Websites and images blocked since installing Eset Smart Security

[hawks1282]

Hello all,

I recently installed Smart Security on a number of computers at my office, and I've been having a very difficult time with one of them. The first time I installed it, (Version 3.something) the computer kept locking up with ekrn.exe errors and had to be continually reset. I un-installed that version and put version 3.0.672.0 , and now whenever the firewall is enabled, a large number of websites and images are blocked. I have the firewall disabled now, but the particular computer that I'm having problems on belongs to the guy who I had to convince to buy Eset (very frustrating that this computer had to be the one to have the problems).

I have NOD32 at home and love it so I recommended it here, all the other computers have had no problems (5-6 machines), but every time I put an Eset product on this particular computer it never works right. Is there any way to enable the firewall but give the user control of what content is blocked? Or even a pop-up declaring why a particular site is being blocked instead of just killing the connection? Two example sites I have experienced abnormalities with are eicar.org and hotmail.com. With regular settings, eicar.org is being blocked. If I disable Web Access Protection, hotmail.com is blocked. If I disable all filtering (firewall off) everything works fine.

I miss version 2.7 :'( . Everyone wants the combined "internet security" packages so I need to install firewalls and spam filter suites. I have never had any luck with security suites that try to do everything. I much prefer specialized individual programs that do their work very well.

Thanks in advance (sorry for the rant)

[hawks1282]

Any ideas on which direction I should go with this?

[ASpace]

I would repair the Winsock and check if there are leftovers of previous antivirus products .

Repair Winsock
Windows XP SP2 , XP SP3 and Windows Vista all

Goto Start –> Run
type cmd and click OK.
Type netsh winsock reset
Press ENTER . Restart immediately !

N.B. ! There is a space between the commands , example netshSPACEwinsockSPACEreset
N.B. ! If you use Windows Vista , you must first run cmd as Administrator .

Download ESET SysInspector and try to find something
http://www.eset.com/download/sysinspector.php

You can also generate a log file from that machine (File > Save Log) and send it to ESET support@eset.com

[hawks1282]

Unfortunately we're using windows 2000, so it doesn't look like the Winsock fix will work. Also, this is only blocking certain websites, not all of them, and the problem goes away immediately when the ESET firewall is disabled. In my experience, Winsock errors affect all websites all the time (could be mistaken about that).

[hawks1282]

I tried the WinsockXPFix program, but it didn't help. I examined the firewall logs and found that there were logs of hundreds (possibly thousands) of DNS Cache Poisoning Attacks, that were being blocked. I did a swift search and found http://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=200137
which references the same log entry, noting that there was supposedly a bug in the firewall. I disabled the 'DNS poisoning attack detection' option in the firewall, and now many of the websites that were blocked earlier operate correctly now. For the moment this seems resolved, I will post an update tomorrow with any developments.