Anti-virus For Linux


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Hey folks, I'm just test driving this free anti-virus scanner for Linux. The program is available in rpm and tar.gz format so it should work on most systems. I'm running a scan now on my slackware box, I'm curious to see if anything shows up. :D

Note: if you're running your linux box as a user and not root you are mostly safe from virus activity. Actually virus activity in Linux is mostly a non-issue. If you're curious you can try it out here:

Avast Anti-Virus for Linux

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is it better than clamav?

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is it better than clamav?

I've never tried clamav, so I don't know, iccaros:-) This is my first Linux anti-virus program that I've tried. It is straight-forward to use.

Interesting to note I was able to install it on my Ubuntu box as well, the tar.gz archive works on slackware and ubuntu.

I just opened up a shell prompt, navigated to my download directory issued su for root access then issued this command and hit enter.

tar -xzvf (filename).tar.gz

Then to create an icon you can launch the program with from your start menu you navigate to avast4workstation-1.0.5/bin/avastgui

Edit, added later: You also update the virus definitions from the anti-virus gui.

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in case othersr are intrested

http://www.clamav.net/

Thanks, iccaros:-) I'm currently looking at clamav, trying to figure it out, give it a try:-) Are there any half decent tutorials out there besides the readmes that come with the source code? I'll go take a look at google/linux. :D

You should get a decent idea about it looking through the config files (/etc/clamd.conf, /etc/freshclam.conf). I use Klamav, a KDE frontend to clamav, with either if you want on access scanning you need to compile and insert the dazuko module. There are other linux AV, avg, f-prot, bitdefender, antivir and possibly others.

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The great thing about Clam is their detections - they are one of the fastest outfits responding to threats and

issue multiple updates per day.

AVG Linux ;

Panda

AntiVir Linux;

F-Prot

BitDefender

here's something interesting

Free antivirus + anti-spam filter

...naruku..didn't see your final comments when posting about these av's you've already mentioned :blush:

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Correct me if I'm wrong, doesn't clamav not include an on-access real-time scanner, or is that only in the windows version?

You can get on-access scanning by installing the dazuko kernel module.

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The great thing about Clam is their detections - they are one of the fastest outfits responding to threats and

issue multiple updates per day.

AVG Linux ;

Panda

AntiVir Linux;

F-Prot

BitDefender

here's something interesting

Free antivirus + anti-spam filter

...naruku..didn't see your final comments when posting about these av's you've already mentioned :blush:

also on that, you can add signatures from any other virus scanner (norton for example .. that you can still get free from there site) if clam does not have one you think you need. and then submit them a report.. it will be there in as much as a day.. I have seen hours..

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Well, I've been trying out Avast for a few days. Here's my verdict. This program is buggy and does not function very well.

I recommend that you avoid Avast like the plague.

I'm going with iccaros's recommendation and learn about clamav. :D

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Really? The windows version is great. What were the issues?

The linux version isn't consistent in the way it functions. On some of my boxes (Slackware) it ran fine, but, on Ubuntu I got start-up errors and also it ran deathly slow.

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