Antivirus and the disabled computer user from blog The Technology blog and podcast

Antivirus and the disabled computer user

Hello folks,

I really need some help, and it deals with AntiVirus and security. I’ve been using Microsoft Security Essentials, but have found in my opinion that it doesn’t work as advertised. I saw an article online about creating a file, with some code. The antivirus should pick it up while saving the file. Its not harmful, but it is a test of sorts that checks the antivirus. Its called eicar and you can google it.

MSE did not pick up this file while saving, and saving the file and scanning it showed that it was fine. I wrote an E-mail list with Jaws users on it, and someone recommended Sophos home free which i downloaded. Someone else just said that it was not accessible, and that I’m better off with MSE.

The problem we’re running in to is that we need antivirus now more than ever. Even if we’re careful, things can be downloaded that are not wanted, even when visiting a site we intend to visit. With all the breaches, something is better than nothing, but in my opinion, security essentials is not cutting it.

I do not want to install something that is not accessible, although i want something where I can set some options, and forget it unless something comes up.

It should be able to scan as something is downloaded, notify the user if something is not right about the file, and do daily updates and weekly scans.

If anyone that reads this comes up with something accessible that is free or low cost, I would be greatful.

We should not live without something that can protect our PC’s. Just because we don’t browse much, doesn’t mean that sites we do could become a problem. Its sad that antivirus has become such a problem with companies, that they make it useless to us.

We use a computer just like everyone else, and I hope to publish a series on screen reader usage. Two articles are written, and I am hoping to start a third. I know these developers are aware of access tech, as we once had the access to a lot of the products out there, but as I said, MSE is just seemingly to just pick things up at random, and it doesn’t pick up something that is tested to make sure the program runs as it should.

What are you using? How does it work?
I do not want people responding who don’t use antivirus. That will not be helpful to me.

Thanks for your time.

Informazioni sull'articolo

Antivirus and the disabled computer user was released on June 4, 2017 at 4:52 pm by tech in accessibility newsand issues,security news and commentary.
Last modified: June 4, 2017.

Comments (2)

1. Comment by tech date 10 June 2017 alle 08:31 (),

   Enter your comment here…Well Shaun, thanks. Problem is that i had a zip file that I knew was dangerous. I saved it on purpose to see if the antivirus would pick it up. It never did. MSE occasionally picks up things, things I’ve not downloaded but may have came elsewhere while browsing legit sites. It hardly says anything, and this eicar thing is a test of sorts and it doesn’t say anything. Someone sent me a link to sophos home which i downloaded and have an account, but then they say its not accessible. Nod32’s last version to be accessible last I used it was 2.x. I even reached out to f-secure, and asked, and they said no. They need to be, its a sad sttate of affairs. We can’t go with MSE which hardly says something, it needs to change somehow.

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2. Comment by crashmaster date 10 June 2017 alle 01:00 (),

   Its a debate I have had with various things from time to time.
   msse and windows defender work, they are not the best but they work.
   The landscape of antivirus has changed a lot, accessible antivirus include avira, avg, eset nod32, avast, kaspersky and panda as well as sophos.
   Aparently vipre and sophos are still good, avast isn’t well it varies from version to version.
   Avira is full of nagware and just doesn’t work fully kaspersky sort of does but still, pander did, avg did but is full of bloatware and is no longer accessible.
   nod32 did but is no longer accessible.
   Msse is the best for access because the fucking security companies don’t deem the disabled valuable customers.
   I have had arguments for security with many users on many lists.
   My arguments have been the same for ages, malwarebytes works for the most part but not fully and its been agreed to just use our heads and trust in our brains a bit more and not click things.
   Having had mcafee then norton then other stuff and hearing horror stories I just don’t have the stomach for it anymore.
   I want a security solution that will.
   1. work in the background to remove viruses, but not my non virus files.
   2. give decent messages and not mangle my computer.
   3. run without slowing down or impairing my system.
   4. if it doesn’t need to care, then don’t make me care.
   Sadly when I used other av and security products firewalls and the like I ended up having to make sure the system wasn’t mangled and reformat if it was, constantly restoring so called bad files, get criptic messages and the list goes on.
   Msse doesn’t do that.
   The furtherist I have got with things is to get a user acknowledgement but not much more.
   Till we can convince all manufacturers of software including security software that we are valued customers and that we would like to use their programs maybe not paying expensive rates and that they work without making our audiogames, screen readers and drivers malware to themselves I think people will actually take security companies more seriously.

   As an edit since I can’t post any more comments due to them being closed, I tried sophos.
   Immediately I realised why I had msse and immediately restored my system.
   Further to my comment the reason a lot don’t care about thirdparty av products is that a lot of our games, and such are mistaken as threats.
   In msse’s case that was dice by gma and pipe classic by blindsoftware.
   In sophos case it also found nir cmd which was part of edsharp, filedir and other empowermentzone programs.
   I was able to find and select one acception but not others the system processed things so fast I couldn’t react.
   I then searched the net and got the following impressions.
   1. sophos will kill all infections by deleting the infected files.
   There is no way to restore these files and if they are killed from backup to well.
   A horror story told of backups, and entire memmory cards being deleted.
   I lost scroling battles and a lot of other programs.
   I immediately restored to msse.
   And happily the folders I had made msse not check were still there.
   I only lost 1 windows update.
   Sadly I had to delete and reinitiate the definitions because they got dammaged.
   As for sophos the web interface was good but I had to use it for everything, not good if I have to play non standard programs like old games.
   There is no way to report false alarms either.
   Sophos did more dammage than msse ever did.
   I was able to restore my system and go back to msse.
   This was the reason why I quit so called antivirus software.
   I prefur to pay a ransomware artest for my files rather than run a so called secure program which immediately kills my files and potentially important data.
   I can run norton or mcafee to do that.
   Avast goes up and down to.
   Well I tried, I am better where I was.
   This is the reason we as users just can’t take so called third party security seriously all our blindy programs are targeted.
   Fuck that!

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