Avast's at it Again. Outlook.com is Apparently Viral

Forums › Desktop computing › Avast's at it Again. Outlook.com is Apparently Viral

Oubadah

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#119060 18-May-2013 19:50

I don't know if Avast has just reached a new level of paranoia or if there is actually some threat, but I just tried to log into my outlook.com account (had already logged in multiple times today) and avast locked up the page and spat this message:

'More information':

I tried another outlook.com account that I made and never used:

Can anyone tell me what is going on?

sidefx

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#821721 18-May-2013 19:58

Can't say I was sorry to drop avast when I moved to Windows 8, just for these sort of things. I've also got rid of it in favour of security essentials on a couple of Win7 machines.

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ubergeeknz

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#821722 18-May-2013 20:00

Unless you are really short on system resources... i'd ditch it and go with Microsoft Security Essentials. Works well and keeps out of your way (unless it has a problem).

Oubadah

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#821724 18-May-2013 20:01

sidefx: Can't say I was sorry to drop avast when I moved to Windows 8, just for these sort of things. I've also got rid of it in favour of security essentials on a couple of Win7 machines.

I was (still am on some machines) using MSE, but it seems to have a really poor detection rate at the moment, so I thought I'd try avast. Now avast is the opposite.

I'm not sure what to do. What if outlook.com is breached?

bradstewart

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#821726 18-May-2013 20:04

Oubadah: I'm not sure what to do. What if outlook.com is breached?

Unlikely but if true you would be seeing the news everywhere.

freitasm

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#821727 18-May-2013 20:05

Microsoft Security Essentials.

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Oubadah

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#821733 18-May-2013 20:12

I'll wait a few hours to see if avast changes their minds.

As for MSE:

Virus detection aside, I really like it except for one thing: there is no way to make it auto update independent from windows update. There's no way in hell I'm letting Windows Update auto install whatever it likes (why on earth does it put nvidia drivers in the high priority category?). So that means that MSE only gets updated when I initiate Windows update (and I think it does it when a scan is run too). I wish it could just auto update itself on a regular basis like Avast. otherwise, I like the interface, it seems pretty light, and I've had no annoyances (apart from when i'm dragging an object from a flash drive and it happens to pass over a large archive file - then MSE locks up the mouse for a few seconds while it (presumably) scans the entire archive unnecessarily).

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DravidDavid

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#822151 19-May-2013 22:16

Avast has its niggles. Like when I went to install a new video card driver it forced me to do a windows repair almost 10 times before I figured out what was corrupting my install.
Avast was stopping a .dll from writing during the install and causing the black screen of death on the log in screen. It was SO FRUSTRATING.

I always totally disable it now when ever I install something. It is perfectly happy once it is on the drive. No other hassles apart from that. Who am I to complain, it is free!

ubergeeknz

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#822166 19-May-2013 22:42

Oubadah: I'll wait a few hours to see if avast changes their minds.

As for MSE:

Virus detection aside, I really like it except for one thing: there is no way to make it auto update independent from windows update. There's no way in hell I'm letting Windows Update auto install whatever it likes (why on earth does it put nvidia drivers in the high priority category?). So that means that MSE only gets updated when I initiate Windows update (and I think it does it when a scan is run too). I wish it could just auto update itself on a regular basis like Avast. otherwise, I like the interface, it seems pretty light, and I've had no annoyances (apart from when i'm dragging an object from a flash drive and it happens to pass over a large archive file - then MSE locks up the mouse for a few seconds while it (presumably) scans the entire archive unnecessarily).

It does update itself separately. I have windows updates disabled (well, prompt to install) and MSE still updates its definitions etc without any intervention. I don't recall the last time the actual program needed updating. It's a lot easier to manage (ie. totally hands off) than Avast! in my experience.