Have you ever wondered how to test your Antivirus software to ensure
it’s proper working? Well here is a quick and easy way to test your
antivirus. The process is called EICAR test which will work on any
antivirus and was developed by European Institute of Computer Antivirus Research.
This process can be used by people, companies and antivirus
programmers to test the proper functioning of the antivirus/antimalware
software without having to deal with the real computer virus which can
cause damage to the computer. Here is a step-by-step procedure to test
your antivirus.
1. Open a notepad (New Text Document.TXT) and copy the following code exactly onto it, and save the notepad.
EICAR Test code
X5O!P%@AP[4\PZX54(P^)7CC)7}$EICAR-STANDARD-ANTIVIRUS-TEST-FILE!$H+H*
2. Rename the file from New Text Document.TXT to myfile.com
3. Now run the antivirus scan on this myfile.com file.
If the antivirus is functioning properly on your computer, then it should generate a warning and immediately delete the file upon scanning. Otherwise you may have to re-install your antivirus.
NOTE: Most antivirus will pop-out a warning message in the Step-1 itself
You
can also place the myfile.com file in a ZIP or RAR file and run a scan
on it so as to ensure whether your antivirus can detect the test
string in the compressed archive. Any antivirus when scanning this file
will respond exactly as it will do for a genuine virus/malicious code.
This test will cause no damage to your computer even though the
antivirus will flag it as a malicious script. Hence it is the safest
method to test the proper functioning of any antivirus.
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