Who runs an anti-virus scan these days? Apparently almost nobody

http://www.techworld.com/news/secur...-these-days-apparently-almost-nobody-3595951/

 

I still do every so often.

 

Me too. On-demand scans only...

 

After first installing an av, I run an on-demand scan to populate the cache. After this, it's random. I turn off scheduled scans.

 

I still do yes, every other week or so.

 

Surely anti virus software comes with scheduled scans set?

 

I believe that it depends on AV. In past when I was using ESET it would only perform automatic scan after installation. All additional scans had to be run manually or schedule had to be set up.

 

Every night.

 

What is an on-demand scan going to catch that the real-time scanner won't catch? If the on-demand scan is to unpack and scan archives then I can see this, but at the same time, if malware is located in an archive, the real-time scanner should catch this while it is unpacked.

Plus, these on-demand scans are mainly signature scans. These files are not run by the on-demand scanner but will be detected by the real-time scanner if the file is run.

I am referring to real-time resident anti-virus only.

 

Every Saturday or Sunday with main AV, mbam, hitmanpro, nortonpowereraser, herdprotect, emsisoft emergency kit.
Every day is GeGeek Toolkit update, just in case something goes bad, to have the tools I need to handle almost any disaster I can come up with....

 

Every day scheduled scan with MBAM and HMP. ESET not scheduled, just run occasionally when I am going to be away from the computer.

It seems true to me that the "some users" who have become "less invested in the ideas of using it" quite possibly could have already belonged to the ranks of the I-never-cared-about-security-anyway crowd. It is probably impossible for these folks to become "less invested" in something they weren't doing anyway.

Same goes for faith. I'm supposed to believe that users who have traditionally been unconcerned about computer security suddenly gained faith, but then subsequently lost it?

AV companies can't lose users they never had.

 

Once in awhile with herd

 

I leave Norton automatic idle QuickScan on, it is enough.
Sometimes I scan with Hitman Pro and MalwareBytes Antimalware, always clean.

 

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http://www.symantec.com/connect/forums/what-added-value-running-scheduled-full-scans#comment-4340301

 

Maybe if the antivirus is reliant upon definitions only but current av's use more than definitions. The definition may not be there related to that particular virus but when the antivirus updates, the real-time scanner should pick this up if the file decides to run, either by definition or by dynamic detection.

 

One point not mentioned so far is that the data comes from their GEARS tool, which it targeted at medium sized organizations on up, not home or individual users. Viewed from that perspective, I'm not really surprised. Very few businesses I'm familiar with run regular scans. And that's always been the case.

 

I think that a Quick Scan is enough in most scenarios, you really shouldn't need to scan all files in your pc.
Many modern antivirus runs a quick scan when the user is idle, the problem is that many users are running older or expired versions.

 

Once I install an AV, I just run one full scan to whitelist the files and makes future scans faster then I never ever run a scan. Since the AV is always active and would catch anything new, it doesn't make any sense to run any scans again.

 

Totally agree, one when it is installed and then never again.

 

Every 3 months a full scan with Avira, MBAM, Hitman Pro. I'm actually planning to schedule it every 6 months as I had no detection whatsoever since 2007, a lot of hard disk wear and tear for nothing...

 

The same here, escept for occasional quick scan if the antivirus has a quick scan option.

Back in the days when antiviruses did not do caching and also didn't have quick scans, I would never do a scan.

 

You make a lot of sense, Osaban. As a result, I have rethought and reconfigured all the scanning I've been doing.
No more daily scans with HMP. MBAM changed from daily to weekly. Next (soon) I'll dial it back to monthly.
Believe it or not, your comment about HD wear and tear for nothing did it for me. TY

 

I have never in my entire life had an on demand scan find something that the realtime protection did not already catch, with the exception of a few false positives.

 

I run scans often. Norton 2015 finds cookies - sometimes. Trend is so fast no reason not to run it.

 

Well the thing is, if a full/quick scan found something, it would definitely mean that there is a security breach somewhere in my system, and given the fact that I rely more on Sandboxie than Avira either Sandboxie had been exploited or I made a big mistake allowing something infected to install. The more I think about it, an AV can’t be held totally responsible for bypassing a layered defense. I’m sure if that happened it would be a very rare event hence scans can be done sporadically. Frequent scans should be done by people who solely rely on an AV for their security.