Have lost all faith in Zemana!

When I first installed it, it prompted just the "right" amount of times, i.e. I knew it was doing its job but was not annoying. That, coupled with the MRG test results and the free one year license made it a great security addition. However, shortly after the first of the last few Privatefirewall updates it didn't seem to be functioning. Indeed, it couldn't pass it's own or the Spyshelter tests. So I removed Pfw and went with Comodo (firewall only) since a few members reported conflicts, but it is still not consistently passing the tests. It will for a while, then it won't work again until I run a reinstall or repair. This is just on XP 32 bit so it has nothing to do with 64 bit. If I see a Spyshelter discount I'm just going to move to it. Any theories? Thank you!

 

I had the same problem than you are experiencing but in x64 with Zemana a fresh win7 x64 installation. Maybe you can get in contact with Zemana to see if they can solve the problem.

Since then I'm using spyshelter without problems, the support is excellent and fast and the development quite active but is not only and antilogger it's a full HIPS, although with the default settings does not give many popups. I you don't want the "full HIPS" you can simply disable the "system protection" module. I have use it together with Private Firewall (I removed pf because the x64 HIPS is not at the same level than the x86) and Comodo without any problem.

 

Are all your settings at default? Is the failure consistently repeatable? i.e. e.g. it will always pass the test first time, then it will fail thereafter until a reinstall

 

You mention Zemana re-install. Did you actually uninstall it first?

 

It may pass several times. Also don't experience the problem on a Vista laptop.

 

I believe I've tried both!

 

The reason that I asked is that a number of people have had a similar problem with the PF/Zemana combo (PF is quite intrusive). But after uninstalling PF, Zemana reboot, then installation of Zemana cleared things up in those cases.

 

One of the latest releases of PF added anti-keylogger protection so it's not unsurprising that PF+Zemana would now produce conflicts.

Ratchet, I think the only way to resolve this is to determine a repeatable set of sequences leading to a failure scenario. Also you didn't say whether all your settings were on defaults. One final thing - I believe Comodo (even just the firewall component) has some cloud based scanning which can interfere with keylogger tests.

 

That's interesting! Does test = real life threat I wonder?

 

Well, that's always been the problem with these synthetic tests. What they don't do is replicate the number one real-life 'keylogging' scenario, which is form-grabbing, as used by Zeus, Spyeye, Carberp etc. And whilst I've no particular reason to doubt their integrity, using simulators produced by the manufacturers of anti-keylogging software to test the effectiveness of anti-keylogging software is fatally flawed from a scientific perspective. Independent tests using real-life malware or software that mimics the exact mechanisms used by real-life malware is the only reliable and truthful mechanism.

 

Admittedly, it is somewhat early yet, but Zemana does seem up to par for almost 24 hours since I uninstalled it and reinstalled with Comodo Firewall (firewall only) already installed.