems able to keep of their install images...
Re:Rock and hard place (Score:4, Interesting)
I can explain that to you. It's called a delusional dominant reality.
If you act as if you were the godking of antivirus, you will start to ignore your flaws. If you then are so strong in that belief, that you pull others into it, they will start to ignore them too.
As you might imagine, this is quite easy with the uninformed masses, who never have seen anything else.
I mean that "Dr. Norton" with his white doctor coat, his cool name, and all this... He looks so sure of himself. And others have it too. So it must be good. Ever if it is bad there, and there, and there, and there, etc.
It's the same thing that makes you believe a medical doctor actually had any more competence than a better pharmacist. And him stating "there is no cure" except of "I did not go to a further training for the last three decades, and just don't know a cure, but there might be one, and we still have to find it", does not help it. (This is his delusional dominant reality in action.)
It is also the thing that can make you good at dating, pickup, etc. (Don't hear to the Mistery method losers and their a million and one imitators. That stuff is outdated for at least a decade now.)
Getting the protection you need? (Score:2)
And Symantec's product does this? A good 1/2 of the people i have to go clean messes up are running that damned Norton.
Re: (Score:2)
Now be fair, many users get messed up because they install McAfee instead.
You get what you pay for. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I'll buy that, its not like Bananas grow on trees.
Indeed, they don't. Banana plants [wikipedia.org] are just weird clones - not trees.
Meh (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Meh (Score:5, Informative)
I won't run Symantec on my network. When I first took over, everything was Symantec 11, and it was just horrifyingly bad. Pretty much every time I logged into my workstation, I had to kill the rtvscan process, and users were always complaining. When the license renewal came in, I just crumpled it up and through it in the garbage. I had had some experience with F-Prot from when I was working at a small ISP, and decided "what the hell". The licenses were cheap (I did forty computers for $200 a year), it's very lightweight and while I can't do remote scans and the like, the LAN version is dead-dog simple, it just copies the definitions from the server. Even then, it still screws up on occasion, but a helluva lot less than Symantec ever did.
All in all, however, I despise AV products.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Meh (Score:4, Informative)
I've found that free anti-virus, like Avira and Avast, pretty good
I can second this whole-heartedly. I work in a computer shop, and I can personally testify that these two products catch more infections than anything Symantec, McAffee, or Trend Micro EVER came out with. I still recommend Malwarebytes Antimalware [malwarebytes.org] as a supplementary spyware scanner, but Avast and Avira are definitely my favorite for main protection.
Anything is better than Norton (Score:5, Interesting)
Dear Symantec,
The reason you are steadily losing market share has less to do with the availability of reasonably good antivirus software for free, and more to do with the staggeringly awful quality of your own products. Norton Internet Security was so completely terrible, that not only did it fail to stop critical attacks, but it slowed down systems more than the worst available spyware infections. Removing those spyware infections was also easier than removing your software, because the uninstaller would fail more often than it would function. I began to keep the latest version of the Symantec removal tool in my kit because it was better to assume the uninstall would fail, and not bother to use it. Until I managed to get a significant portion of my clients away from your products, they paid me to fix problems with your software more often than any other single product by a factor of 10. At this point, even if your company came out with the perfect security product, I would advise my clients not to buy it purely based on past experience, because you do not deserve their money.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I loved how Norton Internet Security would *DISABLE* windows firewall when you uninstall their Norton shit
Everybody else warns against relying on Symantec! (Score:2)
I'm just saying... From what I hear from pretty much everything and every test, is that they have the worst piece of shit of a useless resource hog with no detection rate in the whole industry, including free solutions.
Re: (Score:2)
Their latest product is much improved: http://www.hardwaregeeks.com/index.php/GadgetBlog/comments/symantec_norton_internet_security_2009_to_install_in_under_1_minute/ [hardwaregeeks.com]
If McAfee could protect us (Score:2)
Linux is the best AV solution (its also free) (Score:3, Informative)
Download clamav, then check the drive.
The reason I say it is better is because many virus/malware disable AV features in Windows so you can never be 100% sure - I know you can get clamwin but again some 'bad thing' could have disabled some it it's features...and linux allows you to write to folders that would be normally projected by the system (i know there is any obvious danger to this)
There has been at least 2 cases in the last month where a vista machine (one had norten and signed up to onecare,,,) which had av protection was not able to completely get rid of a trojan - even using clamwin - clamav in linux sorted it.
Not QUITE right (Score:5, Interesting)
You know what is really a non-protection in AV? Products from large companies. No, really.
Malware is today routinely tested against the big players before it's leaving the door. More and more often, you also see protection against specific AV suits (Norton, McAfee, Kaspersky are amongst the top on that list), where the malware specifically tries to disable those AV suits or at least blocks updates.
Malware protecting against smaller players in the AV field is rare. Market dictates that. It does not pay to protect your malware against an AV suit the market share or which is less than 5 percent.
So, I essentially agree with him: MS Antivirus will offer ... well, let me say not the best protection, because EVERY piece of malware will be tested and hardened against it. But, and I guess Mr. Hall will not enjoy that, Symantec doesn't offer protection any better, because, since they're big enough with a big enough market share, they, too, are on the malware writer's radar.
They Have A Point (Score:5, Funny)
Why I hate bundled AV (Score:3, Interesting)
I personally am very vocal about my hate of purchased anti-viruses for end users.
Most of the home user computers I've seen use some kind of outdated anti-virus technology that wasn't updated in ages. They purchase the computer, they got a 90 days free AV deal, then weeks before it ends up, they are asked to subscribe to this crap for some kind of amount, they say "later", next reboot "later", next reboot "later", next reboot GAAAH "never! there!", and they are stuck with that piece of crap that slows down their computer than gives them a false impression of security "because they got Norton installed", even if they totally forgot they even had to subscribe.
Even worse are the computers with some outdated version of the software that isn't even updated anymore, like they got this 3 year old version of (example) Symantec they purchased, asked for the year update, then got a message about that brand new (shiny) version with more features. They said no because they aren't doing anything fancy with their computers. Now they are stuck with some 3 year old solution that isn't updated anymore. How appropriate.
So my suggestion for all the computer users: don't use a bundled anti-virus unless you get explained what's the deal pay their due diligence everytime they are asking for it. Then, they are very good (usually vastly superior) products. -- Instead, use some free anti-virus, like AVG, that will automatically update everyday, and won't become outdated, and you won't have a popup message asking for money or else... Use spybot for the lesser evils. There, you are free of pains.
Sounds like the FUD against Universal Health Care (Score:3, Insightful)
Symantec is taking a page right out of the republican/democrat "anti (not for profit) universal health care" hand book. Instead of having universal single payer health care that would cover us all, for the good of man kind... the special interest groups are spreading FUD because they would lose profit and power.
Same thing with Symantec. They would have you believe that Free AV would destroy humanity itself and leave you unprotected. Symantec would have you believe that only they can protect you properly.
The reality is free AV will help prevent the spread of virii thanks to more people having anti virus software.
Apparently Symantec doesnt really care about protecting users... they just want a profit.
My latest fiasco with commercial anti-virus .... (Score:4, Interesting)
One of my clients bought a new Dell Inspiron notebook with an integrated Verizon cellular card. He wound up needing my help getting the Verizon card set up, because every time he ran the Dell utility to manage the card, it just hour-glassed the PC for about 30 seconds, and finally returned an error message about being unable to connect to one of its components.
I fought and fought with it, checking to see if the cellular card might be disabled at the BIOS level, or if a Windows service was incorrectly set to "disabled" or something.... nope.
I finally gave up and called Dell tech support, to see if they knew anything about the issue. The tech had no clue, other than suggesting steps I already tried, and seeing if I could launch the configuration program from the START menu, as opposed to from its system tray icon (same result).
Then, on a "shot in the dark" troubleshooting step, I did a full uninstall of the McAfee Security Suite provided with the machine (with 1 year subscription). That did the trick! McAfee was blocking the cellular card utility from launching, despite its firewall not even listing it as a blocked executable or anything! Nice.....
Pot calling the kettle black (Score:3, Informative)
Your shit is just as bad as the free stuff. It gives me a false sense of hope, makes me feel I'm safe when I'm not.
W^X (Score:4, Interesting)
...
On the other hand, I know plenty of people running active commercial anti-virus software that's been plagued with virii.
The reason?
1. No Awareness.
2. No Patching.
3. No Prudence.
4. Running Windows
There. Fixed that for you.
Worm/Virus are spread so fast these days, the AV software just can't catch up in time to prevent the infection and in quite a few cases, the Worm/Virus disables the AV software, making it more difficult (in some cases impossible) to remove the infection without booting to another OS (Live OS from a CD/USB Drive).
Except that spreading fast is nothing new. Most worms hit peak a few hours sooner than the average time it takes for the AV makers to create and push out a new profile.
That's why I use ClamWin for occasional scanning.
ClamWin, ClamAV are fine for remedial action. The best remedy, as in all things, is prevention and that can be accomplished by moving to systems that are resistant to malware. Here even the consumer unions fall flat on their faces and fail to mention the Linux distros. Most mainstream distros are years ahead of Windows as far as ease of use, maintenance and speed. The main weakness of real systems (non-M$) is that Web 2.0 script crap.
If someone wanted to make a really hardened desktop or netbook appliance, the following steps can be taken:
I wrote the word appliance above, because with extreme settings like that, you are not going to want to try to add, remove or radically reconfigure any packages.