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Virus? 10 Places to Scan Your PC Online for Free
Use any of these ten sites to scan your PC for problems.
With so much technology becoming cloud based, it's no surprise that the companies that create anti-virus software are moving right along with the trend. This article from the beingPC site has a good list of companies that have online scanners.
Several of the companies listed are familiar and likely to be recognized by many. Most of the scanners install some type of software on your system (usually small) so the online scan will work, so it's a good idea to backup any data that might be lost (along the lines of "not likely to happen but better safe than sorry" idea). Just a note, scanning takes more time on slower connections, something to keep in mind before you start.
Scan your PC online for viruses
Editors update: Number two on the list, Windows Live OneCare, has been discontinued.
Signing off for now,
Rhiannon
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Comments
your link does not work because that site is over bandwidth.
You can try again later to see if it works. Sometimes, these things can happen with sites :).
I use www.virustotal.com/ to scan single files
Title says ten places but I only see one link.
make click on the link, read all the page and...you ll see
Hi.
I'm not sure i understand the problem you're having. I just hit the link above that takes you here http://beingpc.com/2010/01/scan-your-pc-online-for-viruses/
and when you scroll down this page there are ten more links to different online scanning services. Only one of these links didn't work for me (Panda: some sort of server issue) but the rest seem to work fine. I didn't try the scanners themselves, but the links definitely work. Are you saying the links don't work or that they aren't even there when you go to this page?
Did you try clicking on the link? :)
Nice find - the Kaspersky scan found a rootkit disguised keylogger on my PC that was missed by my standard antivirus program Avira Anivir.
I have a slow connection and really swallows up the bandwidth. I woud suggest getting a good scanner from TSA and have it do a full scan at night instead of wasting your time with these online menaces.
I agree with Anupam, the sites are useful but they don't replace having security software installed on a system.
I understand what you mean about using them with a slow connection - it's probably not worth the wait if you are on anything less than high speed unless it's urgent.
I'm on a satellite connection and they are slow for me - of course, satellite isn't as fast as the higher bandwidth connections.
These are not online menaces, but very useful links. They are certainly not a replacement to your resident antivirus. These online scanners are useful, when you have virus/malware infection on your PC, and it won't let some of your scanners run. Or, when you want to make sure, that your PC is not infected. At such times, these online scanners are really of help.
Recently, my cousin's PC was infected with malware. Avast was able to detect, but could not get rid of it. I tried several scanners, they were not successful. Then, I scanned the PC with online scanner from Trend Micro HouseCall, and it cleaned the PC.
Yes, on slow connections, it may be a pain to run these scanners. But, still, these online scanners should be in your knowledge, in case you need them sometime.
Hi, I tried the link in the article above but internet explorer says it can not display the web page. Can some one send me the correct link? Thanks in advance.
Moderator's Comment: Email address removed for safety reasons. The editor will help you on this page if she can.
Their site is down right now, that's why Internet Explorer can't load it.
I would try back in a while - sites aren't usually down for very long.
You can also check if a site is down, or if it's just your connection, by plugging in the web address here:
http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/
Very true.
Snipped. My initial post, without logging in, didn't show up, but it did after I logged in and resubmitted the post. So I'm snipping out this duplicate since I can't snip out the non-logged-in post.
I just use Virustotal, which BeingPC provides as an alternative recommendation, but this is for single file inspections, which I perform before installing newly downloaded programs or applications. When I did a complete system scan, using the online scanner, it was done with Eset's NOD32, and for every alert it provided, I ran Avira Antivir on the file, and it always reported the same alerts.
As for the other online scanners listed by BeingPC, I haven't tried any of them.
Are any of the other online scanners listed by BeingPC better than using Avira Antivir fully installed and running all of the time, plus VT and NOD32? I'd think these should be sufficient, but am not expert on AV's, either.
Also, I still use Win 2000 and believe to have tried Windows Live, but couldn't use it for Win 2k. Or maybe the problem was something else. I'm pretty sure it's that Windows Live doesn't work for Win 2k.
Mike Corbeil
I'm not an expert on anti-virus either, but Avira gets good ratings here at Gizmo's Freeware. Personally, I use Microsoft Security Essentials (yeah, I know it's Microsoft but it works well, integrates nicely with all the programs I use and my system doesn't take a performance hit).
The main difference between an installed anti-virus program and an online scanner is the online scanner doesn't provide any ongoing, real-time protection or detection. They scan your system for problems each time you use one, and, to the best of my knowledge, nothing is installed on your computer to provide additional protection after a scan.
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