Re: virus got past mcafee viruscan 8.7

[Jeffrey Walton <noloader () gmail com>]

> Unfortunately, anti-virus isn't capable of stopping the most common or
> basic of malware.  Simply moving the hostile payload beyond the first
> hundred bytes or so of an executable is enough to prevent most AV
> software from detecting/alerting.
Could you qualify this statement? I don't believe it accurately
reflects the current state of the art in detection. For a survey, read
Szor's 'The Art of Virus Research and Defense'. I'd suspect the
malware is relatively new or otherwise has not been analysed. Perhaps
the OP should submit the malware for analysis.

Jeff

On 5/6/09, Michael Graham <jmgraham () gmail com> wrote:
> Unfortunately, anti-virus isn't capable of stopping the most common or
> basic of malware.  Simply moving the hostile payload beyond the first
> hundred bytes or so of an executable is enough to prevent most AV
> software from detecting/alerting.  Beyond that, the number of
> third-party applications with serious vulnerabilities (Acrobat seems
> to be this year's problem) means that relying on anti-virus to prevent
> malware infection is likely to result in an unpleasant surprise.
>
> On Tue, May 5, 2009 at 7:49 PM, Anand Narine <anand.narine () gmail com> wrote:
> > Hi all
> > Our client workstations all have Mcafee antivirus installed, but a
> > virus infected on particular pc
> > and has been sending out spam by making outbound connections on port 25.
> > Mcafee viruscan 8.7 blocks programs from making outbound connections
> > on port 25 by
> > default so how did the virus get past ? I verified that the mcafee was
> > working since I could
> > not telnet to any mail server on the internet via port 25.
> >
> > [SNIP]

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