GIANT Microsoft Antispyware -- Is it legit?

[David]

I received a message from my Taskbar indicating that a MS antispyware
update was ready. I clicked 'Yes' to download, and now have a shortcut
on my desktop (with MS target symbol icon) to --

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft AntiSpyware\GIANTAntiSpywareMain.exe."
-
My question is, is this shortcut legit or should I delete it?
-
Thanks,
David

 

[Adam Piggott]

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I received a message from my Taskbar indicating that a MS antispyware
update was ready. I clicked 'Yes' to download, and now have a shortcut
on my desktop (with MS target symbol icon) to --

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft AntiSpyware\GIANTAntiSpywareMain.exe."
-
My question is, is this shortcut legit or should I delete it?

The "GIANT" bit is a remnant of the original program from "GIANT Software"
which Microsoft borged (aka brought out) a while ago.

It is indeed a legitimate shortcut.


- --
Adam Piggott, Proprietor, Proactive Services (Computing).
http://www.proactiveservices.co.uk/

Please replace dot invalid with dot uk to email me.
Apply personally for PGP public key.
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[Vanguard]

I received a message from my Taskbar indicating that a MS antispyware
update was ready. I clicked 'Yes' to download, and now have a
shortcut
on my desktop (with MS target symbol icon) to --

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft AntiSpyware\GIANTAntiSpywareMain.exe."
-
My question is, is this shortcut legit or should I delete it?

You don't know from where Microsoft got their anti-spyware product?
When you visit
http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/software/default.mspx
to download it, there at the bottom is mention of Giant. For some more
info, you can read
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2004/dec04/12-16GIANTPR.mspx.
A Google search on "+Giant +Microsoft acquires" will turn up more
results. The "beta" versions are being offered while Microsoft fixes
the product to meet the requirements of being a Microsoft product that
can run under multiple platforms, under different types of accounts,
fixes the bugs that Giant left in their code, and get an enterprise
version available (the personal version is supposed to remain free). If
you look in Task Manager's Processes tab, you'll also see a couple of
gcas* processes when MSAS is running. The naming of the files still
reflects the old Giant code.

No anti-malware is sufficient against all pests so you should still
employ a suite of anti-malware tools besides MSAS, like Ad-Aware, Spybot
S&D, CWshredder, LSPfix, SpywareBlaster, and Prevx Home (if you feel up
to understanding it). Anti-virus software is also a must as is a decent
firewall (i.e., better than the one included in Windows).

 

[Wilbur Post]

No anti-malware is sufficient against all pests so you should still
employ a suite of anti-malware tools besides MSAS, like Ad-Aware, Spybot
S&D, CWshredder, LSPfix, SpywareBlaster, and Prevx Home (if you feel up
to understanding it). Anti-virus software is also a must as is a decent
firewall (i.e., better than the one included in Windows).

I've been using the MS Giant program for awhile and it hasn't found one bit
of spyware. I'm also using the others, but they find stuff from time to
time.

 

[Vanguard]

I've been using the MS Giant program for awhile and it hasn't found
one bit
of spyware. I'm also using the others, but they find stuff from time
to
time.

It depends on what other "stuff" the "others" are finding. Some of
those others have deliberate false positives to con you into buying
their software. Tis easy to say "others" have found malware missed by
MSAS when you deliberately omit who are those "others". For example,
SpyDoctor is rogueware; see
http://www.spywarewarrior.com/rogue_anti-spyware.htm. Just because you
get an alert and just because the utility purports to eradicate it
doesn't mean you actually had it. Even SpySweeper and PestPatrol have
false positives. However, for PestPatrol, they provide a list of manual
eradication instructions (http://www3.ca.com/securityadvisor/) so you
can see if their alerts are real or not (but it takes time to walk
through all through instructions to see if anything it claims to be on
your host is really there). Although a little old now,
http://spywarewarrior.com/asw-test-guide.htm (click on the "Results Page
#x" links) shows that none of them provide 100% coverage so you need to
use a suite of tools to overlap their coverage.