Question for those of you using Spybot S&D and AVG Anti-Virus

Each time I update Spybot and re-Immunize, I get an error when I run an AVG virus scan. AVG is telling me that there is an error in the "hosts" file within system32\drivers\etc

If I tell AVG to fix it the error goes away until the next time I update Spybot.

I'm assuming Spybot is putting entries in there to block potential spyware. Should I not have AVG fix the "hosts" file error, or should I continue to let AVG fix it?

Thanks a bunch!

 

When SpyBot adds things to the hosts file, the next AVG scan will flag the changes. There is a way to make AVG ignore them, or to not scan that folder. Sorry, I don't remember how.

 

That's ok. It doesn't bother me if AVG tells me about them. I just wanted to make sure that Spybot wasn't actually giving me malware that should be cleaned up.

I'll leave "hosts" alone.

 

After reading this discussion, I decided to test this. I use Spybot S&D and AVG but I don't recall what you described happening in my system. But, I haven't re-Immunized for quite a long time, so I thought I'd start Spybot S&D, re-Immunize, and then run an AVG scan and see whether AVG tells me it found errors in the "hosts" file. It did not.

 

Thanks for checking. Seems really weird to me; the warning only comes back when I get a Spybot update and re-immunize. I am on Spybot version 1.15. I'm going to update to the new .20 when I get home and see if that helps.

Drew

 

Spybot does change the hosts list when you update and immunize. The hosts list is a list of known bad sites. This prevents you from accessing them. AVG reports that change. It is not an error that AVG is reporting, it is an information post. It is not a bad idea to check the hosts list, occasionally. My wife picked up a bug that had removed the Spybot list and added it's own. Spybot's addition will be listed at the beginning and there will also be an entry at the end point of Spybot's list.

 

Great info! Thanks musksnipe.

 

Well then, can you explain why AVG did not report the change in my system?