News: Symantec Updates Cause Chaos in China

Once again, I hear about Symantec Norton products causing major issues. These problems occured in China, but clearly point up the problem that Norton products can cause.

Let me be clear and say that I used to recommend Norton products exclusively for my clients, but growing problems with their software has made it impossible for me to continue recommending them. Instead, I usually offer an open source solution like ClamAV for Windows. It doesn't try to do everything and maintains a much lower profile on your computer.

While it is great that they have a work-around for the issues, I wonder how many of my clients could copy files off their original Windows install disks. What this means is that clients would have to pay me to come in and repair their machines. Somehow, I don't see Symantec offering to cover my fees, even though their software caused such a dramtic problem.

At what point do attempts at security override the basic functionality of your computer? Is this a case of the cure being far worse than the cold?

Symantec Updates Cause Chaos in China Hello Kitty writes "According to Computerworld, a signature update to Symantec's anti-virus software has knocked out thousands of Chinese PCs. Apparently the latest update for the AV component of the various Norton packages mistook two system files in the Chinese edition of Windows XP SP2 for the 'Backdoor.Haxdoor' trojan. Piracy issues may complicate recovery, since once the updates are installed Symantec says the only hope for reviving an affected system is to re-copy the affected DLLs from the Windows restore disks. Everyone has their official restore disks handy, right?"

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

(Via Slashdot.)

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