McAfee "Lifesave" failed to save my computer!

[Howard Davis 17]

DO NOT DEPEND ON McAfee ANTIVIRUS!

Despite having up-to-date McAfee "Life Save" on my computer, it was infected by the Koobface spyware worm. McAfee DID NOT PROTECT ME from this malware, which probably was acquired from a website. Subsequent to getting this malware information was hacked from my computer from three different locations. Fixing this was done through Dell at a cost to me of $100 plus several days of aggravation and inconvenience. I cancelled my automatic renewal of McAfee and will be researching and shopping for better protection in the future. If you have McAfee, DON'T TRUST IT!

[FunkyMike 1,861]

 

 

[Steven P. 14,233]

Sorry to hear that, I myself use Malwarebytes and a quick google shows that back in 2009, Malwarebytes was able to detect koobface while McAfee couldn't (on the same system).

 

Malwarebytes and the ever improving built-in Windows Defender (in Windows 10) should set you right. But you are right in that you should shop around!

[xendrome 5,553]

Wondering if he had some fake AV app installed, since McAfee doesn't make a "Livesave" app.

[Nick H. 9,990]

Never depend on one single piece of software if your data is important to you. I have ESET installed on my computer, and also Malwarebytes. If my home data was really that important to me I'd also be performing a backup that would be disconnected from my computer when not performing a backup, as well as backing up to something like Google Drive or Dropbox.

 

EDIT: @xendromeI think he means this? https://promos.mcafee.com/offer.aspx?id=1196997&pkgid=430&s_tnt=XX

[Jim K 13,735]

6 minutes ago, xendrome said:

Wondering if he had some fake AV app installed, since McAfee doesn't make a "Livesave" app.

Maybe he meant LiveSafe?

 

https://www.mcafee.com/consumer/en-us/store/m0/catalog/mls_430/mcafee-livesafe.html

[xendrome 5,553]

Maybe he means that, but it could be a spoof program made to look like it with a fake name. Either way McAfee is garbage.

[Jim K 13,735]

6 minutes ago, xendrome said:

Maybe he means that, but it could be a spoof program made to look like it with a fake name. Either way McAfee is garbage.

Surprised it didn't detect Koobface though  ... that is a fairly old worm even for a "garbage" antivirus.  Unless, like you said, his "McAfee" is a spoof program.

[Mando 5,117]

tbh your sorry tale does not surprise me.

 

McAfee is trash, I still cant fathom out why Intel bought them out tbh. 

 

tbh the only paid for AV i use and would reccomend is ESET or Webroot Secure Anywhere, I use the latter for myself (Webroot) and all my direct families systems. I do not use any other antimalware solutions, Webroot is more than capable on its own. tiny install footprint and only uses 10Mb when resident in ram.

 

Free if you really must, only Bitdefender free or W10s built in AV, ive had both Avast and the old AVG pre-avast days fail on protecting against a worm, so binned being a beta tester and their product. Havnt looked back since WSA.

 

$100 from Dell to resolve, jeesh id have cleared it up for half that

[aclarke_31 1]

I'm not a fan of McAfee products just in general. They've never filled me with confidence.

 

I use Avast Anti-Virus, Comodo Firewall and Malwarebytes Anti-malware. Been using the products for years and having no problems with them what so ever. Highly recommend this combination going forwards.

[Steven P. 14,233]

11 minutes ago, Mando said:

tbh your sorry tale does not surprise me.

 

McAfee is trash, I still cant fathom out why Intel bought them out tbh. 

 

tbh the only paid for AV i use and would reccomend is ESET or Webroot Secure Anywhere, I use the latter for myself (Webroot) and all my direct families systems. I do not use any other antimalware solutions, Webroot is more than capable on its own. tiny install footprint and only uses 10Mb when resident in ram.

 

Free if you really must, only Bitdefender free or W10s built in AV, ive had both Avast and the old AVG pre-avast days fail on protecting against a worm, so binned being a beta tester and their product. Havnt looked back since WSA.

 

$100 from Dell to resolve, jeesh id have cleared it up for half that

No love for Malwarebytes?  I have a lifetime license, so right now I don't even need to shop around.

[goretsky 1,062]

Hello,

 

There's no such thing as a "Koobface spyware worm."  There was a Koobface worm that was operated for several years starting back in 2008 or so, but it's operators were identified and the operation dismantled around 2012.

 

Most likely whatever was reporting the "Koobface spyware worm" was some kind of fake anti-malware program designed to scare you into giving a scammer your credit card details.

 

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky

[Marujan 92]

install Kaspersky, its free.

 

 

ps: and free ransomware decrypting of your data

 

 

 

[+therealDamien 589]

avira and adblock here. never got infected ever.

 

and 95% of the time I have avira disabled.

[Ulpian 30]

McAfee is trash. Comodo too. Windows Security Essentials (Win7) or defender (Win 8.1/10) is better. And free even for commercial usage.
I use ESET (paid for business) or Kaspersky (free for home). Additionally I use Eset Online Scanner to scan customers computers.
Avira was decent, but they started adding ads to free products. I dropped it >4y ago.

 

[Mando 5,117]

16 hours ago, Steven P. said:

No love for Malwarebytes?  I have a lifetime license, so right now I don't even need to shop around.

I dont see the point to it with running Webroot mate  it replaces around 3 3rd party programs in a 10Mb footprint

[Howard Davis 17]

12 hours ago, goretsky said:

Hello,

 

There's no such thing as a "Koobface spyware worm."  There was a Koobface worm that was operated for several years starting back in 2008 or so, but it's operators were identified and the operation dismantled around 2012.

 

Most likely whatever was reporting the "Koobface spyware worm" was some kind of fake anti-malware program designed to scare you into giving a scammer your credit card details.

 

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky

Thanks to all here for your advice. Dell, in a remote session, identified Koobface. They cleaned it out and restored my security software, and ever since my computer has been running like new - fast as lightning as long as some external server is not equally fast. When McAfee expires I intend to try Avast plus Malwarebytes. 

[goretsky 1,062]

Hello,

 

A little behind-the-scenes story from the making of that video:

 

https://goretsky.wordpress.com/2013/06/11/the-secret-guide-to-uninstalling-any-anti-virus-software/

(Just read the first and last paragraphs)

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky

 

On 2/11/2018 at 7:54 AM, FunkyMike said:

 

 

 

Hello,

Are you certain it was Dell you spoke with, and not a third-party masquerading as them?  You might want to check your credit card statement to see what you were charged for the service, and by whom.

 

Regards,
 

Aryeh Goretsky

 

11 hours ago, Howard Davis said:

Thanks to all here for your advice. Dell, in a remote session, identified Koobface. They cleaned it out and restored my security software, and ever since my computer has been running like new - fast as lightning as long as some external server is not equally fast. When McAfee expires I intend to try Avast plus Malwarebytes. 

 

[Mando 5,117]

7 hours ago, goretsky said:

Hello,

 

A little behind-the-scenes story from the making of that video:

 

https://goretsky.wordpress.com/2013/06/11/the-secret-guide-to-uninstalling-any-anti-virus-software/

(Just read the first and last paragraphs)

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky

 

 

Hello,

Are you certain it was Dell you spoke with, and not a third-party masquerading as them?  You might want to check your credit card statement to see what you were charged for the service, and by whom.

 

Regards,
 

Aryeh Goretsky

 

 

I was kind of wondering that myself, didnt know Dell did support sessions to customers for general issues, their hardware faults fine, but even then they get you to run through the built in tests to the systems, they never take remote control (that ive seen)

[satukoro 1,350]

This is why having a (your choice of OS here) install/recovery disk is useful.

 

Also, many antivirus/antimalware software vendors offer a free home version of their product.

I personally use Sophos and Windows Defender.

[FunkyMike 1,861]

8 hours ago, goretsky said:

Hello,

 

A little behind-the-scenes story from the making of that video:

 

https://goretsky.wordpress.com/2013/06/11/the-secret-guide-to-uninstalling-any-anti-virus-software/

(Just read the first and last paragraphs)

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky

Hello Areyeh,

 

That is some really impressive professional experience let alone the instructions and the behind the scenes story about the John McAfee video.

 

Quote

Preface

 

As a bit of background, my former boss John McAfee contacted me back in 2013 looking for help in making a video explaining how to uninstall McAfee AntiVirus software. Since I used to run support for him over there, I figured “Fair ’nuff,” considered it some karmic payback and did a bit of web spelunking.  I found the appropriate knowledgebase article on McAfee’s support site, McAfee Document ID # TS101331, “How to uninstall or reinstall supported McAfee products using the Consumer Products Removal Tool,” noted the link in the article to download their manual uninstaller (conveniently called the McAfee Consumer Products Removal Tool) and forwarded that to him with instructions to contact McAfee’s tech support if things didn’t go as instructed in the article. [Note that I was being asked about removing the consumer version. For assistance with the enterpriseversion, I would have otherwise referred him to their business support.]  He said that wasn’t enough information, so I ended up writing this blog post, which comes out to about six printed pages.

 

McAfee—like my current employer, ESET—provides a perfectly serviceable set of instructions. As a matter of act, you can view them at ESET Knowledgebase Article #2289, “How do I manually uninstall my Windows ESET security product?” (complete with link to ESET’s manual removal program, the equally pedestrian-sounding ESET Uninstaller tool).

...

...

...

Oh, and in case you are wondering, John McAfee never ended up making a video following these instructions.  I sent them over, and he explained he wanted to make a different kind of video on how to uninstall his eponymous software, one that involved guns and explosions. He did end up making this video though, and it has gotten a lot of views on YouTube.  He had even written in a small part for me as “Bartholomew,” but I declined.  The audio engineer from the video production company played the part, instead.  I think he did a pretty good job.

 

Aryeh Goretsky

 

+1000 Internets

 

Very nice cameo and I can totally see how your write up went a long way towards shaping the John McAfee video.

 

[patseguin 1,321]

I  used to use AVG at my business and it saved me a few times, good product. These days though, Windows Defender is more than enough.

[+BudMan 3,551]

23 hours ago, Howard Davis said:

Dell, in a remote session, identified Koobface

I am really doubting that to be honest.. Dell would not support your antivirus product of choice.. While you could get support from Mcafee - I juts find it hard to believe dell would do this..

 

This really common scam... Scare/Show user they are Infected with XYZ, offer to fix XYZ for $$$ - profit

 

You do understand there have been Dell and Windows Support Scam's shoot even Mcafee for years and years..

[Brandon H 3,144]

I've never trusted McAfee as an anti-virus, neither their free or paid solutions are good. They've been one of the worst offenders with system slowdown in the past too.

 

for free anti-virus I always recommend Avast, or even just Windows Defender if on 10

for paid I tend to recommend choose between these 3. Avast, Kaspersky, and ESET

[nekrosoft13 724]

On 2/11/2018 at 9:50 AM, Howard Davis said:

DO NOT DEPEND ON McAfee ANTIVIRUS!

Despite having up-to-date McAfee "Life Save" on my computer, it was infected by the Koobface spyware worm. McAfee DID NOT PROTECT ME from this malware, which probably was acquired from a website. Subsequent to getting this malware information was hacked from my computer from three different locations. Fixing this was done through Dell at a cost to me of $100 plus several days of aggravation and inconvenience. I cancelled my automatic renewal of McAfee and will be researching and shopping for better protection in the future. If you have McAfee, DON'T TRUST IT!

let me make this easier for you....

 

DO NOT TRUST ANYTHING On YOUR PC/MAC/Phone etc....

 

nothing makes you 100% secure, use common sense.

4 minutes ago, Brandon H said:

I've never trusted McAfee as an anti-virus, neither their free or paid solutions are good. They've been one of the worst offenders with system slowdown in the past too.

 

for free anti-virus I always recommend Avast, or even just Windows Defender if on 10

for paid I tend to recommend choose between these 3. Avast, Kaspersky, and ESET

oh no, The Russians....

 

 

/jk

 

 

 

Kaspersky does make good software.