Comparison Review
Company and product:
International Computer Virus Institute
1257 Siskiyou Boulevard, Suite 179
Ashland, OR 97520
USA
503-488-3237
503-482-3284
BBS 503-488-2251
British Computer Virus Research Centre
12 Guildford Street, Brighton, East Sussex, BN1 3LS, England
Tel: 0273-26105
Joe Hirst
Eliminator/Virus Monitor/Virus Clean, version V1.17, Oct. 1990, Rel B, also
Virus Simulation Suite
Summary:
Resident and manual virus scanning and disinfection, also demonstration virus
simulators.
Cost: range from $190 (single copy with updates) to volume $8.50/CPU (US)
Rating (1-4, 1 = poor, 4 = very good)
"Friendliness"
Installation 2
Ease of use 3
Help systems 1
Compatibility 2
Company
Stability
Support
Documentation 3
Hardware required 4
Performance 3
Availability
Local Support
General Description:
Virus Monitor is a resident scanning program which checks disks as accessed,
and programs when invoked. Virus Clean is a manual scanner and disinfector.
The programs are suitable for intermediate users in the average computing
environment.
The suite of virus characteristic simulator programs are interesting, and may
be useful in boosting attention in virus awareness training.
Comparison of features and specifications
User Friendliness
Installation
The programs are shipped protected, but on a writable disk. There is no
installation program, as installation consists merely of copying the files to
the system they are to be run on. Virus Monitor (VM.COM) is a resident
checker, and the user is instructed to add it as the first line in the
AUTOEXEC.BAT file, but no direction is given as to how this is to be done.
The package comes with a printed manual. There is also a file on disk
(MANUAL.TXT) which is the same information in softcopy. The disk label directs
the user to type "ICVI" to get information. Doing this presents a menu which
offers to list onscreen or print out the manual (as well as the documentation
for the virus simulators.)
The documentation is brief, but fairly clear aside from the lack of
installation instructions. There is no discussion of dealing with pre-existing
infections.
Ease of use
The resident scanner, VM.COM, has no options and, the documentation suggests,
should be started at boot time. When invoked, it will examine memory for viral
infections, and then go into the background. (If any infection is found, the
program will disable it.) As disks are accessed, VM will examine the boot
sector, and will alert the user to known virus code. No other action is taken
or suggested, the user is merely prompted to "Press any key to continue." If
an infected program is called, the program will alert the user and refuse to
run the file.
The Virus Clean program (VC.COM) accepts command line switches to check only
boot sectors, check only files, check files with specific extensions, check all
files, list files checked, pause when the screen has filled, output to a file,
delete infected files or remove infections. The removal option has five sub-
options, boot sector only, .COM ONLY, .EXE only, all and none. The default
settings are stated to be to check boot sectors, .COM and .EXE files, not to
list checked files and to remove only boot sector and .COM infections. (This
is suggested by the documentation because of the possible overwriting of
overlay portions of .EXE files.) However, in testing the program did not
attempt any removal of infections.
When removal is attempted on a write protected disk, the program will generate
an error message.
The virus simulator programs that come with the disk are amusing, and can be
useful in demonstrating to users the type of activities that viral programs
*may* demonstrate. I have found that they stimulate great interest in
seminars, but must be used with caution so as not to suggest that all viral
programs demonstrate these, or similar, characteristics. (Joe Hirst is to be
congratulated on the TSR expertise that allows Cascade, Ping-Pong/Italian,
Oropax and Yankee Doodle to play simultaneously. Note that attempts to run
Cascade on 386 systems have not been successful.)
Help systems
None provided.
Compatibility
Given the old release date (as supplied), the program finds a significant
number of common viral programs. Of interest is the fact that the program
checks for variation in known viral strains, and alerts the user to keep a copy
for forwarding to the distributor for study.
Company Stability
Unknown.
Company Support
Unknown.
Documentation
The documentation is brief, in terms of program operation, but clear. Over two
thirds of the documentation is given to a description of the operation of the
viral programs that the program will detect. This section has about the same
level of detail as that supplied with FPROT, but with fewer viral programs
listed.
Hardware Requirements
No special hardware required.
Performance
Although the program does not match the number of viral programs detected by
some others, the speed of operation ranks with the fastest scanners tested.
Local Support
Unknown.
Support Requirements
Although the program is not very complicated, the lack of automated
installation, the lack of detail in the installation section of the
documentation, and the command line switches used by VC.COM suggest that novice
users will need some assistance.
copyright Robert M. Slade, 1991 PCELMNTR.RVW 910514
======================
roberts@decus.ca rslade@vcn.bc.ca slade@freenet.victoria.bc.ca
Virtual reality is for those who can't handle the command line
Author "Robert Slade's Guide to Computer Viruses" 0-387-94663-2 (800-SPRINGER)