Check if your Antivirus is Dead or Alive

In spite of having Antivirus software installed, I often hear that people got into virus related troubles. So, how come their Antivirus software is not detecting any old/new virus?

The problem here could be .. anything. Improper installation of Antivirus softwares or the conflict of more than one antivirus softwares(don't install more than one antivirus software), it could be the outcome of advanced virus/malwares which could render any antivirus software useless and for innocent end users it may still look like their system is being protected. Whatever, Antivirus could go useless.

So, what's the big deal?

EICAR(European Institute for Computer Antivirus Research) has a simple test to conduct on user's system so as to check if their Antivirus is working or not. You can check if your antivirus is working or not. One who is not using Antivirus on today's computing life is surely a moron, out of this world.(no offence) This post is of no use for them.

TESTING SYSTEM FOR ANTIVIRUS EFFECTIVENESS

- Open up your Notepad.

- Copy-paste the following code.
X5O!P%@AP[4\PZX54(P^)7CC)7}$EICAR-STANDARD-ANTIVIRUS-TEST-FILE!$H+H*

- Save it as 'eicar.com'(not a text file name like this eicar.com.txt)

As soon as you try to save this file, your antivirus software should delete this. Depending upon the antivirus software you are using, you must see the screen like below:


This small code is in no way a harmful code but just to test your security softwares effectiveness.

To learn more about this EICAR test, please click here.

Thank you for reading.