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Symantec Competing Unfairly Against Spybot?
frankbaird writes "Symantec has been claiming for months that the anti-spyware program Spybot-Search & Destroy corrupts Norton Ghost images. Spybot has tried to convince them this is a false positive. After having been ignored, and this is the second time Symantec has claimed a false positive against Spybot, the makers of Spybot have gone public. They claim that rather than compete fairly with quality products, Symantec is resorting to libel."
If symantec was not the biggest antivirus (or virus) making company, they would not have done such a thing.
They called me mad, and I called them mad, and damn them, they outvoted me. -Nathaniel Lee
Their products suck. They are slow, bloated, and never find nearly as much as AVG and spybot do (and arent free). This is just another reason for me not to use symantec's products
yap
Please someone remind me, WHY even bother with symantec software? It's more annoying and takes more resources than most viruses out there...
Norton/Symantec software is garbage.. i have use spybot S&D to restore many 0wn3d systems due to malware and spyware. Its advanced tools make it easy to weed out nasty programs and clean a system up.
Symantec asserts that SpyBot is corrupting Norton Ghost images - well, is it, or isn't it?
I mean, this isn't like determining the existence of god is it? The image is either corrupt, or it is not. So which is it?
Anyone?
There's a Starman, waiting in the sky / He'd like to come and meet us, but he hasn't got the time.
Symantec must be having problems with their earnings report.
But...But...But Symantec is part of the Anti-Spyware Coalition. They would never lie about something like this...
Be a real patriot: Question authority. Think for yourself. Formulate your own conclusions.
hey spybot S&D has much better anti-spyware protection than Symantec. and it isn't a resource hog (unlike 90% of which are resource hogs, (ghost and paritition magic being there only good products) it's one of 3 application I use to keep spyware off windows. but then again I don't use windows much anymore (just linux, and we all know what spyware and viruses mean to a linux box).
easy shroedinger's cat joke . . . must not succumb to temptation
Only through direct observation will we know if ALL OUR BASE BELONG TO US IN SOVIET RUSSIA HOT GRITS @@#$#%%NO CARRIER
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
You just lost 20 orders of NAV ... I'm more than happy to move our company to AVG!
Now its only 20 orders here, but I wonder how many others are dropping you because of this, as I write this? Probably lots who won't even say so, on here.
I'd be more impressed if the Spybot people had shown some actual citation about what Norton has said or done, other than their own claims. Norton has no rebuttal here, and I'd seriously like to see it.
But then I believe in fairness, and I know the Vorlon proverb very well.
As far as I am concerned, the corporate version of Norton AV ist the only decent Symantec product out there. Anything for the consumer is crap. Eventually, the market will take care of Symantec. Use AVG instead.
Corporate flamewar!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Symantic's Norton and Spybot being considerd competitors is quite a streach in my opinion. Spybot was "country before country was cool" in the anti-spyware arena. The Symantic folk have an uphill battle convincing many folk (like me) that current versions of Norton bloatware are not a plague upon RAM, CPU cycles, network communication, and Winblows in general.
A wise man once said: "Never pick a fight with a man who buys his ink by the barrel."
Or an example of really clever free press.
I can't help but think that no matter which way this goes, Spybot is the one clearly coming out ahead; they'll loose some enterprise business if they really are corrupting Ghost images, but otherwise, a lot of people will hear about 'em. If Symantec was engaged in libel, then there is a whole David vs. Golliath thing going on. If Spybot was making up the whole thing, everyone grumbles a bit, but a lot of people checked out their website and/or decided to give the software a try.
All of which will make proving damages in court rather...interesting :-)
Please help metamoderate.
One of the first things I do for any system in distress is REMOVE Symantec. Of course, it's a pain since they are like a plague. They infest the registry like lice and do not remove themselves when you run their deinstallation tool. Bottom line, they are big, but they hogs.
Sysmantec can whine, but no one who knows anything is listening or buying.
I donate to Spybot and promote McAfee.
ay
And how many magnitudes of order more A) will never hear about this, B) have never heard about SpyBot, or C) don't give a flying fuck.
While this is all quite suspicious and Slashdotters love the very idea of a conspiracy, I'm not yet in Spybot's camp here. First of all, one week to investigate and respond to an issue is way too short for a company as large as Symantec. Who does Spybot think they are to demand a one week response. Even the Department of Justice couldn't make such a demand, and if the DoJ did Slashdotters would be all up in arms over the evilness of it all.
But, the next question is how did this come to be? I'm sure that Symantec didn't write everyone letters saying that Spybot sucks. I even searched the knowledgebase and could not find any reference to Spybot S&D. It may be there, but I couldn't easily find it. So, how did this come up?
My first thought, with no further information, is that Ghost users were having a problem with corrupt images. I further suspect that Symantec found that by removing Spybot S&D the problem was resolved. Regardless of the real cause, the previous steps would certainly lead me to believe that the problem lay with Spybot S&D and if I were getting enough calls about it, I would put the fix in my knowledgebase as well.
All I'm saying is that where there is smoke, there is fire. At first blush there does seem to be some sort of compatibility issue with Ghost and Spybot but, more information is definitely needed before I can jump into Spybot's camp.
havent the spybot guys put up the address of the product marketing manager of Symantec - Mr. Guido Sanchidrian as a plain mailto: address? Prolly they want his inbox to be filled with SPAM :| Not fair IMO.
We've been deploying images with Ghost 8, AV 8, 9, and now 10 with SpyBot for at least a year and a half now and have never had any problems.
I know, I know, anecdotal evidence and all that, but still we've never had a corrupt ghost image in all that time.
Are Symantec trying to tell us 'Dont use Spybot' or 'Use dd instead of Ghost'?.. Out of Ghost and Spybot I know which I consider more disposeable.
// MD_Update(&m,buf,j);
Well I emailed Mr. Guido Sanchidrian and asked him to validate the truth about the article. His email is in the article and I'm sure his mailbox will fill up over the weekend. :)
/HH
Haven't had the chance to test this issue yet but it sounds highly unlikely that a scan would corrupt a file. I've gave up on Symantec a couple of years ago and have been using alternatives such as AVG and Mcafee. As such, I still find that 2-3 products run in conjunction work best. Speaking of issues, there is one nagging issue I still have with Symtantec NA (version 8/9) for work. We use a content management tool called Teamsite (made my Interwoven) and they don't work well together (short summary). We called Interwoven and they said Symantec is the problem. We called Symantec and they told us that Interwoven has to fix it. Sigh... So you can imagine how far this problem has gone in being resolved.... Frustrating to say the least...
I had no issues in 2005 with my system at work, using AVG.
This year we are using Semantic and daily I run other programs to remove the spyware and virus'es that get through semantic. And daily I remove spyware that is taged as possible virus by adaware.
I do this when I notice my system getting clunky and always when I do a windows update (as there is always spyware added to any MS update, especially security updates)
So who is the "security" really for? Obviously its not for me or the company I world for.
MS anti-spyware software doesn't work.... It had over a month to find and remove a bunch of spyware... then I ran adaware.... it found spyware several years old... This is not new and improved spyware needing a new datatbase..... but old stuff...
Who is this MS anti-spyware working for? It certainly doesn't catch the spyware MS updates installs.
Moral of the story: Consider the motivating factors of any company offering such software.
Consider them strongly, and do NOT assume "they wouldn't do that", but test them for doing it if you accept their offer.
In my opinion, anyone who has been attentive to the computer industry in the last 8 years has seen plenty of evidence that Symantec is to be avoided. Such a person would have seen the amazing number of serious bug reports. Often Symantec is even worse than Microsoft in attentiveness, and that is extreme.
We stopped using Symantec software, other than to buy copies and test them, many years ago when a Symantec technical support representative cheerfully explained that the very misleading operating system error message we were getting was due to Symantec software being corrrupted by another program. The other program? Symantec WinFax Pro.
In recent years, Symantec technical support has been very angry and adversarial. It is not difficult to guess that things are not going well inside the company.
My experience is that Symantec has a high percentage of employees who know almost nothing about technical things. Such employees are cheaper to hire; I imagine that is the reason.
It's interesting that the few posts here that say they've had no problems with Ghost/Spybot have been using Ghost 8. As I mentioned in another post, Ghost 9 and 10 are repackaged versions of Drive Image, which were obtained from PowerQuest. They have nothing to do with prior versions of Ghost except for the name. Does anyone here have any experience with Ghost 9 or 10 and Spybot?
Be a real patriot: Question authority. Think for yourself. Formulate your own conclusions.
Based on my experinece, symantec is certainly a resource hog (scanning outgoing email with pdf takes FOOOOOrever), and each edition has a less clear interface, but is macafee any better ? the new dells at work come with macafee, and I cant even figure out how to update the stupid thing - why do people on /. claim it is better ?
These programs are also a significant cost, which suggests, finally, a way for linux to gain market share on the desktop: tell people about the 5 yr tco of anti spy ware.
Every time I have tried Norton's Anti Virus or their Internet Security package it's ended in me letting it expire. I only used it on my wife and kids computers since they are on windows. As is often said and from my own experiences it is a resource hog, without a doubt.
What really ticked me off though was once I actually needed support from Symantec and found out that they wouldn't offer support because the machines were dual boot. What difference would this actually make? It's not like I wanted them to scan the linux install too. lol
Now it's Spybot S&D,Ad-aware and AVG (free version). I don't feel like I am entitled to support since you get what you pay for. But, at least I'm not paying the yearly subscription/extortion money to Symantec in hopes that "nothing will happen" to the windows installs.
The first thing I do whenever I get a new PC or a new client is remove the Symantec GARBAGE from it. The only thing that the company puts out that is remotely useful is Ghost, and even thay had to buy someone out to do it right. Pathetic claims, and even more pathetic business practices. Spybot works well for what it does and the PRICE can't be beat. Anyone that charges money for this sort of thing doesn't deserve any business, unless they can guarantee 90%+ protection. Since no one can do that, no one should be paid for it. It's ridiculous to claim Spybot, who pretty much started the entire arena, "corrupts ghost images" - maybe if Ghost wasn't broken since 2003 (it now copies live filesystems on the fly - most of you know this is a BAD idea), there wouldn't be a problem?
I tell you what, remove your Symantec Ghost and use a better and free (as in beer and speech) product called QtParted.
Symantec owns BrightMail and IIRC, has a consumer level product as well.
If they can't handle spam, then that product manager deserves everything he gets.
Are there any 'for-profit' companies that get posted about on slashdot that people dont flame? Here's a likely scenerio: Symantec gets 2 or 3 calls a month out of maybe 5 to 10 thousand of corrupt images. They get a hold of the images and find it's the same corruption in each file, and the common software installed on each image is Spybot. They cant reproduce the problem in house and their customers are demanding answers. So they make a statement. I'm sure this scenerio has happened to plenty of other companies, but since were talking about the 4th largest software company in the world, we'll bash them. I have worked in Tech Support for a software company for 10 years. The crap that you see from the inside is amazing.. Sometimes you just gotta say 'We dont jive well with this other software package so dont use them together'. it's just the breaks.
I work in a computer store and service center as a technician, and it hurts me every time I have to tell a customer that Norton is their best option. McAfee, Norton's only real competitor, makes Norton look positively well-designed and bug-free. When Comcast started giving out McAfee SecurityCenter for free with service we saw a steady flood of computers coming in that had experienced extreme registry damage to the point of requiring a wipe and reload just from the McAfee install. Norton merely breaks Internet connectivity. I also haven't seen a system with both a working, updated install of Norton and Antispyware protection of some kind coming in with preventable spyware infections, so the job at least does get done.
I do have to admit that it's horrible that you need more than 256MB of RAM just to Run Norton and Windows XP at the same time and still have free RAM left. Also, why on Earth would they block all HTTPS traffic by default in Norton Internet Security?! It makes no sense! I'm also pretty pissed off about the fact that renewing your Norton subscription online, while it costs the same as buying a new copy retail, doesn't get you updates to the software, just more virus definitions. Despite these problems, there still aren't any good options for customers other than the one-two punch of Norton AV 2006 and Counter-Spy.
Uhhh.. Do you have any evidence of this? My computer doesn't become "clunky" when I download updates for Windows. If MS was implanting supposed spyware with its updates I'm sure everyone would have been discussing it on Slashdot by now.
I have never used Ghost, so I can't speak to this particular case, but I have some expertise in the more general case. Exchange 2000 and 2003 shipped with an interesting feature: a virtualized file system that pointed into the store. (Think WinFS or the BeOS file system backwards, if you will. Instead of exposing a hierarchical file system as a set of tables, it exposed a set of tables as a file system.) It was a cool feature, making possible some awesome speed hacks, so they exposed it to users as the M: drive. It worked like a dream, as long as nobody ever ran a virus scanner against it. Users being users, however, some would routinely ignore that warning and run a virus scanner against the M: drive. They had a ticking time bomb; sooner or later, the their internal CRC's would be rendered invalid by a direct rewrite, and their store would dismount violently. Disaster recovery time, baby! What does this have to do with spybot? Well, it's very likely that the Ghost corruptions, if they happen at all, are a one in a million occurence. In that case, Symantec may well not be able to figure out exactly what happened to cause the corruption, but may only be able to say, "Look, this is a corrupt image." If that is the case, then not only is Symantec no libelling spybot, but, in fact, the slandar is in the other direction.
I wont' trust any product with the name Norton on it any longer. Their firewall is nothing short of annoying (even to my non-techie mother,) the fact you have to pay for updates to your virus definitions bugged me so much I went back to AVG (which seems to do a better job of picking up stuff and eradicating it,) and Norton systemworks almost always killed my machine.
So, I think from my personal experience, that Symantec is indeed being libelous. I've had so many problems, even with the old DOS Norton Utilities, that I don't find it hard at all to believe Symantec would be trying to save face by blaming someone else.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
If you got a free trial, and it expires (AND STARTS ENDLESSLY BITCHING AT YOU), you can set your system clock back to before the expiration, run Live Update, ignore the error messages, and everything will get updated anyway.
Pretty lame for a 'security' company.
The latest Slashdot meme.
It must not have collapsed yet into a single quantum state. Perhaps an observer one quantum reality out from me would have a go at it so I could try again, and see if it collapses this time...though I suppose this message is bound to encounter some quantum turbulence, so who knows what will happen.
I must say, I am shocked, shocked to hear that Symantec might have said something untrue in order to promote their product or malign a competing product. Clearly they have always shown in the past that they hold themselves to the highest of ideals.
If I don't put anything here, will anyone recognize me anymore?
Somebody wanted to expunge some essence from reality, so they neatly redefined it.
According to Hebrews 11:1, Faith is the evidence of things unseen. For example, any evidence of a god or spiritual things is faith. But somebody wanted God to be ineffable, so they changed it so that it means something close to what the NIV says for 11:1 Now faith is being sure of what we hope for, and certain of what we do not see.
Tuning faith into a sort of "I know what to believe because I make it up myself sort of thing"
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say your statements about Microsoft installing spyware with Windows update are just patently false. If you're really seeing what you describe, you haven't done a good enough job of cleaning spyware from Internet Explorer before you run Windows Update. Try using Spybot S&D in addition to Adaware, and be sure to use all of the immunization features.
Breakfast served all day!
I have had two recent problems with Symantec:
1. A client with a new DEll PC that shipped with the latest "Internet Security" package - whatta pig! Just uninstalling this package made the computer easily 5X faster. By the same token their firewall (unecessary since SP2 built one into Windows) was sooo restrictive that he couldn't even use AOL's 800 number to find local numbers without temporarily disabling it.
2. The last client that I used Ghost to backup an image of their disk for backup/recovery crashed randomly until I disabled the resident portion that they left on the system. Why the hell does Ghost (at least in this application) need to have something running in the taskbar?
Of Spybot and any Symantec product, I know which I consider most expendable!
It is pure and simple junk. I have used earlier revisions of the product and they were great, but the new methods they imploy to duplicate drives has only served to corrupt drives for me, and in fact I was forced to reload from backup. When I called Symantec for support I was connected to outsourced support in India, with no Symantec suppport options above level 1 technicians, and these fellows who knew less about the product.
After sending me links to the FAQ's availible on the Symantec web page (which I had read and executed) they were unable to provide any additional help.
Needless to say, I was glad I had a backup, I restored, tossed the $90 Ghost package, and installed Arconis TrueImage http://www.acronis.com/
Have never looked back, and would never reccomend that anyone use Ghost
"...and always when I do a windows update (as there is always spyware added to any MS update, especially security updates)"
You are mistaken. Cosider looking for something that has slipped through your cleaning apps. Try running another clearner, like AdAware, to suplement the detection capabilities of SpyBot. Update and rerun your AV.
Point being, MS is not infecting your machine via updates, you must have something else.
I was wondering if you could post how you are going about scheduling adaware and spybot. As far as I know, you're probably using some sort of script to call the software and to update definitions. Any help in this regard would be appreciated greatly. Thank you
I donate to Spybot and use it on Windows. I donate to ClamWin and use it on Windows.
(Yes, I know about AVG. ClamWin is better and it is open-source.)
I ran Gamespy 3D and Arcade on a computer that had Symantec Corporate Client 10.0 (ok ok, in a not so "corporate" environment) and their stupid malware scanner kept finding these two products as adware and removing them completely without any trace. I tried to put them on the ignore list and it kept doing it. The funny thing is, I own both of these products and have advertisements DISABLED yet this piece of shit symantec software would not stop removing them no matter what I did. I ended up going on Symantec website and, what do you know, they have these products listed as Adware. I contacted both Symantec and GameSpy without much help (Gamespy actually responded and basically said there wasn't much they could do). If you go on Google and search for "Symantec Corporate Gamespy" you will see a link straight to Symantec. Unfortunately that link is broken, but Google cache will show it. Maybe they finally fixed it? I don't know. But their description for the product is retarded:
"Adware.GameSpyArcade is a game server browser that displays advertisements when the compromised computer is connected to the Internet through its customized browser."
How many products do this? They even mention the following:
"This program has to be manually installed."
Compromised computer.. with a manually installed program. Riiiiight. I know that programs don't have to be manually installed due to worms, etc. but Symantec needs to pull their heads out of their asses if they really think this is adware. If this is their definition of adware, there are sooo many products that could be removed from a typical users computer.
Fucking Symantec.
Unfortunately, Symantec keep buying nice software (Paragorn Partition Magic was the last one I remember) and making it suck.
They recently bought Veritas Backup Exec, which already sucked before the buyout.
Not to mention the nuisance of Dell installing Norton antivirus on every new computer, which I have to manually remove (to be replaced with ClamWin free antivirus software).
So, Symantec? Just Say No!
--frank[at]unternet.org
I deal with both enterprise class systems and general public systems on a daily basis and I have never seen a case that I could point to Spybot for corruption of any images, anywhere. Ghost in itself, at least the consumer version that the public can buy, has a tendency to corrupt it's own images (which I have seen on preinstalled products from the big computer manufacturers). In fact, one of the first things I tell people to do when they get it preinstalled on their computers is to remove it. The bootup engine is flaky and corrupts, well, everything. The OEM product sucks. In the enterprise environments, most have stepped away from Symantec products around 2000-2001. I know we went to Trend for all of our antivirus/spam needs. The engine isn't nearly as clunky for mass management as the NAV corporate products. Resources are WAY less on the Trend products as well... As far as the debate here with Spybot-S&D and how this is all going to play out; I would say that there will most likely be some litigation between the two. Symantec is really skirting libel here and they're using some monopolistic tactics to squeeze the little guy. Xserv
"I love lamp."
Who cares for Symantec and Spybot? I use Linux. I do not need antivirus or antispyware programs.
It's probably worth mentioning at this point that there's McAfee and there's McAfee - I was a (happy) customer of the home version until a forced "upgrade" to version 8 (I'd only tried to renew the DAT download licence). McAfee 8 is reliant on IE (as was the home version of Norton last time I looked) and doesn't work if IE is configured in a way that I'd consider remotely secure. I was also unimpressed with the way that it tried to replace MS' security centre and impose its own, claiming that I was "unprotected" without McAfee firewall (in spite of a software firewall from another manufacturer). Uninstalling it is also "interesting" including stuff in the registry referring to temp directories (ugh).
However, the non-home version I've used for years with a business hat on and haven't had a major issue with. Minor stuff sure - but compared to some of the problems our customers have with the competition no reason to switch (yet).
If anyone is still fighting with the home edition I'd recommend checking here: http://forums.mcafeehelp.com/
It's an official forum (not eidely publicised) but does tolerate people raising pertinent issues.
Thanx,we where just reconsidering which imaging application to use and it was basically down to ghost and a compeditor. With your suggestion you'ven added an other adversary to the list.
So allthough it might not really affect symantics bottum line this article might cost them around 100 licenses.
Regards
The reason I allege is that they want God to be ineffable. The things that you cite are the consequences of that reason, not the reason itself.
There are a few reasons why someone wanted God to be ineffible. One would be that if God is ineffable, only his chosen powerbase can carry out the will of God. Pretty handy if you are claiming to be that powerbase. Want proof? Excommunication is proof enough.
True faith is the past performance of the IRS and not the surity that one may choose to affect from it. In fact, that decoupling causes the results that you misread me saying was the cause. Once that decoupling occurs, any surety regardless of backing ends up being called faith.
I've han many people tell me to "Have some faith" when they wanted me to affect that surety, when I didn't have the evidence (real faith) with which to go on.
Norton used to be great. Remember those days? I am computer consultant for small and medium sized businesses and each time I see norton installed I suggest my clients to use an alternative. One client recently exclaimed "After I installed Norton, I ended dealing with Norton this, Norton that, I just want my computer to work." If Norton has an issue with a third party app, perhaps they should patch their software.
Every single thread regarding anything to do with Symantec is flooded with complaints about how bad Symantec products are. That's fine, I respect that opinion.
But what the hell do these complaints actually have to do with the topic at hand? Doesn't it distract from the actual complaint ("Spybot being accused of corrupting Ghost images" instead of "Ghost is crap, and so is NAV, NIS, and any other program with the words Norton and Symantec")?
Good grief.
...now I have to look for a better alternative on my work's computers. Any suggestions?
A CC-licensed illustrated horror novel
I use Ghost & Spybot regularly. I've never seen anything like this happen before. The only time I've seen any issues with corrupt Ghost images is when I image NTFS machines, occasionally those turn out corrupted - they still load, they just take forever. That's pretty rare too and in no way correlates with Spybot scans. Symantec is either stupid or trying to abuse their market position to malign Spybot.
Excommunication meant more than that. If the Church excommunicated someone, from the Church's point of view, and the perspective they wanted the excommunicated to have, it was issuing the person a ticket for a one way trip to Hell, so you'd better stay in line, or you're going straight to Hell.
I'm very well versed in Norton Ghost, but I have little experience with Spybot S&D. So, I decided to test out the application.
.GHO image, and makes modifications.
.AEX, .AEP, *.MPEG, *.BAT, *.ICA, etc.)
.GHO images and make changes leading to corruption. Unless, of course, older versions of the software had the ability to scan compressed files.
/autocheck /autofix /autoimmunize /autoclose.) Before executing Spybot however, I captured the testbed image and deployed to a new PC (same hardware configuration).
I assumed that images could be corrupted using 2 means:
1. Pre-image: Spybot is installed on the Ghost Server PC, deepscans the
2. Post-image: Spybot is part of the image, and causes damage after the target PC has been successfully imaged.
Pre-Image Testing:
I installed Spybot and quickly checked Spybot's Advanced Settings. In it, I noticed an option to "Ignore File Extensions". *.GHO (Ghost Images) was included in this list, as well as various other extensions (ie,
After further testing, though, it was revealed that Spybot does _not_ appear to scan compressed files. It should not be possible for Spybot to deepscan
Post-Image Testing:
Now, what if Spybot is installed as part of the image?
I installed Spybot S&D on a testbed PC with the intention of the application automatically scanning the harddrive and fixing issues
using it's default settings (ie, "spybotsd.exe
Upon restart, I was overwhelmed by the amount of legitimate registry entries and required files that Spybot chose to "correct". After Spybot fixed all issues, the Windows OS and our variety of applications were a complete and utter mess. I would officially have to say that Spybot corrupted the system.
I also contacted technicians from 2 major computer manufacturers. Generally, they had the same things to say about Spybot:
Q: How familiar are you with Spybot?
A: Very familiar.
Q: Have you ever seen any instances where Spybot corrupts the operating system?
A: Oh yeah.. _all_ the time. Our support team receives customer calls all of the time in regards to Spybot. It can damage system files and in many instances would detect spyware but not actually remove it. I'm not too sure about the most recent version, but all old versions are complete crap.
(Last time he had used Spybot was about 1 month ago. He had also mentioned something about Spybot "Installing toolbars". Did the software used to have Ad-Popups or something? I also learned that Spybot has caused Winsock damage in many cases.)
I tried using Spybot manually (rather than automatically scanning and fixing the system), and it seems that Spybot has many false-positives. Of all files detected, Spybot wanted to correct about 30 perfectly legitimate and required files (application dependent). If I was a simple user, I would most likely select ALL entries in this list and delete them without realizing the consequences. Other than those issues, CPU Utilization was pretty high and I tend to have a bad impression (and little respect) for software that is littered with grammatical and spelling errors.
I could see Symantec using a couple available defenses:
1. A Complete Defense: Symantec needs to prove that Spybot does indeed cause corruption of Ghost images. An image is considered an exact replica of the harddrive, but does not necessarily mean the pre-packaged/special format snapshot file. This means that Symantec would only need to prove that Spybot can indeed cause damage to software or the OS. Also note that multiple restarts are required which Spybot can interfere with or damage before the full imaging process is completed.
2. Honest Belief: Symantec would have to prove the facts on which their opinion is based. This was mentioned in a previous post; customers call in with a corrupted image, an
Yes, you are and yes, they out to get you so go run and hide in the closet; you can trust no one. Everyone knows about it but you.
I'm not entirely convinced that releasing the source code of an AV package is necessarily in the best interests of the community. I imagine a cluey virus writer (if there is such a thing) would find it useful.
I use AVG. I have for several years. A fantastic product.
Have you tried Safety.Net?. It's the best free Windows firewall I've found (one of the few that doesn't block ICS). Having said that, can anyone tell me how to get the Proximotron to co-operate with it? Answers on a postcard please...
1. The NIV translation is a reflection of the new meaning in common usage, and not a going back to see what words actually meant back then.
2. In most churches, the pastor is still the diviner of God's will, since most Christians still accept the long established lie of God's ineffability.
3. The NIV translation reinforces the pastor as the diviner of God's will and the fact that the pastor is the diviner of God's will reinforces the apparent truth of the NIV translation.
We've rather moved on quite a bit from that. You might want to consider keeping up with the direction the conversation is moving or you'll end up caught in the conversational equivalent of the getting run over at the nearest zebra crossing, which refers to a pattern of black and white stripes on roads, and not a crossing for actual zebras, for those coming across this posting that happen to be unaware of that fact.
It looks like the mods haven't read enough Hitchhiker's Guide. :-(
I used to see Symantec AntiVirus turn up false positives all the time (I think it was Norton AntiVirus 2000, it may have been a later version) and they never, ever updated it - it wasn't until they released their next major revision that they fixed it. (I do not remember the specific details now, and it's irrelevent to me now since I've migrated to Linux and when I DO have to run Windows, I use clamav)
/obligatory plug for open source
So my view is: what's good for the goose is good for the gander. If they can wait until major revisions and annoy customers, with their response being "just set it to ignore that file", why can't they be just as patient and wait for SpyBot's next major revision? Isn't Spybot at only 1.2 now? Can't Symantec just stop their bitching and wait for 2.0 to come out, at which point I'm sure that false positive bug will be fixed?
Lastly: why would anyone use Norton Ghost when Partimage is more flexible and doesn't encumber the process with DRM?
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Oops, I see they're at 1.4 now. My bad.
Still my point remains: Symantec can be patient and wait until 2.0. They make THEIR customers wait for a (billable/non-free) major revision for fixes for glaring bugs.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Well check out the EULA for the new media players and the service pack updates. They basically say they can spy on you.
maybe they should fix that ******* dialog where the buttons are obscured. It's been like that for far too long. That would never fly if Spybot wasn't freeware.
Why is this considered flame bait?
It's the reason I don't use Teatimer (prior to finding several better utiities that Teatimer that was.) CodestuffStarter, WinPatrol, PestPatrol etc.
Symantec is a company. Semantics is the study of words.
http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?t=3640 92&highlight=mcafee
I dropped Symantec last year when their "tech support" gave no useful explanation of why my installation could not authorise itself. Why such a tool needs to be authorised in this manner is another question that affects the decision to go with an alternative.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
I was at MacWorld in San Francisco recently because my company had a exhibition booth there, and a Symantec employee came to our booth. We were conversing for awhile, and then he proceeded to claim that there are viruses for OS X and went on to claim that there are malwares/spywares for OS X as well.
What rot. There's not *one" example of either a virus or malware/spyware for OS X in the wild that I am aware of.
I hate Symantec and Intego as well. Both purveyors of useless softwares for OS X who also engage in scaremongering. In the case of Symantec, it is well documented that their antivirus app can do some serious damage to an OS X volume. Assholes.
get a mac!
you've been employed by Symantec for how long now?
if your little homebrew test did indeed have that result, that's very far-fetched. This doesn't take into account the fact that Winblows XP whines with a BSOD/reboot if you replace parts in the system that weren't there at the time of installation. This means that not only do(es) the target system(s) have to be IDENTICAL in hardware configuration, in order to run a ghosted XP image, but because the hardware in the target PC (recieving the image) has to be identical for Winblows XP to even BOOT, I can't envisage Spybot finding so many changes to make, unless your image is chalk-full of garbage that you inadvertently left behind.
If your result was indeed as you posted and you can claim that all software registry entries/files/etc were indeed legit (read: NOT spyware-dependant P2P applications and the like), then yours could simply be an isolated case. But from personal experience, although I have not (and will not) attempt to recreate this user's test, I can say that this claim is unverified, unduplicated rubbish.
One test does not a confirmation make.
About those people you phoned: Had you stopped to think that maybe they were PAID to say what they said?
In a perfect (or at least better) world, Symantec would recognize Quality software and work with it, rather then compete with it. I look forward to the day Symantec executives begin jumping en masse from helicopters, sans parachutes.
how is babby formed?
Whoever modded your post 3, Informative - must not have read it carefully. If your post is not tongue in cheek, I call BS.
"I'm very well versed in Norton Ghost, but I have little experience with Spybot S&D. So, I decided to test out the application."
"Q: How familiar are you with Spybot?
A: Very familiar."
So, which is it - do you have "little experience with Spybot" or are you "Very familiar" with Spybot?
And your post just gets worse from there. Spybot corrupts the OS? Problems with Spybot installing toolbars?
What the hell?...Many of us here have used Spybot and have recommended it to users. Trust me when I say we would not do so were it to have all the problems you speak of.
That being said, IMO, Symantec products have sucked for a few years now. We switched to AVG and Acronis True Image years ago and have been much happier since.
MOD PARENT UP +5 funny and +5 insightful = +10
People call the command line interface in Windows XP "DOS" because it has mostly the same lame, unfinished utilities. In 1983 I sold computers with the CP/M operating system that came with a CLI called Pilot that was better in many ways than the Windows XP CLI. Of course, there was no GUI, only the CLI. And its true that the native CLI in CP/M was worse than DOS.
My experience with the newest version of Acronis is that it is far better than Ghost.
Acronis is not perfect, but much less stupid than Symantec, in my experience.
I don't know what the GP was doing, but AutoIt and AutoHotkey are excellent, and the best in their fields. Use AutoIt for scripting, AutoHotkey for hotkeys. Free.
You won't need much technical support, because they work.
Use the SciTe IDE for AutoIt. Very nice. The install package takes care of installing AutoIt, too.
This guy is full of complete and utter bullshit. Almost every helpdesk I've had any dealings with, and two I've worked at, recommend SpyBot and Ad-Aware incessantly. I've never seen it damage a system. The only problems I've ever had with either is that they occasionally can break winsock when removing some particularly annoying spyware. There's utilities that easily fix the damaged registry keys however.
Plus, this persons example makes NO SENSE. Why would spybot go crazy after an image was restored, but not before, unless Ghost (AKA Drive Image) did something wrong when making/restoring the image? Not to mention that Ghost 10 (Aka Drive Image) has a long history of generating corrupt images when making them while running the system. This is a documented problem on many Ghost and Drive Image forums and Symantec has demonstrated that it doesn't care. (See http://ghost.radified.com/) Hot-imaging is a non-feature prone to making bad images.
Well, since Spybot has fixed almost every computer with a problem I've put it on, and Norton AV has broken more than 3 computers I've seen it on, I'd have to go with Spybot's version of events.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
In addition, Spybot never broke winsock, it can remove spyware dll(s) that have been made a part of winsock, causing winsock to malfunction. Microsoft had such a flood of these issues, they added netsh command to reset the winsock catalog. not spybot's fault, most spyware removals did the same.
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/atta ck_sigs/s20070.htmla ck_sigs/s20069.htmlu rity/Content/8732.htmlu rity/Content/3.3.2003.html ...and so on and so forth.
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/att
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/sec
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/sec
No OS is immune to vulnerabilities.
Additionally, I use NIS at home because I've tried the free alternatives (AVG and ClamWin) and found them to be rot. For some reason, every time I install AVG, my web browsing goes to crap. I have to refresh every page to get it to come up and I find unacceptable delays. NIS does the scanning with no noticeable performance hit.
I hate to get in these flame wars, but I honestly don't get the passion. I've tried the alternatives and found them to be shoddy. I'll stick with what works.
... DEAR.. LORD.. Did anyone of those who commented to the post even _READ_ it? I mean, Holy Crap. How do these people find their way to Slashdot.org? Of all of the questions asked, the answers were in the original post. Please read it 3 more times. And if you still don't understand, read it 3 more. Or was it just your failed attempt at clever rhetoric? Then again, maybe this is just a problem that all Slashdot posters experience. I'll simply overlook the ignorace and continue to move forwards.
I'm very well versed in Norton Ghost, but I have little experience with Spybot S&D. So, I decided to test out the application."
"Q: How familiar are you with Spybot?
A: Very familiar."
So, which is it - do you have "little experience with Spybot" or are you "Very familiar" with Spybot?
He is not very experienced with Spybot. He called 2 manufacturers and asked THEM how familiar they are with spybot, and THEY told him that THEY are very familiar.
they occasionally can break winsock when removing some particularly annoying spyware. There's utilities that easily fix the damaged registry keys however.
Yeah, so if it breaks your winsock, you can just go online and download the repair utility, right?
Do a fresh install of any windows os, then run adaware...
sure there is proof. proof that you can see for yourself...
try it, see it for yourself, Or continue to believe what you want.
To correct an error in my post above this, I meant 'batch' not 'bash'. Silly typo. However, I thing it's a bad idea to call it DOS and I get annoyed when people do. Techinally it's not DOS, DOS is an OS, the command line is just an interface to the OS. They may look the same, but that's only on the outside. Saying they're the same is like saying Windows 2000 and ME are the same.
I definitely agree with you, though, that the shell is very lame.
And if you visit a purple state, you get the best of red and blue states, Country and RAP. It's more commonly known as CRAP!
McAfee is the biggest POS I've ever used. I had it many years ago on Windows NT, but the update feature never worked properly. Worse, if I changed the password on the NT Administrator account, McAfee ceased to run. Now, many years later, they use that garbage where I work. The stupid thing spikes the CPU about every 10 seconds with a process named mcupdate.exe. It causes all Windows Explorer windows to hang every time it does this. Without admin rights on the local PC at work, I'm stuck with these rogue processes.
Oh and don't get me started with how it wants to use INTERNET EXPLORER. Any program that hooks into IE is USELESS!
1. Uninstall Norton if it's already there. You may also have to manually delete some files for this to work, so you're better off starting from scratch if possible.
2. Set your system clock FORWARD 10 years.
3. Install Norton.
4. Download your updates.
5. Reboot as needed.
6. Now set your system clock back to normal.
7. Continue to be able to update your definitions for the next 11 years.
8. ???
9. Profit!!!
Mwahahaha. My script image of the day is "retrofit"! ;)
uuuuh.. i read it.. once.. it's a well thought out post.. good methodology. your testing makes a lot of sense.. i have to say that in my years of doing the same thing, i've never had this problem.. although there are 2 major differences in the way we work.. (assuming you actually DO use NAV & Ghost reguarly, the OP does imply this)
/me shrugs
1) i don't use symantec products. like many other posters i've been both a helpdesker and a shop pc tech.. in my experience, their products have cause more harm than good. again, this is a common response. it's not hard to see why people didn't read your post properly, because there is an overwhelming animosity towards norton av and symantec in general.
2) why the hell are you trying to run Spybot on startup anyway? i HOPE it's merely for testing purposes..
anyway, the OP gives the impression that, while you may be very familliar with ghost and drive imaging in general, you don't really know anything about spybot.. if you have to resort to 'some helpdesk guy' who talks about toolbars being bundled with the software, your credibility goes out the window.. which is unfortunate, because the first half of the post is very well thought out..
also, it should be noted that the scenario you talk about with apps providing false positives is quite common.. but not with Spybot.. if this were, say, a discussion about Hijackthis (for example) i could understand.. but spybot?
urk
oh yeah.. i'd like to state for the record that i do actually buy symantec's version of events in regard to this problem.. i simply don't care.
i'm not concerned with any libel case, but i DO know which of these products (either spybot OR Nav AND Ghost) i'd rather use.
urk
http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?t=3640 92&highlight=mcafee
In an application requires a specific browser to be set as default then the problem is with that application. However it can be an uphill struggle getting the vendor to accept that this is the case. They'd rather blame everything except the inability of their programmers...
thats wrong. It's unethical imho.
submitting that address to lists is unethical.
Leaving it on the page is not. That address would be no more susceptible than others that belong to customers that have ended up on the web for various reasons. If the products they claim can handle normal levels of spam can not, they are reaping what they sowed.
I also haven't seen a system with both a working, updated install of Norton...
As far as I'm concerned, you can stop right there. My experiences with various versions of Symantec products always broke down at the "working, updated" portion. Every run of Liveupdate was a crapshoot, waiting to see if I would once again have to uninstall and reinstall the entire package because an update failed. For a while I had a permanent link to the page with their special uninstall tool, because it generally took four to five reinstalls for one to get past its very first Liveupdate uncorrupted.
What finally moved me away from Symantec forever was when one of our systems that hadn't been on the internet for a while got connected, did a Liveupdate, and promptly went belly-up. After much searching, I found an item in Symantec's knowledge base explaining how a particular patch could cause the problem we developed. But the article was dated several months before, and the flawed patch was still available on Liveupdate!
Symantec is unprofessional, unreliable, and unconcerned about its consumers.
I figure by 2030 or so my 6-digit UID will be something to brag about.