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Consumer Reports Creates Viruses to Test Software

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the trial-by-fire dept.

Maximum Prophet writes to mention an MSNBC article about a Consumer Reports plan to test anti-virus software by creating viruses. Security companies are objecting, on the grounds that it's a generally accepted practice not to create viruses for any reason. From the article: "Consumer Reports didn't create thousands of new viruses from scratch. Rather, it took a handful of existing viruses and created hundreds of slight variants, changing the malicious programs just enough to evade detection by an antivirus program with a list of known threats. That's a common trick in the virus writing world; it's standard for a successful virus to inspire dozens of variants. "

2 of 241 comments (clear)

  1. Symantec et al. are stupid by Evro · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Security companies are objecting, on the grounds that it's a generally accepted practice not to create viruses for any reason.

    You mean they aren't already doing this internally? If not... what the hell are they doing all day? If they're just being reactive without testing their software against possible variants then their software isn't really useful. Though frankly I find antivirus software to be a cure worse than the disease. A 1/100 chance I'll get a virus that does bad things to my computer, or a 100% chance that my computer will run like crap due to NAV.

    Solution? Backup all my documents (mostly pics) to a dvd monthly and trust my Linux box firewall/router/proxy to keep the bad bits out.

    --
    rooooar
  2. The real thing is by Sycraft-fu · · Score: 5, Interesting

    AV software WILL protect you from new viruses... Just not McAfee and Symantec's crap. Well I suppose I should rephrase: Their software can protect you, but not very well, not as well as others. Bitdefender appears to do the best job at finding viruses that it doesn't have in it's DB. AVG also seems to do a pretty good job.

    That's what they are afraid of. Not that it will be revealed their software does nothing, it does work, just that there is cheaper software that works better.