Are there any Mcafee Security Center Experts here

Hi its been a while since I was last here and EVERY time you guys have provided excellent support so I thought I would try you with this issue .. hopefullysome peeps in here can give me a hand..

I have recently finished cleaning up a VERY messed up PC over 400 infects and MANY trojans - its taken me almost a week, many many scans with diff tools and HJT logs etc but finally its clean..

My reason for asking for help here is the PC is a family members and in the past they had a load of infections and someone reformatted it.. They then had the chat about security with the "expert" and based on their needs ( a family with 6 kids from primary school to pre uni and they all use PC plus Mum and Dad .. So the skill level across the whole family is very varied ..

The advice they were given is Mcafee Security Center they bougt this installed it "expert set it up" they thought they were fine till the pc really slowed done loads of pop ups appeared etc etc .. That was when they called forhelp .

The amount of junk on the machine was vast, including various P2P's etc , and lots and lots of games downloaded from all over the shop ALL gone now..

I have never use mcafee, what I had heard about it was not brilliant, but that was some time ago.. I have gone theough all their security settings and am somewhat baffled as to how these infections got through when the settngs appear to be pretty secure including firewall settings etc.. Their subscription is up for renewal in March and to be honest at this stage I am not sure whether it is wise to renew it.. So I though I'd do look into this in more detail..

I have talked to them about using Avast Free and Noscript ( as I use these and have NO probs) but they did not fele comfy with them.. The family just want to use the PC and not worry about security alerts etc ( I guess like many users)/ Although now this is the 2nd big infection I think the Dad is going to restric use on that PC and allow the others to "play" on other PCs in the house..

I was also wondering about introducing the kids to something like Sandboxie so they can do what they want and still be safe .. anyone tell me is sandboxie easy to use ( anything complex and it will be rejected for sure)


So my questions

1. Does anyone have info -recommended settings for Mcafee Security Centre
2. What is the general opinion of Mcafee ( wld you recmd it) I have seen a few posts from peopel who def wld not !
3. Anyone know how so many malware, Spyware, Trojans, etc got through in the 1st place ?
3.Any suggestion on Family Friendly Security Applications - Personally I though the all in one security ones were not the way to go - have things changed?
5. Firewall - anyone know/use any family friendly firewalls
6.I have also installed winpatrol to try and keep the startup clear it was full of stuff and pc taking ages to boot up .. This is causing niggles re alerts so I was wondering about Staruplite by malwarebytes ( anyone use this before )

I look forward to your replies

Many Thanks
tamba001

 

A search might yield you better results. There is lots of info on here about Mcafee. Reviews, Views, Tests among other things. Just do a quick search you will find all you ever wanted to know.

 

Hi Tamba,

Here i would like to say that McAfee is pretty good security suite. But you should or they should keep in mind that no security suite is 100% bullet proof. I have never used McAfee Internet Security or McAfee Anti-Virus so i can't tell you how strong it is....But yeah i have used McAfee VirusScan Enterprise 8.5i and 8.7i and both of them if configured properly will result in safe system.

 

Defensewall might be easier to use/setup that Sandboxie. It was easier to setup and explain to my parents anyways. Other than that I just keep their OS patched, software updated, and have them run an AV.

 

First: security software cannot replace 'common sense'.
I know that may not be that common.

P2Ps ? I can't see how ANY AV can protect a computer that is used by so many people, some not knowing anything about computer security.

If you want an AV, I would suggest NIS 2010, probably the closest to full protection AND easy to use. McAfee is a particulary bad product, it has all sorts of issues. Sometimes it won't update for a few days, sometimes updates will break the computer. I don't know if that has been fixed by now.

Maybe LUA+SRP with different accounts for everyone is a good idea ? It doesn't provide 100 % protection, and if you have Windows XP HOME EDITION it is more difficult to set up. There are some variations on this, but since I know little about it I'll leave it at that.

Defensewall, some rollback software, system virtualization, etc. can be useful.
But that may not fully protect you against spyware. For example, you log in, the computer is clean, you make a payment at a website, maybe you are redirected, some malware catches your CC number.

 

For as far as I know the enterprise version is quite different from the consumer version.

 

Having used both the consumer and enterprise version of McAfee, I can say they have both proved to be effective and reliable security products when configured correctly. Despite what you might read on here (or see in those daft Youtube videos where someone lines each security suite up against 10 pieces of malware), most security suites provide decent detection and removal capability. The problem is often the end user, who gets easily bored with firewall prompts or whatever and ends up clicking yes to everything. No anti-malware solution will provide you with total coverage, especially if the end user has allowed the malware to execute in the first place.

I presume that the application had been configured to automatically download the latest signatures and detection for all types of malware was enabled? Did scheduled scans take place, alongside real time detection? You don't mention which McAfee application they are using either - Security Center is a feature central to them all) - is it VirusScan Plus, Internet Security or Total Protection?

Did you also keep logs of what malware was found on the machine?

 

I somewhat agree with what you stated. But when it fails pretty much ALL tests that it gets tested in It starts to make you wonder if it's the program.

 

I think it is worth looking at what AV-Comparitives.org have to say before rushing into anything.

 

Indeed. On the last on-demand comparative test, McAfee had the third highest total detection rate of all - their final rating was lowered due to speed issues and FPs.

Whilst I concur that McAfee hasn't produced the most fantastic anti-malware product ever, it is a decent security suite and is just as likely to protect you as the others. Anti-malware products are not the solution to safe computing - for safe computing, you need safe users.

 

Yes, Especially when you find out there is better "FREE" Solutions available it just makes the program look like total junk. And we wont even get into how bad it can slow the system to a crawl. Unless you run it on a Quad core with 8 gigs of ram.

 

To be honest, a debate about the merits and demerits of McAfee won't serve this thread very well.

I do hope the original poster did indeed keep a log of the infections he saw on this machine.

 

Means the poster did ask about how the product was and if it would be recommended. I believe all views stated so far are valid. So in the end hope it gives him a view of both sides.

 

In fact G-Data & Kaspersky have had higher false-positives than McAfee in many tests. In the end it all comes down to swings & roundabouts.

 

I suppose it depends on whether you get McAfee for free or not I suppose.

 

Why is it that in every post when someone ask a particular question about a specific AV or Suite that everyone starts recommending other Apps. can't you read the questions that have been asked? If not Might be a good idea to just not post at all.
bigc


My reply to the question is that McAfee is a good product but it sounds as if it wasn't set to max settings or possibly one of the less knowledgable family members might have changed the settings.
bigc

 

The McAfee firewall is pretty good as a rule, surely anything that came through the firewall would have been logged. My guess is that someone downloaded lots of warez & games & got infected from a dodgy mirror or something. Some 'gamers' even disable their firewalls.

The biggest security risk sits between the chair & the keyboard!