I've been running Norton360 for the last year with the AntiSpyware option switched on. Its completed many full system scans and found no problems. I recently installed Spybot S&D which to my amazement has reported 314 issues.
Why doesn't Norton find the same issues?
Hi Dazzler,
Welcome to Norton Community!
The heuristic techniques and definitions for the detection/repair of virus may different for different Security Products. For example, if Norton detects a macro virus, then it opens the macro file and removes as much of the viral code as possible. However, to keep the macro intact, it may leave harmless pieces of viral code or the macro name behind. Other security programs may detect this and report an infection even though the file cannot infect other files (I am not sure if this is your case). I think, there is a chance of false positives from Spybot program. To confirm whether all the 314 infections are false positives or not, better submit some of those files to Symantec Security Response for further analysis.
Also, none of the Security programs can guranatee 100% protection over the computer as it is always with in the hands of the users. For example, if you open an email attachment that you don't recognize and run it, and you choose to ignore a warning that your anti-virus package or firewall throws up, you're telling the software that you know better than it does what is or is not safe.
Make sure that you don't have realtime protection enabled in Spybot along with Norton program as it may conflict the functionality of each other, as well as affect the computer performance.
Yogesh
Hi Dazzler,
That is a lot of detections! Could you post the names of some of these that were found by Spybot? Spybot will list some things such as tracking cookies and Windows security configurations that really aren't actual threats to your computer. I'm thinking 314 real infections would have pretty much made your computer only usable as a doorstop. Just curious about what was found.
thanks for the input so far.
Here are some of the details from Spybot.
Company: Thinking Media LPProduct: TM.BTGrabThreat: Trojan Functionalitysupposed to be some kind of usefull toolbar Description
This trojan horse installs as a browser helper object (BHO). It runs in background without user notice and can enable hidden remote access.
Company: Electronic Group Interactive
Product: LiveSVC.Wintrim
Threat: Trojan
Functionality
plugins from websites are supposed to grant access to multimedia content
Description
LiveSVC.Wintrim installs its useless plugins in background (user is supposed to need special plugin for flashgames or downloading wallpapers), these plugins do not grant access to the promised content. There is no uninstall option and the user has no control over the plugins. Websites installing these plugins are related to other malware sites. This trojan horse also connects to its malicious servers and transmits crypted data. It may also install components which are hidden from the Windows API (rootkit). If the rootkit functions are active, the windows taskmanager and registry editor are not available. Plugin may contact various adult content sites in background.
Hi Dazzler
Could you please run HiJackThis so we can see what is on your computer? You can post the log using the add attachments under the post button. Don't attempt to fix anything that it shows by yourself please. Thanks
ok - first off apologies there was some confusion this computer has Norton Internet Security and not 360 (360 is on my own computer at home not this one) but still the same question why these issues are not found by Norton. Incidentally the subscription for Norton is up in about 40 days time - should i renew it based on this?
What is HiJackThis? where do i get it from and what does it do?
I have already used SpyBot to remove some of the issues.
You can download it here
http://download.cnet.com/Trend-Micro-HijackThis/3000-8022_4-10227353.html
It will give more info about what was detected. Looks like Spybot has lot's of false positives
yeah I can understand False positives but the two examples I posted above look fairly sinister to me. If you are expected to pay out an annual subscription to Norton or any other company should you not expect it to at least report these issues?
What does everyone else do? Have Norton plus Spybot plus Highjackthis plus....
If Norton can't do the job are there better alternatives that will?
When I get the chance I'll be installing Spybot on my own pc and see what happens there.
Hi Dazzler
If you are running Spybot with Tea Timer installed and enabled, then you are running 2 real time security programs. That in itself will prevent both programs from running and scanning correctly. It will cause more problems than it will actually find. The reason I asked for the HiJackThis is to see if there are any conflicting programs running on your computer.
Each antivirus program or suite uses different types of definitions. No security program will be able to find everything as malware is constantly changing. It's ok to run on demand scanners for malware like Malwarebytes free version. That won't conflict with your Norton product.