IT'S TIME TO PUT YOUR THINKING CAP ON

[I AM]

First of all, if you didn't read the post from the 19th, please do as it help will verify the seriousness of the matter.

Infections, data theft, unbootable PC'S unfortunately become as common as those of us who suffer allergies in Houston. Just because you have an Anti-Virus software, does not exclude you from the class of infected users, and perhaps we should start thinking "Out-of-the-box" for ways to combat this. Yesterday's post was alarming enough, and now a report from NSS LABS in Austin Texas leaves me wondering "how do you keep from being infected?"

I realize, as you should, that the report was about some specific threats, and that some AV software which fared well, may not do as good against another type threat, but the answer is definitely not running more than one Anti-Virus on your PC.

I wasn't very happy where Norton fell amongst the 13 products tested, however it (the product) has yet to fail our family after a decade of use. The article about the test was picked up by PC WORLD, which is where I first read about it, then I went to the TSS website to download complete results. As the article on PC WORLD'S website pointed out:

"Antivirus firms will doubtless point out that the attacks were crafted in the lab, that the the vulnerabilities chosen were fairly recent, and that only two were looked at. Making judgements on the basis of such a narrowly-defined test offers only one indication among a number."

However, from reading both the article and Test report, I can no longer recommend a free anti-virus for you to use.

I can ask you "Would you rather pay $80 for an Anti-virus now, or possibly spend over $200 removing an infection and a chance of losing all of your pictures, music, and data?" (which could still happen, but with a far greater chance if you continue to use free anti-virus software).

You can read the PC WORLD article HERE.

'Nuff Said,
Brian