Hello again my friends, I sent an e-mail to Pest Patrol a few days ago about the CWS that their software shows on my system, no reply yet... I thought I'd post this info just to see if anyone has any feelings or thoughts on this matter. After a format and complete re-install, pest patrol shows that I have a case of the CWS blues. I tried to quarantine it, but it disapears from the scan box, but when I look in the quarantine hold area, it's not there. Re-scan and there it is. I'm thinking a false positive, what do you think? The following is a hand made copy of the pest patrol scan info: CWS C:\Program Files\MicrosoftAntiSpyware\gcThreatAuditSettingsData.gcd Any ideas? Thanks, Carl Oh yeah, I scanned my system with an up-to-date copy of CWShredder 2.14, and a few others anti-spyware programs, all scans showed my system clean...........

I think it is a false positive.

In particular the file path seems to lead to a data file, not an executable one.

I've found that individual anti-spyware programs will turn up findings that you should
(as you have done) question, at least initially and thereafter depending on what you learn about the program. Basically there is value in the false positives, to a degree. At least you know the program works, and if it is not a known "rogue" program designed to deceive you, (and Pest Patrol is not, to my understanding, one of those) it simply means that in the changing environment of malware detection, overlapping techniques can turn up some odd results. All the more reason to maintain a varietal approach to anti-spyware scanning.

Oh, and hold off on actions like reformating based on indidivual findings that are in conflict with other known good programs.

Posting here is also a good method of saving yourself some grief.

Thanks for your input, I will continue to investigate this problem and hope that I get a response from Pest Patrol. Thanks again, Carl

Carl,
I won a copy of Pest Patrol on the site here a while back.
I experienced a little difficulty installing it.
At the time, I couldn't seem to get past the FlashMedia intro. lol
Anyway, I emailed them, and got responses.
Loaded it and found false positives.

I even had a fairly thorough post about it a few months back.

Bottomline is I still use it.
It works.
It is fairly aggressive, though.

I also use:
A2
Ad-Aware
Spy-Bot S&D
Microsoft Anti-spyware Beta 1
SpywareBlaster

Thats all.

Presently trying out the free Bit Defender Anti-virus,
although I'm kinda partitial to AVG after years of successful operation
and countless updates made it possible to be free of all viruses.
It does catch the files that are malware that I occassionaly request
for the purpose of analysis or helping others to.

Keep up your careful consideration of what you are doing, I'd say.
More power to you.

Thanks much phawqq.................carl