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False positive on both AOL Spyware Protection and PestPatrol?
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False positive on both AOL Spyware Protection and PestPatrol?
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False positive on both AOL Spyware Protection and PestPatrol? |
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#1 |
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I just ran a scan with both AOL Spyware Protection and
PestPatrol's free online scanner and both detected ISTbar. I looked at the location of the file that was "infected" through PestPatrol and it said it was c:\windows\system32\mciwndx.ocx. When I checked the properties of that file, the description was MCIWndX OLE Control Module and the Company was Microsoft. After doing a search at microsoft.com, I determined the file was from Visual Basic 5.0 Learning Edition. I installed the Learning Edition on my system a while back, and aparantly these two apps are falsely detecting the file as an infection, when it really isn't. I have run scans with MSAS, Ad- Aware, Spybot, ewido, and the trial version of Giant AntiSpyware (before MS bought out Giant Company) and none have ever detected this as an infection. I've used past versions of AOL Spyware Protection and it didn't detect this infection either. I'm thinking that AOL might be now using PestPatrol as their engine for the latest version of their spyware scanner, since both are detecting the same files and other scanners aren't keying in on these files. Both are detecting PowerReg Scheduler, which was installed in my Startup folder when I installed an Iomega ZIP drive a few years ago, which is listed as adware. They are also both detecting ExecutiveSoftware's Deleted File Analysis Utility, which both are detecting as a misc tool. Neither of these files has ever been flagged by the MSAS, Ad-Aware, ewido, Spybot, not the trial version of Giant AntiSpyware (before MS bought out Giant Company). Alan |
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#2 |
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Thanks, Alan--This is illustrative of the nature of the beast. False
positives are a problem for every antispyware vendor and app. What will differentiate them is how responsive the team is to reports. I believe Microsoft has done quite well in this regard, judging from what we've seen in these groups. -- "Alan" <detredwingsfan1@aol.com> wrote in message news:00cf01c5c8bc$dc2c1310$a601280a@phx.gbl... >I just ran a scan with both AOL Spyware Protection and > PestPatrol's free online scanner and both detected > ISTbar. I looked at the location of the file that > was "infected" through PestPatrol and it said it was > c:\windows\system32\mciwndx.ocx. > > When I checked the properties of that file, the > description was MCIWndX OLE Control Module and the > Company was Microsoft. After doing a search at > microsoft.com, I determined the file was from Visual > Basic 5.0 Learning Edition. I installed the Learning > Edition on my system a while back, and aparantly these > two apps are falsely detecting the file as an infection, > when it really isn't. I have run scans with MSAS, Ad- > Aware, Spybot, ewido, and the trial version of Giant > AntiSpyware (before MS bought out Giant Company) and > none have ever detected this as an infection. > > I've used past versions of AOL Spyware Protection and it > didn't detect this infection either. I'm thinking that > AOL might be now using PestPatrol as their engine for the > latest version of their spyware scanner, since both are > detecting the same files and other scanners aren't keying > in on these files. > > Both are detecting PowerReg Scheduler, which was > installed in my Startup folder when I installed an Iomega > ZIP drive a few years ago, which is listed as adware. > They are also both detecting ExecutiveSoftware's Deleted > File Analysis Utility, which both are detecting as a misc > tool. Neither of these files has ever been flagged by > the MSAS, Ad-Aware, ewido, Spybot, not the trial version > of Giant AntiSpyware (before MS bought out Giant Company). > > Alan |
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