VirusTotal, an invaluable free service to the Internet community, which utilizes 42 antivirus engines to analyzes suspicious files and URLs for all types of malware, recently released a Firefox only extension – VTzilla.
VTzilla is designed to scan URLs, links, and files (potential downloads) for malware, by employing the installed toolbar, or alternatively, the right click context menu.
Note: You can stop the toolbar from appearing, by making the required adjustment in Firefox’s: View – Toolbars.
Using the toolbar, I’ve plugged in my own site address as an example.
VirusTotal’s report indicates my site is a safe site, and does not contain malware.
Taking it one step further, (paranoid common sense), I’ve clicked on “View downloaded file analysis” within the report, which indicates all 42 engines found – there is no malware. The screen capture below, shows only part of the file analysis report.
The following two screen captures illustrated both my request to scan a link on my own site – Tighten Your PC’s Security With Free Encrypt Stick, using VTzilla’s right click context menu, and the “clean” result.
Next, I visited Download.com and set up a download. Before saving the file however, using the right click context menu again, I had VirusTotal perform a scan.
The result indicates a clean file.
A couple of caveats:
Regular VirusTotal users are aware that file size is restricted to 20 MB or less, and this restriction unfortunately, is still in effect for this new service.
VTzilla is available only as a direct download from the developer’s site at the moment. It should be available from Firefox’s add-on repository, in due course.
First impressions:
Overall, I think this extension has some value. But, it is not a panacea. More and more, if a site is imbedded with malware, just visiting the site can trigger a driveby download. Porn surfers particularly, need to take note of this.
System requirements: Firefox 1.5 – 3+
Download at: the developer’s site.
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