Does Anti-Virus make a difference?

Like so many of us in the profession, I was asked to look at friend’s computer. Nothing specific was wrong; she had just moved out of an “Friend/Ex-Friend’s” house. She was worried that they might have done something to her machine. So I started looking at it. Nothing looked really out of place. The owner would never install anything (including updates or e-mail links). So after updating everything, I started to scan for viruses and malware. That’s when I noticed that there was no anti-virus software. I thought that was odd because there was the update program. I asked if she had uninstalled it and she said, “no.” It then hit me:  the “evil plan” was to remove her anti-virus and trouble would soon follow.  Fortunately, her “safe-surfing” habits of never opening or installing programs had saved her! Even after 3 months of surfing, she still had a clean machine. I guess this is pretty good evidence that “Safe-Surfing” and a little luck can keep you safe.

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Symantec chat no better but Good phone support!

So after having fun / failure with Sony I chatted with Symantec. The only saving grace was that the lady I talked to on the phone was awesome and friendly. Sadly Norton doesn’t seem to offer this disk anymore. They did offer to clean the machine if I could get it on the net but I couldn’t as you’ll see.

(I didn’t change the phone number. It’s the one I gave him.)

Mr. David has entered room.

Manu has entered room.

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:07:50 EDT 2008)>Welcome to Symantec Support, my name is Manu.

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:08:07 EDT 2008)>Welcome to Symantec Virus & Spyware Solutions.

Is this the first time you are contacting us or do you have a Priority ID?

Mr. David (Fri Jun 27 19:15:06 EDT 2008)>First time

Mr. David (Fri Jun 27 19:15:13 EDT 2008)>no ID sorry

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:08:38 EDT 2008)>May I confirm your email address as  

xxx@xxx.net and direct phone number as  123-123-1234  , am I right?

Mr. David (Fri Jun 27 19:15:32 EDT 2008)>correct.

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:09:01 EDT 2008)>May I know which country you are

connected from and Please provide me your alternate phone number or mobile

number.

Mr. David (Fri Jun 27 19:16:08 EDT 2008)>I don’t have one.

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:09:43 EDT 2008)>May I know which country you are

connected from?

Mr. David (Fri Jun 27 19:16:39 EDT 2008)>USA

Mr. David (Fri Jun 27 19:16:44 EDT 2008)>Cleveland OH

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:10:15 EDT 2008)>May I know if your computer is on network

or it is a stand alone PC?

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:10:18 EDT 2008)>Are you connected from the computer,

which is facing this particular issue?

Mr. David (Fri Jun 27 19:17:15 EDT 2008)>Do you still have the file

that you can download and burn to a CD to boot a computer?

Mr. David (Fri Jun 27 19:17:26 EDT 2008)>Standalone

Mr. David (Fri Jun 27 19:17:37 EDT 2008)>Its not this computer

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:10:59 EDT 2008)>I shall explain that

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:11:06 EDT 2008)>Thank You for all the information. I

would now create a Priority ID for you.

Mr. David (Fri Jun 27 19:18:08 EDT 2008)>The machine restarts the

desktop whenever i try to do anything

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:12:16 EDT 2008)>Thank You for your patience.

Your Priority ID is  nnnnnnnnnn. Please make a note of it for future

reference.

Mr. David(Fri Jun 27 19:19:26 EDT 2008)>Is there a way to build a

current bootable cd from inside norton Corporate ed.

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:12:41 EDT 2008)>As I understand from your issue

description is you want a CD to boot your PC ,Am I correct?

Mr. David(Fri Jun 27 19:19:52 EDT 2008)>Yep, Then I can try to fix it.

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:13:31 EDT 2008)>David , do you suspect virus/spyware

activity in your computer?

Mr. David(Fri Jun 27 19:20:27 EDT 2008)>Yes

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:14:03 EDT 2008)>David , do you suspect virus/spyware

activity in your computer?

Mr. David(Fri Jun 27 19:21:07 EDT 2008)>yes/yes

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:14:51 EDT 2008)>May I know whether you have downloaded

any free software’s, animation’s, free music, movies etc from the
internet recently? Or did you accept any ActiveX controls or video codec’s

when prompted from unreliable websites?

Mr. David(Fri Jun 27 19:22:24 EDT 2008)>I didn’t. A friend asked me to

help him fix the laptop.,

Mr. David(Fri Jun 27 19:23:04 EDT 2008)>Right now the system restarts

explore.exe about ever 10 to 20 second.

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:16:38 EDT 2008)>David ,We will help you resolve all the

virus issues from your system, by transferring you to our virus removal
technicians, who will take Remote Access of your computer , diagnose the

computer completely and resolve theissues for youHowever, for that you will need to connect from the infectedcomputer

Mr. David(Fri Jun 27 19:23:52 EDT 2008)>The machine can’t connect to the internet.

Mr. David(Fri Jun 27 19:24:06 EDT 2008)>That’s why I was looking for the boot cd.

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:17:59 EDT 2008)>David ,In that case, we will not be able

to help you. We can help you only if you are chatting to me from the infected pc
as we will have to take control over that particular pc tinfecting the computer

Mr. David(Fri Jun 27 19:25:31 EDT 2008)>Do you know if you still have

the boot cd on your website?

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:19:14 EDT 2008)>I request you to check that on the website

Manu(Fri Jun 27 16:19:19 EDT 2008)>Is there anything else I can help you with?

Mr. David(Fri Jun 27 19:26:29 EDT 2008)>I did but I couldn’t find it.

That is why I did the chat.

Mr. David(Fri Jun 27 19:26:43 EDT 2008)>Nothing else. Thanks

Once again reading the language is different from knowing it. What they need is a way to build a Virus cleaning CD/DVD.

Almost pwnd by my watch!

So I bought a MP3 watch on E-Bay. It has 2gig of storage and doesn’t look like an MP3 watch. So I waited my two to three weeks for the slow boat to get here. I plugged the watch in to charge and started reading the instructions. That was a waste of time, I can understand anything the tried to translate. The next day I plug it into my computer and Norton pop’s up and the message is Warning infected with W32.Rajump – RavMon.exe

The ad said “100%NEW! Never been Used Before.” I e-mailed them asking why there was a virus on it and they answered with the following.

Dear E-BayID,
We apologize for any inconveniences this may have caused you. we will give you full refund, please check your paypal account later, and please feel free to return the items to follow address and leave positive feedback to us, we will do same to you:
To:OU YANG YONG
Address: 16G Block C, guo qi Building, Shang Bu road, Futian Shenzhen, China 518000
Please mark my Tel number on the mail:13724288098
Please mark the item number and your ebay id in the mail.
If you have any further questions, please feel free to contact us through ebay message so that we can respond you in time.
sorry again.
yourS
Lisa

I have e-mailed them again:

Dear excellbay,

Hi,
I want to keep the watch, not return it. The reason the I was e-mailing was to find out why a “new” watch would have a virus on it? The issue of positive or negative feedback I haven’t even thought about. Sadly I got the watch as promissed the question is if it is truly new with a virus?
Thanks
Dave

FYI:The E-bay user is: excellbay