3 ms·

This is going a huge tangent, but... I don't much believe in antivirus, as crooks can often find ways around them. Traditionally, trust is based on knowing so

by im3w1l 4y ago

This is going a huge tangent, but... I don't much believe in antivirus, as crooks can often find ways around them. Traditionally, trust is based on knowing someones name and place of residence so you can call the cops on them and/or take matters in your own hands if they try any funny business. For anonymous people, an established reputation can also work. In this case the repository is 7 years old. The owner states a full name (that if we are paranoid may or may not be the real one). A person with that name has published a scientific article about compression.

jart 4y ago
I generally agree but give me more credit. I monitored the system calls myself. Also VirusTotal isn't a virus scanner but rather a community driven aggregator. People leave comments and downvote when binaries do evil things.
- pmoriarty 4y ago
  "People leave comments and downvote when binaries do evil things." There are just way, way, way too many binaries out there for even a large fraction of them to be commented on. I would definitely not rely on such comments for my security. Anecdotally, I've scanned a ton of stuff through VT and very rarely saw any comments on them at all. It happens sometimes, but not a lot.
  - dontbenebby 4y ago
    The binary has to be used for evil a lot before people notice.
- dontbenebby 4y ago
  Sorry, I wasn't questioning your integrity, it was more a meta level question since I lack that ability to start looking at system calls and thought to myself "this looks cool, I can probably trust it, but am I making a rational choice or just being reckles because it's on a well known site and I think the concepts are cool". (And sorry I posted hard today, I had too much caffeine and my weed supply dried up -- if I didn't have those issues you'd see most of my comments be more like this one.)
  - jart 4y ago
    > I lack that ability to start looking at system calls Let's fix that then. Which operating system do you use?
dontbenebby 4y ago
>I don't much believe in antivirus, as crooks can often find ways around them. I have mixed feelings. It can be good to spot check things, but I think things like checking the firewall for odd traffic are probably better uses of resources.

by im3w1l 4y ago

jart 4y ago

I generally agree but give me more credit. I monitored the system calls myself. Also VirusTotal isn't a virus scanner but rather a community driven aggregator. People leave comments and downvote when binaries do evil things.

pmoriarty 4y ago
"People leave comments and downvote when binaries do evil things." There are just way, way, way too many binaries out there for even a large fraction of them to be commented on. I would definitely not rely on such comments for my security. Anecdotally, I've scanned a ton of stuff through VT and very rarely saw any comments on them at all. It happens sometimes, but not a lot.
- dontbenebby 4y ago
  The binary has to be used for evil a lot before people notice.
dontbenebby 4y ago
Sorry, I wasn't questioning your integrity, it was more a meta level question since I lack that ability to start looking at system calls and thought to myself "this looks cool, I can probably trust it, but am I making a rational choice or just being reckles because it's on a well known site and I think the concepts are cool". (And sorry I posted hard today, I had too much caffeine and my weed supply dried up -- if I didn't have those issues you'd see most of my comments be more like this one.)
- jart 4y ago
  > I lack that ability to start looking at system calls Let's fix that then. Which operating system do you use?

dontbenebby 4y ago

>I don't much believe in antivirus, as crooks can often find ways around them. I have mixed feelings. It can be good to spot check things, but I think things like checking the firewall for odd traffic are probably better uses of resources.