Antivirus Programs are not Perfect

Sounds silly when said this way, huh?  Well, it's true, and its sometimes surprising when people think otherwise.  This means that when you do dangerous things, like go to dangerous-type web sites (gambling, warez, porn), click on suspicious email attachments (even after scanning them), you could get into trouble.

For proof., look at this (safe) link created by Adrien at the from Internet Storm Center.  He analyzed a message that said it was an security message from Facebook notifying customers of a password change.  We all know this never happens, and the attachment contained malware.

The link above, here again, shows multiple virus scanners against the file, and while my favorites (except one) all found it, there were a troubling number who didn't - 20 out of 41 - technically less than half.

This does not mean that you should completely stop clicking on attachments.  Just that you should think, and do a quick risk analysis.  Don't click on every "this is funny" when send by a friend of a friend when it's an attachment, don't click on ANY attachment that's sent by a bank or financial institution unless it's generated by a transaction you made yourself.

Use Mozilla Firefox for browsing,  Use Noscript, stay off bad sites, be internet safe.

Perry