Review of Microsoft's Anti-Spyware Tools

happyslayer writes "Matthew Fordahl has written a review of Microsoft's anti-spyware tool and has declared it, in a word, 'ineffective.' Though the methodology isn't carried out completely (he uses another anti-virus program after trying MS's tool, but doesn't do the same with the anti-spyware tool), it's a fairly good anecdote on the MS product's usefulness."

Comments

Actual conclusion

[wmspringer]

From the end of the article:

Overall, I was more impressed with the antispyware program's protective measures and simple interface than with its ability to cleanse existing infections. Still, Microsoft seems to be on the right path to fixing the mess caused by the careless users, malicious programmers, unethical companies and vulnerable software.

Wow. Anecdotal Evidence!

[Frennzy]

This is great news!

Is someone at /. intentionally trolling?

I can tell you that I had to clean a machine today that had 56,000 instances of 'Claria' (GAIM aka Gator)

Ad-aware missed them on the first pass...so I used MSAS, and it caught them all. And removed them. Successfully. (whereas Ad-aware would have just quarantined them).

I know I'll get roasted for this obvious 'fanboi' ism, but remember, MSAS is actually still GIANT, who they brought it from. (check your process names while running it...you'll see)

Re:Spyware on Linux/Unix

[damiam]

Several straight answers:

1. Unix users are self-selecting; they tend to be technically competent and less likely to be infected than the general populace.

2. Unix systems use a wide range of email applications and web browsers, almost all of which have fewer holes than IE/OE. No Unix mail client will execute an attachment for you; you have to save it, enable the execution flag, and then run it yourself.

3. Unix desktops are not nearly as common as Windows desktops, so there're fewer incentives to hack them. They're also quite diverse; a binary for PPC MacOS isn't going to work under x86 OpenBSD, Sparc Solaris, or ARM Linux, which reduces the pool of target machines for a given virus.