Items tagged with AVG
Security outfit AVG is catching some heat for a Chrome browser extension that left millions of users vulnerable to a variety of online attacks. Called "AVG Web TuneUp," it automatically gets installed into Chrome as part of AVG's antivirus product. That's problem number one. Problem number two is that it presented several potential security risks. A developer for Google brought the attention to Google's Project Zero team, noting that the extension adds a bunch of JavaScript APIs to Chrome "apparently so that they can hijack search settings and the New Tab page." It appears as though AVG intentionally made the installation process complicated so that the extension could evade Chrome malware checks....
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AVG has long been considered one of the so called good guys in security software. It drew fan support for offering a no cost version of its antivirus software, which traditionally has worked quite well, but its reputation as a champion of the average Joe is now in jeopardy over a revised privacy policy. As part of the new single-page privacy policy, AVG explains that it may collect and sell non-personal data to third parties. Such data might include a user's browsing and search history (including meta data) so that AVG can "make money from our free offerings" and "keep them free." This kind of honest transparency can be unsettling, though in AVG's defense, this is the type of thing that many...
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You can debate all day long how much of a threat malware truly poses to Google's Android platform, but if you want to err on the side of caution, there are antivirus solutions available to you. The most popular appears to be AVG's free AV app, which just leapfrogged over 100 million downloads on Google Play. That's an impressive achievement and one that puts the app in the same company as WhatsApp, Skype, Twitter, and others that fall into the 100-500 million downloads club. Even more impressive than making it into the 100-500 million downloads category is being the only the AV app represented in that particular tier. Clearly Android users feel security is necessary on their smartphone and tablet...
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If your moral compass doesn't dissuade you from pirating games, maybe the prevalence of malware will. According to the latest research from AVG, game hacks and cracks almost always contain malicious code, as in more than 90 percent of the time, depending on where the downloads originate. In other words, for every 10 times you download a keygen or cracked copy of a game, you're lucky if just one of those files isn't infected. This doesn't just apply to cracked copies of popular titles, either. Some gamers get more than they bargained for when they go in search of shortcuts to character development. AVG says World of Warcraft, League of Legends, Runescape, World of Tanks, and Minecraft are played...
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Forget the school bully who wants your kid’s lunch money: today’s 11-year-old wants your kid’s digital gold, and he’s writing malicious code to steal it. Feeling out of your league, yet? AVG recently took to the airwaves and the Internet to warn parents that kids are learning to code at an early age – and that some of them are getting into serious trouble with those skills. It points to a recent Trojan for stealing data from gamers who play RuneScape. Cheating doesn't pay, especially if the tool you're using to cheat is actually stealling from you. Image credit: AVG. “We have now seen a number of examples of very young individuals writing malware, including...
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AVG launched AVG Family Safety, a new application that is designed to help parents protect their children online. AVG Family Safety acts as a virtual guardian for children by letting parents create age-appropriate settings and profiles for each child in the home. These profiles can be adjusted as the child gets older and as their digital behavior and habits change. AVG Family Safety can filter unwanted communication from over 80 social networking sites. Chats and network threads can also be monitored. The software can monitor what websites children are visiting and what searches they are conducting online. Full reporting is also available to help parents know what sites their children have visited....
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If you're an AVG user having trouble booting into Windows 7, you have our condolences. Perhaps it might come as a small consolation that you're not alone, and chances are you did nothing wrong. The culprit, AVG says, is that the latest virus database -- 271.1.1/3292 (432/3292) -- released earlier this week is bricking systems with a STOP code. AVG has since pulled the update, but that doesn't do you any good if you've already installed it. In that case, AVG recommends booting into Safe Mode and running System Restore to a point in time prior to the update. Barring that, AVG says to do the following: Find a working computer and create an AVG Rescue CD, if you didn't already, and use it to boot...
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Many techs will agree: antivirus programs can be a hassle. Mostly, the issues tend to stem from slower performance and similar issues that result from using an antivirus program. Still, it’s a bit of a lesser of two evils deal: you can risk getting a virus, or you can deal with lags in performance. Usually, you can count on well-known antivirus programs to only touch malicious files, but this isn’t always the case.AVG, a free antivirus scanner, recently created problems for some of its users when it mistook user32.dll, a critical Windows component, for a container for the Trojan Horses PSW.Banker4.APSA or Generic9TBN. When the scanner activated, it assumed this critical file was a virus and deleted...
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