Does anyone think AVG LinkScanner is useful next to the existing Avast Anti-virus and (OA) firewall for another extra layer of protection against spyware, Adware. The only reason I am asking is I uninstalled Spyware Terminator (found out them and spyware begone were rouge software in the past) and I dont have a resident spyware shield to protect me online.
The people that have used this product, is Linkscanner a toolbar (I hate toolbars) or is it similar to spyware blaster, spybots Immzi or is it a web guard protection, because I can’t find another free spyware shield. And does anyone know if spyware guard is still useful or is it out of date software and protection.
Do u think LinkScanner is a useful software to use.
Edit: and no to Windows Defender, Microsoft and security don’t match.
I do not know what operating system you are using but Finjan SecureBrowsing works fine on XP as it can be made to be at the right end of the menu bar: http://securebrowsing.finjan.com
Microsoft’s Security Essentials is another layer of protection for me.
Thanks YoKenny and AdDict for the information on Finjan plugin, I had installed it but it seems to be quite slow to load up the scanning results of the web link for my XP computer.
Im currently trying “Web of Trust” to scan my links and I’m testing it at the moment. Do you guys know if Web of Trust is as reliable as Finjan to scan bad web links.
Hey hi Tech, nice to see u I did have Finjan install but it’s scan’s of the links takes a long time to load, so I’m not sure if that is normal on my PC.
Do you know of any other’s and do u know if Web of trust is reliable cos i just read they get their results from community groups, and with community groups alot can bs and have bias results.
Yes, it’s not fast. I think is the price for a secure search.
I think WOT has too much negative information (false positives). Any suspicion will warn out as will the infected sites.
I dropped WOT some months ago.
For me Finjan was way to slow, especially on dial-up and that is why I stuck with WOT which is much faster, with all its warts, it is used for guidance for me and not slavish abeyance.
You need to understand and use WOTs ways of warning/blocking. If you dont care about social chitchat about a site being half-yellow or full-yellow then set it to only block RED sites. Of those there are very few false positives, if any. Ive never seen one the 2 months Ive tested WOT anyway. Secret to transparent WOT protection is to use settings in plugin. Sign up and make your own WOT, almost…
They claim to be aware of idiots playing the system and I think they have succeded but stay out of silly arguments - cant evaulate whole internet anyway! Is the only effective tool of this kind when we are talking about dangerous sites. Takes few minutes to find bad sites/downloads unknown to Mcafee/Norton/AVG but RED-blocked by WOT. Output of those sites is also unknown to more than a few AV-products. These sites pop up 24/7 and WOT have contact with good sources providing links - the others are much slower. Protection is not better than sources since this is old blacklisting. You can find those site at WOT site but be careful when testing. But you will find that WOT block when others have no clue and definitely not to trust AV-scanner too much. Is very educational if you think you are safe as long as you use Avast, Avira, AVG. Actually since I dont have kids, know internet quite well, my main interest in WOT is to check how bad AV programs are
Sadly today WOT made an agreement with PANDA! Partnership or whatever. Seems to me like independence has changed a bit. Panda will be yet another source to WOT, which is good, but they also say WOT members will get extended trials of PANDA software. We will see if that exclude other companies or what will happen. Panda will use branded versions of WOT, lets hope that is all. http://www.pandasecurity.com/homeusers/downloads/WOT/
One of the most used sources is hpHosts btw, http://hosts-file.net/ as said be careful when testing or use link extend. Will not take long to see why WOT is effective and the others pretty much useless. WOT will of course know all those sites but so should AVG etc. They dont. In some cases that goes for AV too - you will be surprised/alarmed. They have obvious problems with sites offering legit programs but with bad sideeffects/behavoir, like trying to trigger you to pay for useless functionallity. Scams in various clothing! Google “Registry fix boost” for examples, also notice google ads on those sites - but of course Google is not blocked, too many get money from them… Users find out before AV-companies who have their own definition of what “protection” is.
hpHosts also blocks myspace and many other sites you probably would not expect. Check out why. Ok, but why dont they block download centrals like Softpedia or Majorgeeks then? Majorgeeks actually host the very same programs hpHosts block! Does not make sense. Also try do make a “negative” comment about those sites on WOT - good luck! You can question features about most sites/programs. Trusting random/crazy people on the internet is not the way to go but as said WOT works great at only blocking 100% sure to be crap sites, mostly based on sources collecting them, not democracy. Pretty sure that will take out the false positives danger Tech noticed. It must or WOT will die sooner than later.
Avast should have bought out WOT months ago btw 8) Plugin is great and modifiable, their network of sources superb, have some community (potential buyers!) flavour to it as well.
WOT can’t be compared with the effectiveness of WebShield. Please, do not compare any antivirus before knowing exactly the accuracy and the protection given by avast.
You’re just making ad of WOT and FUD of other antivirus.
I found that Finjan does not work on Windows 7 so I am using Browser Defender™ Website Safety Lookup: http://www.browserdefender.com
Whatever browser site indicator you use is only as good as its maintainers just like any malware detection application’s developers so use them as you like but I would not run 2 as they probably would slow down browsing.
Im basing my judgement on testing and checking out how WOT works. Of interest is updated sources and flexible pluging. What matters. Webshield have nothing to do with WOT and does not come close in actual protection. I did not mention or compare with WebShield but that and any other http scanner do not overlap WOT - that is 100% sure. Also goes for regular file scanner. WOT can be seen as a big complaint against the old AV companies and their idea of what protection is - and how great their own products are.
Im definitely criticizing AV products in general, including Avast but nice to hear they have been aware of WOT. There should not be a need for WOT or even build-in WOTs in browsers like IE8. Actually there is not if you buy ads from companies. Some would even reject the idea of “3rd party”/“other” programs. Not really FUD´ing anything but focused on what works and what does not. Ive seen Avira, NOD32, Norton miss downloads from blocked WOT sites, just how it is…
I have used WOT for some considerable time and it is no different to other security related applications in regard of false indication/no indication. I have seen many false positives and I have also seen many false negatives, which is why it should be used for guidance, it is not 100%
Or you don’t know what you’re posting because you don’t know how WebShield works, its capabilities and accuracy.
And avast?
Can you post examples? We, users, will be glad if you help improve avast detection?
Please, post “dead” links and not live ones that an user can inadvertently click.
Well if you said some I would be puzzled but many? Are those many RED flagged site? I surely hope not and doubt it as well. Not that easy to red-flag a site if even possible. Ive seen 1 up to now. You have some examples? All sites have their own page so lets fix errors. Sources are most important I guess but the option of setting up plugin as you wish is a close second. Can be transparent until needed - which means such a setup is great for people not capable of or interested in evaluating whats up and down. That is where it shines, not like everyone must have an opinion on any website. You dont have to participate in the social chitchat about whats wrong or not. As soon as internet-democracy decides much I would not trust anything. Seems to me WOT is split up in sections, the one Im happy about, and do not find elsewhere, is the one being fed by sources like hpHosts - or what actually works 100% foolproof. Im not dissing their advanced algorithms figuring out who´s evaluations is to be trusted - I just prefer hpHosts type of sources. I dont really care much for anything but RED though of course a yellow could later turn out to be a true RED. Well, WOT is just another little helper.
As mentioned it is very easy to test and show WOT is not AVG, Norton or other similar tool or is waste of time because you have http scanner activated, regardless of what it says on the box. Test over a periode of time, Firefox/IE8 will block as well - have improved a lot btw! Disable them to make it easier. Subscripe to hpHosts in RSS-Reader, make it easy to test many domains. And WOT is similar to the rest? Ive done such sessions a many many times and of course WOT looks great because I use some of their suppliers of bad links - point is how bad the others are, and how AV like Avast deal with incomings from those links.
No not close to 100% but easy to prove it adds to defense - in some cases your only defense. You can make all AV-products look bad, they also are not close to 100%. I do use Avast but have Avira on main computer. Have submitted many files to them originating from hpHosts sites. Really a good way of losing faith in active/heuristic/magical protection - or rather being naive Same as some products like Malwarebytes have shown to be quite useful even if there should not be much need for them. Users should ignore promises and supplement away, and here WOT is a good choice. If service is being exploited more than the odd site, value vanish quickly but I doubt that is the case.
Well test away yourself Tech. I can give you some links to sources should you think hpHosts is not enough. Im merely stating facts and not bashing Avast, not more than the others. As said I do have Avira running as well so… You can easily prove the usefullness of WOT - why is that trolling?
I did not code Webshield but I guarantee you are making a mistake thinking you can freely click around on those sites WOT blocks. Very naive.
If you go to any malware removal forum you will see people mostly do have AV installed and yet still get in trouble. Think you should focus on the concept of layered defense rather than praising/prodecting one or the other product - let advertising do that.
Many is more than a few, which I count as three, so more than three (I haven’t been keeping count) have been red flagged when there is nothing at the site. So these are false positives.
As for false negatives, many, many of those, e.g. no alert at all by WOT, when the site is a known malware distribution site, or flagged by Firefox, or google safe browsing and or blocked by the network shield or alerts by the web shield. Normally when the network shield blocks a site I do some investigation to try to find out why and that usually starts with a google search and in most cases there is no WOT flagging.
There have been very few of these network shield blocks that have turned out to be false positives, and often it has been sites that have previously been hacked and serving up malware and after a clean-up are still on the network shield malicious site list.
It is the false negative that is potentially more dangerous as you go there with a false (excuse the pun) sense of security, so WOT is far from 100%. So it is a guide only and you should maintain a level of proactive defence.
I can only refer to hpHosts once again. Those sites you see listed 24/7 are not false positives at all. Some of them will have executables not detected by AVs. You see the idea? These sites are being flagged as RED in WOT. You must understand how WOT works - Im not praising social chitchat which becomes spamming/arguing in 10 seconds. Im not sure you understand the value Im happy with - and if you do it is flawed because 1. WOT dont work as system and 2. Avast is enough? Test, test…
Try orbasoft.com also a harmless site, clean according to Mcafee/Norton, with a harmless download no AV detects if you ask Virustotal. Oh yeah. This is actually harmless to install and is part of the gray area where Malwarebytes and others kick - also due to limitations of the old AV companies. But I dont mind giving that link. 2 weeks or so ago they had a registry checker thingy, now security. Same scam and there are tons of them - why WOT has a purpose.
Also you must understand that people posting on forums like this probably dont even need WOT at all. This is a little helper for less tech knowledgeable people. If set up right it does not require user action but you are correct in that false positives/gaming their system will render it useless. Ive been worried about that since I learned about WOT but it does seem to do the job when it comes to the not up for debate sites. I could not care less of a green lamp but bordering on yellow if child is 11.5 years old and live in Hungary - lets discuss…
If tiny malwaredomains is “quite good” how can hpHosts be questionable? I know those sources, they are also talked about on WOT forums - they ask for new ones even. Their strength is other companies are lazy. This is a 24/7 business, not weekly updates of half-dead links - throw hpHosts in your Google Reader and see for yourself. Use a linkify add-on in Firefox and do 10 fast ones, then 10 more. Cant spot anyting? I dont understand. Ive yet to see any healthy sites at hpHosts. Vast majority is so very obviously not for public consumption, just domain name give them away but you can land on sites in more than one way. Tinyurl type of linking is common. Phishing is also not always easy to “spot” but still not recommended. I really doubt you have visited many of these RED sites and wondered why the fuss?
So I simply dont believe you can test over a period of time or just randomly with many AV products and then declare WOT not to be trusted or not needed since X is already installed. Avast is good but certainly not 100% good. And neither is Avira with heuristics racing at full speed I should add… We are back to old hosts-blocking and Avast name is not to be found - but it still work! Actually I believe hpHosts is available as a hosts-file, also useful - paranoid but depends on definitions and also tools to fix that paranoia, hosts manager for example. If you believe WOT is wrong with RED flagging then plugin makes it easy to manage. I might not agree myspace.com is to be blacklisted, just one example there are more. Complicated since many users now dont mind added toolbars/extras and such with long EULA. hpHost is old school and does. WOT does not use anything from hpHosts btw. They have a black or white approach to sites, WOT grade sites not just blocking based on false info.
If you want to see half-baked blocking try OpenDNS. Check for forum for the many requests for malware-blocking. See how far they have come. Is not easy to make universal domain-blocking.
You can question features about most sites/programs. Trusting random/crazy people on the internet is not the way to go but as said WOT works great at only blocking 100% sure to be crap sites, mostly based on sources collecting them, not democracy. Pretty sure that will take out the false positives danger Tech noticed. It must or WOT will die sooner than later.