Anti-virus programs – What to use?
Over the past 31 years, I have watched as the infection possibilities have grown from simple hits that Mcaffee and Norton would clean up rather quickly to the latest infestations that sometimes require a clean install of the operating system.
Back in the late 90’s Mcafee and Norton were the two main players in the market and most infections were much simpler than the insanity of the ones out today.
Today, there are so many different programs, some worse than others, and some are part of the problem as there are FAKE versions that can be installed that ARE the infection. Holy Moly!
The trend of the hackers is to get you to make a call to a number that pops up on the scary FAKE warning screen and the hackers, once they have accessed the computer, install junk or sell a free antivirus for $300.
Yup, there are some clients who got caught in that mess.
So what’s my point? If you have been following my blog and emails, you have educated yourself about these scams and know when to give me a holler.
Over the course of the past year, I have been approached by a couple of companies with offers for certification in their security/anti-virus products.
For the most part, I have stood with the Microsoft Security Essentials/Windows Defender products that are free.
They have worked reliably well for me and most of my clients.
About a month ago I spent a ridiculous amount of time obtaining a certification from one of the many vendors that approached me.
This product offered me the opportunity to be able to manage client infections remotely (called a “Managed Service”) from one dashboard.
This concept is starting to become a widely used paradigm as I would get notified of one of the machines it is installed on gets hit.
Three hours to Costa Mesa, four hours in a classroom, and FOUR hours on the drive home from Costa Mesa…
Traffic was so bad that I saw mouse run by the front of my car, past the on ramp and off the side of the 91. Yup, he made across at least EIGHT lanes of LA traffic. Wow.
Another THREE hours attempting to get their website to work once I got home so I could login and check out the specific product I was certified for. Two more hours and I finally got the product only to see the error message that it could not install.
I gave UP. This would not be usable in real life. It did however, get me to start a new comedy series called “Pythonish”. I did “The Ministry of Frustrating Websites” for my YouTube! channel, which can be found here: https://youtu.be/WIkSgQ3SHuw (Audio Only for now, still working the video part of my channel to add to these…)
I had hopes…maybe I could be a bit more helpful in knowing when a computer got hit and when to make a call to a client to have it cleaned up?
Did I really just waste that much time trying to find a new solution for my clients?
Yup.
But, is there a better product?
For me, the Microsoft products have been pretty ok, except for lately when I personally noticed that my own computer was behaving rather poorly.
I downloaded a trial of a product that I totally forgot I was authorized for but have been using for cleanups on client computers for a LONG period of time.
It had found a couple of questionable items and cleaned them up. Quickly.
Rather than sing praises, I can relate my experience with it and why I am using it in house on my Macs and PCs.
Recently I was called in to check out why a printer would not work. As soon as I sat down and started using the computer, I noticed the response time was about the same as making a pot of coffee. (I know coffee. I am a coffee snob. Really. Ask my mother.)
I asked the client for permission to proceed with a detection and cleanup phase.
It took more than FOUR different tools and multiple passes to finally get to the end result – a rootkit had infected the computer. It had more Trojans than a pharmacy. Ok, bad joke.
How did I know?
The previous security product, it was either McAfee or Symantec, had failed to stop or clean the rootkit, but Malwarebytes caught it and cleaned it out, only after I had removed the poorly functioning security product.
“What’s a rootkit Scott?”
“root·kitˈro͞otˌkit COMPUTING – a set of software tools that enable an unauthorized user to gain control of a computer system without being detected.”
A rootkit is one of the worst types of infections.
Once installed, it can call up it’s “friends” around the globe and bring in more Trojans and other nasty infections…including keyloggers that capture everything typed, transmits that to another server that examines the data for bank URL’s and patterns for passwords and other personal data.
These infections can also provide fake search data and spoofed URLs for the infected user to enter their bank IDs and passwords into by redirecting what is typed into the search bar at the top of the screen.
The same computer was also used for financial transactions and the client had mentioned that they had some issues with fraudulent activity in accounts.
If a computer is relatively new, and the client has been doing data backups to the cloud, I will just reimage the machine back to factory and restore the data and program from the discs. (You ARE backing up, right?)
Older computers are to be replaced outright.
You know my drill – three to five years for computers and then they get replaced. Macs can be the exception to the rule but as machines age, they get more expensive to fix and are not worth the cost as compared to a brand new machine.
So back to my point…
As of now, I am authorized with Malwarebytes for their products and have been testing them in office on more than one computer to see it’s effect on speed, prevention and how quickly it can identify a bad website.
This also included having to get more reseller accounts with industry vendors but now I have access to even more products including computers, home equipment and such if you need it.
The product I am using is site license based called “Malwarebytes | Endpoint Protection”, but there are standalone versions that I will be carrying as well as Managed Service versions. On Friday I meet with their team to get up to speed on that line.
Can you activate a trial I installed on your computer? Sure. I want my clients to be protected from the growing threats. That’s of paramount importance!
If you want me to handle it, let me know and I will happily make a trip to set it up on your computer(s).
Not all clients will be able to use Malwarebytes since some have custom programming that might be blocked with this product such as medical office software.
And please let me remind you: even if you install a new security product, that does not mean your system is 100% bulletproof – you still have to practice safe computing!
This is just another tool in the arsenal for your Disaster Avoidance.
Gimme a holler if you need help!!
Scott (760) 550-9496