a-squared Anti-Malware 4.5 released

a-squared Anti-Malware 4.5

• Comprehensive PC protection against Trojans, Viruses, Spyware, Adware, Worms, Bots, Keyloggers, Rootkits and Dialers.
• 2 Cleaning Scanners in 1: Anti-Virus + Anti-Spyware
• 2 Guards against new infections: signature scan + behavior analysis

Anti-Virus, Anti-Trojan, Anti-Spyware, Anti-Worm and Anti-Dialer all in one. Contains a disk scanner to clean infected computers as well as a background guard which blocks new infections with the signature based onExecution scanner and the behavior based Malware-IDS. Includes Cookie guard and Auto-Update.

There are many anti-virus, anti-spyware and anti-dialer software products but only a few of them can claim to provide effective protection from all types of Malware. The main reason for this is the eternal cat and mouse game played for decades between Malware programmers and the security industry. Normal security software is limited by the fact that it can only recognize Malware for which the manufacturer has already created a signature - assuming that the manufacture even has a copy of the Malware available for analysis.

• Remove Trojans, Viruses/Worms, Keyloggers, Dialer and Spyware/Adware from your PC!
• Double realtime protection with signature scan and Malware-IDS (HIPS). Also against Rootkits!
• Extra: a-squared HiJackFree system analysis tool included!

Emsi Software has now turned the tables and no longer trails behind the Malware authors. a-squared Anti-Malware does not identify damaging software purely on the basis of signatures, but also looks at how it behaves. This means that you will be protected from the hundreds of new Trojans, Worms, Dialers, Rootkits and Spyware that appear every day.
a-squared Anti-Malware includes a Background Guard, which recognizes and blocks all dangerous programs before they have a chance to cause any damage. The unique new Malware Intrusion Detection System (Malware-IDS) immediately warns you when a program attempts to perform a potentially

• Trojans, Backdoors, Keyloggers, Rootkits
Trojans and Backdoors provide strangers with access to your PC. Once a Backdoor is installed, an attacker can take full control of your computer. A Trojan is best described as a piece of software pretending to be something it is not - they often contain Backdoors, and usually arrive as email attachments. A Keylogger is a type of Malware that invisibly records all keyboard activity, whereas Rootkits hide on your PC and manipulate internal system operations. a-squared Anti-Malware specializes in recognizing and eliminating these types of Malware.
• Spyware, Adware, TrackingCookies
Your personal data and information is worth a great deal of money to certain advertising companies. They have no qualms about smuggling software into your system, recording information and spying on everything you do. Adverts that change the start page of your browser also belong in the Spyware/Adware category. a-squared Anti-Malware completely removes Spyware from your PC. Traces of Spyware in the Registry and Tracking Cookies are also recognized.
• Worms, Bots, Viruses
Worm viruses are currently one of the most irritating phenomena on the Internet. Usually transmitted as dangerous email attachments, worms send copies of themselves to all reachable destinations and cause great damage. Newer network worms/bots use security holes (Exploits) to infect a PC, and can reproduce at an astonishing speed. Without your knowledge, your PC is essentially transformed into a spam-sending zombie! a-squared Anti-Malware eliminates worms from your PC and prevents them from doing any further damage. The Malware-IDS also blocks attacks that security holes for which no patches currently exist, so-called zero-day attacks.
• Dialers
Dialers are small programs that change the Internet access number of a modem-equipped computer to a much more expensive number. Costs can rise as high as several hundred dollars per dial attempt. a-squared Anti-Malware prevents Dialers from becoming active.

• For Windows XP, 2003/2008 Server and Vista, limited functionality on x64
• An internet connection is required to install a-squared Anti-Malware correctly.

Product Info: a-squared Anti-Malware 4.5
Download: Emsi Software
View: Online Tutorial

 

Been running it in Beta for a while. No issues, runs great!

 

is ther a changelog or did i just miss it?

 

• Fine tuning & bugfixes: In general we've made tons of little improvements and fixes. Just to mention a few examples of bugs that some users reported in the past: Scanner stops and crashes have been fixed, script files and others are scanned on execution now, etc.
plus all these
http://www.emsisoft.com/a2/changelog/free/

 

i never knew that they protected against viruses as well.....

 

I have a license and like the product but had an issue with IMO very high memory usage of a2service I experienced on a vista 32 machine. It would sit around 40k until a file executed and kicked in a scan or the Mamutu element displayed an alert when the memory usage would jump to over 100,000K and just stick there even after the event or scanning activity finished. The only way it came back down was a reboot. I understand there are 2 sets of signatures etc to load but applications that provide more use less.

Can anyone confirm if this a2service memory usage issues still exist in this new version? Any info would be appreciated.

Thanks

 

When a-squared guard is running, you should see two running processes:

a2service.exe - ~85 MB - it does all the work and stores the signatures. keep in mind that 3 million signatures can't be packed in just a few megabytes. if we don't keep the signatures in RAM but load them on every program execution, the guard would slow down the system too much.

a2guard.exe - ~15 MB - this is the tray icon application that shows alerts.

 

Thanks but meantime I did what I should have done in the first place and installed it on a VM. Still over 100mb for a2service.exe. Also installed on a separate VM with windows 7 and a2service sitting at 40mb.

Is there different memory usage for different OS's? Would a Mamutu style event increase a2service.exe and if so should it return to the 85mb thereafter?

Thanks

 

The memory usage depends on the loaded components. E.g. if you have disabled the OnExecution guard, it should go down. If you have the main application, the guard and the scanner open, it can be more than 100 MB in total.

Every value around 100 MB can be considered as normal.

 

Thanks, I'll let A2 settle on both VM's and keep an eye on it before deciding whether to move it back to main system. Also wanted to point out that while I have some concerns over the memory usage as noted here it should not put people off trying this excellent product.

The on-execution scan means your other system resources (CPU etc) are not wasted constantly rescanning files when reading/writing etc so if you have a decent amount of memory your system runs very smoothly using this product. The IDS (Mamutu) is an excellent feature, the on-demand scans are as good as (maybe better) than any other AV/AS product IMO and support is very good.

Cheers

 

After some internal testing, we found out that the a-squared double engine is currently faster than SpySweeper (with AV), F-Secure, BitDefender, DrWeb, Sophos, eScan and Vipre. But of course, there are faster ones available (single engine products).

 

Faster than the other listed products while scanning the same set of files.

The needed time for the deep scan depends on the number of harddisks and number of files you have. On a fresh installed windows with some programs only, it should not take more than 1-2 hours. If you have 2 Terabytes of datafiles (and especially many binary files) it may take much longer.

But again, compared with other scanners speed, a-squared is somewhere in the middle.

 

I noticed the program was heavy for the first few days, about the first week. After the behavioral element settles in, resource usage has dropped considerably.

Around the 35MB for both processes. From second week on. Some days even lower.



Noticed the surf protection alerts have been updated so you can 'always add the rule'. Not bad for blocking websites from generating advertising and tracking stats.




Overall, I think surf protection is a good feature.

 

Hi.

Having used a-squared 4.5 this morning ... first downloading 51807 KB update ... using Smart Scan it flagged taskmanager17.exe as a Win32.SuspectCtrc!IK. A FP no doubt - anyway, I no longer need the item, I wanted to see if a-squared would be able to delete what it labelled as potentially a High Risk. So I binned it, Or so I thought. When I went back to the file location, in My Documents, taskmanager17.exe was still there!. Total failure.

I did think about giving a-squared benefit of the doubt by restoring the item and trying the process once more.

Am I alone with this problem? anyone else tried deleting a flagged file?

 

Always deletes it here. Whether I choose delete or quarantine, file is removed instantly.



Not sure what is going on, might be a problem with your install, or whether it has the necessary admin rights to run/operate. I don't know what could be going on.

You using a-squared free or the full version? Regarding update size, that should be just the initial update. It won't bother you when you see it detecting all sorts of serious and bothersome malware.

 

I am using the free version. Interestingly, I redownloaded taskmanager17 just to scan again with a-squared. It didnt flag

I did submit the file this morning, but I havent updated a-squared in the meantime. Weird

a-squared Free - Version 4.5
Last update: 19/05/2009 12:02:13

Scan settings:

Scan type: N/A
Objects: C:\Documents and Settings\Desktop\taskmanager17
Scan archives: On
Heuristics: Off
ADS Scan: On

Scan start: 19/05/2009 16:57:02


Scanned

Files: 71
Traces: 0
Cookies: 0
Processes: 0

Found

Files: 0
Traces: 0
Cookies: 0
Processes: 0
Registry keys: 0

Scan end: 19/05/2009 16:57:02
Scan time: 0:00:00

 

Some feedback for Christian (if he's reading).

I know you can control how long you want a pop-up alert to show for (or not show), but with the new version these alerts now fade into the background.

I like it. Much less intrusive.





Regarding general system use.

I have a separate version of hijackfree which I used before installing anti-malware, although hijackfree is also available through the anti-malware program.

But what I've noticed, in times where there is system lock-up, and nothing will load, not even the task manager, clicking on the anti-malware icon, always seems to load (after a short delay) its version of hijackfree. The 'offending' process can then be shutdown.

 

We have made the fade-out of the popup boxes to indicate that the window will hide automatically without action.

Of course you can click a button to close the box, always allow a host or always block a host, but you don't have to.

 

Simple features like that are often overlooked. I like what you've done with the upgrade.

Menus are easy to navigate through, but also allow a lot of 'tweaking' for those who like to fine tune their settings.

I usually can come up with a number of program suggestions, but right at the moment, can't think of any! Solid program.

 

Just one other thing Christian, I was about to suggest an installation tutorial, but noticed it's already on your AM web page.

I watched the tutorial and it's very informative for new users. You might want to place this closer to the download link, as it would reduce any hesitation a new customer might have when installing a new product. (also help advanced users, in showing the steps of installation)





Also, I know you have some great screenshots, but I'd look into putting up a similar video to the tutorial, a short video showing AM in action, blocking trojans, detecting threats. You could place that under the download link too.

 

Thanks for the suggestion, you're right.

There are already other video tutorials for the scanner and the guard parts in our queue, but we're located in Austria/Germany and no native English speaker here.

We'll see how soon we can finish them.

 

Whoever you used for the video installation, is fine. Found it easy to understand.

Where you're from, you could source someone who works in radio. For example, someone I work with, only recently I found out spent many years working on radio, doing the morning shows etc, and I'm amazed at how clearly he speaks. His 'talent' could be utilised for purposes such as this (he works in design).

Just some food for thought - do a bit of digging around, and you'll find someone suitable.

 

Just wanted to mention, in trying to download malware from 50+ different sites, about 40 or more of these sites were blocked when 'surf protection' was enabled.

Wouldn't let me access these sites with it enabled (so I had to disable it - for testing these files).

Overall, impressed with the 'surf protection' feature - would come in handy for higher-risk users.

 

Could u make a few screenies or it blocking malware hosted pages pls?

 

a-squared Anti-Malware today updated to version 4.5.0.13