Podnutz Episode 47: ThreatFire

Special Guests:

Steve McLaughlin www.DoortoDoorGeek.com

Michael Green from PC Tools Malware Research Lab

Running time: 44:03
Added: 6 Mar 2010

PC Tools Products Discussed:

Registry Mechanic

Spyware Doctor

Spyware Doctor w/ Antivirus

Internet Security for Netbooks

Threatfire

Threatfire is a free product intended to run in conjunction with other antivirus products

• Systems should not run multiple ‘Antivirus Programs’ but can run multiple ‘Anti-Malware Programs’.
• Many antivirus products scan for digital signatures of known viruses which take time to update. This does not protect against new virus that have been released into the wild in between updates.
• Threatfire analyzes the files running your computer watching for malicious or suspicious behavior protecting your system from potential ‘Zero-Day Exploits’.
• Threatfire runs in the background, using dynamic analysis, but does not require a lot of system resources.
• When Threatfire detects a suspicious file, it will automatically quarantine it if the file is a known malware file, or will alert the user and ask what to do with the file if it is an unknown but suspicious file.

Popular methods of attack are Phishing Attacks, Online Videos requiring a special viewer download, Flirt Bot (use of chat software to lure someone to accept an invitation to a chat or video chat)and Rogue (Fake) Antivirus Programs.

Running 64bit Internet Explorer does not necessarily protect the user from malware.

iAntivirus is free antivirus available for Mac.

Apple included anti-malware to Snowleopard (OS 10.6).

More exploits are being released for Firefox with its increased popularity.

Exploits have been discovered for Jail Broken iPhones.

Purchasing Spyware Doctor comes with a 3 PC license.

If you feel your computer has been heavily infected, May be best to reinstall the Operating System.

“It’s much easier to keep a clean computer clean that do clean up a dirty one.”

Shownotes prepared by Randy Smith from www.TechGuy911.com