Top 4 Antivirus Fails

In this day and age, it would be considered highly irresponsible not to have an antivirus program installed on one’s desktop or laptop. Unfortunately, these antivirus solutions are sometimes faced with their own issues, which make them very annoying to deal with. In 2015 and 2016 alone, various providers of antivirus software had their own sets of issues that had to be addressed through emergency updates.

#4 AVG Chrome Extension

December 2015 was a rather troublesome month for people who use the AVG antivirus tool. The included AVG Web TuneUp Chrome extension came as a mandatory installation, which is never a good thing. To make matters worse, the installation procedure was designed in such a way it would bypass Chrome’s malware checks, modify settings, and change the main content of the “new tab” page. A very strange move by AVG, but things were rectified rather quickly through an emergency update.

#3 Panda Antivirus Flags Files As Malware

In March of 2016, Panda Antivirus users received some very unusual notifications. Both the free and paid version of this antivirus solution saw core program files getting flagged as malware. Additionally, users of the antivirus toolkit were advised to remove System32 from their system. Less tech-savvy users who obeyed this suggestion made their own computer inoperable, as System32 is a key part of the Windows operating system. Eventually, Panda issued an online update.

#2 Comodo Antivirus Strikes Again

Throughout the past few years, there have been multiple issues with Comodo Antivirus. Although this piece of software is quite popular, it comes with its own set of problems. Multiple issues related to this antivirus were identified in 2016. Perhaps the most notorious problem was the inclusion of GeekBuddy, a toolkit that installed and ran a VNC server with poor security. That is not something one would expect from an antivirus provider by any means.

Unfortunately, it turned out the VNC server was a lot worse than assumed at first. Internal research indicated the VNC server solution found in GeekBuddy had no password protection whatsoever. This made computers running the software vulnerable to remote control, as hackers could bypass the non-existent security features with ease.  This was a major mishap for the antivirus software provider, and hopefully the last of this magnitude.

#1 Trend Micro Antivirus Messes Up Password Manager

Trend Micro Antivirus is a commonly used free solution by computer users all over the world. In 2016, a vulnerability was discovered in the bundled password manager tool. A security researcher found out the password manager launched a local web server listening for API commands from the internet.

That in itself in not a problem, however the password manager had no whitelist or same origin policy. To be more precise, anyone could execute code remotely and retrieve information from the password manager. Moreover, executing the remote code did not require any interaction from the antivirus user, which was another cause for concern. Things were resolved through a new Trend Micro Antivirus update, which was released shortly after this vulnerability was discovered.

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