McAfee Sees Viruses Everywhere

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McAfee Sees Viruses Everywhere

Part 2: Is It Slander?

Related Resources

• Part One
• Glossary of Terms
• False Positives

Elsewhere on the Web

• Sophos statement
• The Register article

While McAfee focuses on defensive posturing and Sophos focuses on customer support, a larger issue lurks in the background. Trusty Funk & Wagnalls standard dictionary describes a false statement that damages another's reputation as being slander. Based on that definition, is McAfee guilty of slander?

Back in late February, an article on this site described the Anna Kournikova worm. Shortly thereafter, reports from readers indicated McAfee VirusScan was triggering a virus alert on the page. While I was able to find and send the support article on McAfee's site dealing with the false positive (4123 .DAT files were the culprit), what of the readers who did not report the alarm to me and who may still believe this site was once infected with the Anna Kournikova worm? Indeed, Sophos - and others - are grappling with this same issue today.

Generally, false positives occur under rare circumstances and are never considered a feature of the product (until now). Indeed, fallout from false positives can result in a loss of confidence in the scanner, a sense of false security, or even damage to the reputation of the victim of the false positive. Consider Macromedia when Norton AntiVirus accidentally false-alarmed on their Flash files. Fortunately, Symantec Corporation, makers of Norton AntiVirus, made every effort to clear the good name of Macromedia and explain the mis-reporting. (Though Macromedia's own handling of the incident could be considered problematic, see the article: False Positives for details).

As false positives can and do occur, the action taken by the overactive scanner vendor becomes of paramount importance. Should the victims of false positives bear the brunt or should the scanner vendor take corrective action? You decide. Cast your vote in the poll and let your voice be heard.

Previous page > McAfee Sees Viruses Everywhere: Part I > Page 1, 2

Guide since 2000

Mary Landesman
Antivirus Software Guide

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