February 2008

If you were to put [ FREE ANTIVIRUS SCANS ] into Google™, you would be led to a wondrous world of sites that will purport to scan and remove viruses from your computer. To some extent that is all true, except not all software is perfect. If you pick up a virus, it is quite possible that the antivirus program that you have on your computer will not find and eradicate the virus—it allowed it onto the computer in the first place, didn’t it? So now what do you do? Below are a series of URLs and Google parameters that will get to additional standalone scanners that are: free, not guaranteed, slow, and good only for the time that it is running. They all run from memory only, so they are not affected by viruses already on your computer.

It is important to realize that malware is coming out at such a rate that the antivirus companies cannot keep up with the flood. What also has changed is that the Zero Day problem is getting worse, e.g., that the malware must be caught within the first few hours and the download of the current status of the anti virus patterns are to be completed within a few hours. Quite a task. No wonder none of the antivirus programs catches the whole onslaught. So what do you do when you suspect (or know) there is a virus? Where do you turn? The series of locations following is just a smattering of the total capabilities out on the net. It is not unusual to know that you have a problem and to just run scanner after scanner until the message comes back to you that the scanner has removed some malware. That it is THE ONE that you are attempting to eradicate can only be determined by testing.

If I can, I don’t even try to test for a virus if I have any concept when I picked up the virus. In that case I use ERUNT/ERDNT to wipe the virus out of the registry or do an Acronis restore to a known good time. That is why I have about 20 backups over a year to choose from all lined up on an extra 160 GB drive mounted right in the computer case. Every Friday I take a full backup. This is not bragging, it is reality and laziness because I don’t want to spend the time reinstall everything. So here are some scanners to try. Try them now so you can learn the programs when you are not under pressure to fix something. Chances are at least one of them will find some problems. Most of them require INTERNET EXPLORER.

· Symantec anti-Malware and Antivirus—
requires IE (not Firefox).
http://tinyurl.com/do09
Google-search: Symantec Security Check

· The following (Kaspersky) can be installed IN ADDITION TO any present, resident competitor’s anti-virus. Go ahead and install the download and test to see if the original antivirus has been effective.

Kaspersky Antivirus Scanner:
http://www.kaspersky.com/
remoteviruschk.html
Google-search: kaspersky free virus scan

Panda Active Scan:
http://www.pandasoftware.com/
activescan/com/
Google-search: Panda Active Scan

Windows Security:
http://www.windowsecurity.com/
trojanscan/
Google-search: WindowSecurity.com

Eset NOD32 AntiVirus:
http://www.eset.com/onlinescan/
Google-search: NOD32 antivirus scanner

· And don’t forget my favorite, which isn’t really in the same league as the above, but it does seem to fix more problems in the registry than any of the others.

Google-search: Windows Live Safety Scanner