Insecticide is a powerful, fast, elegant and modern anti-virus with background scanning, heuristic virus detection, macro-virus support, and more. Insecticide detects viruses, worms, trojans, macro-viruses and HyperCard viruses.
Requirements
• Mac OS 8.0 or better (MacOS 9 & MacOS 9.1 supported)
• PowerPC computer
Installing Insecticide
Insecticide is an application and can be placed anywhere on your hard disk. However, if you want to be protected against viruses (when a disk is inserted, when an app is launched, etc.), you must drag Insecticide Control and Insecticide Extension on the System folder. The System will automatically place them where they need to be. You will have to restart to enable background protection.
Using Insecticide
Using the application Insecticide
Insecticide is an application and can be placed anywhere on your hard disk. However, if you want to be protected against viruses (when a disk is inserted, when an app is launched, etc.), you must drag Insecticide Control and Insecticide Extension on the System folder. The System will automatically place them where they need to be. You will have to restart to enable background protection.
Everytime you will launch Insecticide, it will perform an auto-check and will load the Virus Database. If Insecticide is infected or if the Virus Database is infected/damaged/absent, Insecticide will not launch.
There isn't much in the menus, just the "About…" item in the Apple Menu with the name of the registered user, and "Background protection" in the File menu, a quick way to launch the "Insecticide Control". If the background protection is not installed, you will get an error message.
We will detail here the Insecticide window. Insecticide is very well thought and you can access all Insecticide's features via a single window.
Scan volumes
Insecticide gives you a lot of different scanning possibilities.
You should first choose a scan mode: click the big "Mode…" button and choose between Fast Scan and Thorough Scan. We strongly recommend you to choose the Thorough scan: even if it is much slower then the Fast Scan, it will not miss any virus. Insecticide will remember your settings and will automatically load the last selected mode.
You must then select your scan method. We recommend you to scan your computer using the "Computer" scan method every week, especially if you did not install the Background protection. When you're done, click "Scan" and follow the instructions.
Insecticide can scan busy and damaged files, and can also scan PC volumes. Insecticide will not detect PC viruses, of course.
If you scan a locked volume, Insecticide will tell you, but if you scan a file/folder on a locked volume, it won't alert you.
After the analysis is done, if a virus is found, Insecticide will block your computer and will alert you. Then, you can choose to repair all the files, some of the files, or you can choose other solutions by control-clicking the file(s).
Once scanning & disinfecting is finished, Insecticide will display a report that you can save under Text and will play a sound, either good news or bad news (good Mac startup sound or failure startup sound).
System status
The System status tab will quickly tell you if Insecticide is correctly installed on your computer. You can click on the √ or on the X to have more info about the item. If an item is checked (X) and in red, there is a problem with Insecticide. We guarantee Insecticide's efficiency only if all the items are marked with a √ and in green.
Virus on remand
When Insecticide detects an infected file with its heuristic detection method, Sniffer™ (activated by the Thorough Mode when you scan a file), but that the virus isn't known, it will place the file in the Virus on remand list. The file will stay on your hard disk, but cannot be launched, edited or modified to avoid further infection.
• You can try to repair the file once again; to do so, select the file and click the button "Scan & disinfect".
• You can Delete the file; to do so, select the file and click the button "Delete".
• To securely erase the file so that it cannot be recovered by Norton Undelete and infect your system again, select the file, control-click and choose "Shred infected item".
• If you are sure that Insecticide made an error and that the file is not infected, select the file, control-click and choose "Restore infected item". We do not recommend you to use this feature unless you are really, really sure that the file is healthy!
• If you still can't fix your problem, you should send it to our Laboratory for analysis. Select the file and click the button "Send to VLS".
Using the Insecticide Background Protection
The Insecticide Background Protection (also known as SquashInsect) will scan a inserted floppy/Zip/CD for viruses, scan files when you select them in the Finder or when you open them via an application, and more. It is essential to enable the Background protection. To do so, drag the Insecticide Extension & Insecticide Control on the System folder (the System will copy the files where they need to be) and restart. To see if your computer is protected, insert a CD-ROM: Insecticide will place itself to front and scan your CD.
You can configure the background protection. To do so, select "Insecticide Control" in the Application list, and select "Preferences…" or "Settings…" in the File menu.
The Settings dialog box will allow you to disable the Background Protection (also known as SquashInsect) without having to drag Insecticide Extension & Insecticide Control out of the System Folder.
The Preferences dialog box will change options related to the Background Protection.
When a disk is inserted…
Bring the scan window to front: If you want to bring the "Scanning disk..." window to front when a disk is inserted, check this check box.
Scan inside StuffIt/Compact Pro/Zip archives: Sometimes, viruses are compressed and will infect your system once they are uncompressed and auto-launched. Insecticide can scan inside archives, but this will slow down Insecticide.
When an application is opened…
Scan the application: Just before the application launches, Insecticide scans it and does not launch it if a virus a found.
Scan files opened by an application: When you open a file in an application supporting the standard open dialog box or the Navigation Services, the file is scanned before being opened.
If a virus is found…
Block the computer and alert me: Display a dialog box that will interrupt all active tasks to avoid propagation, giving you a choice between repairing or deleting the infected file.
-or-
Repair the virus: Delete the virus without alerting you. If the virus cannot be deleted for some reason, Insecticide will alert you.
Display a report: After the virus is repaired, Insecticide will display a report.
Other
Auto-scan a file when it is selected in the Finder: Probably one of the most cool functions in Insecticide SquashInsect™. You don't even have to open a file to detect a virus, selecting it without opening it in the Finder will scan it. This function is cool and fast, but if you select a large number of files, it might take some time to complete. If you hear disk activity when selecting a file, this normal. Slow computers (PowerPC 601) should not enable this function, because the Finder might just stop reacting everytime a file is selected.
You do not have to restart when you change an option, it is instantly applied, including enabling/disabling SquashInsect™.
If you quit Insecticide Control, the background protection will instantly stop.
Norton AntiVirus can scan a "hot folder", such as a download folder. This option is absent in Insecticide because it is obsolete: if you click on the file, Insecticide will scan it, and if StuffIt Expander automatically expands the file, Insecticide will find it before. The advantage of Insecticide over anti-virus supporting hot folder monitoring is that all the disk is protected, not only a folder.
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Congratulations, you finished reading this dull Read Me! We hope that you will enjoy Insecticide, and we sure you will... If you do, please register it so that we can keep the virus database up-to-date. Thanks!
Bugs and comments
Send us bugs reports, comments or suggestions by e-mail.
Shareware
"Insecticide" is a $25 shareware. We think it is the best distribution method to counter Norton AntiVirus. Insecticide is complete, powerful and fast. Since we don't count the days we passed developing Insecticide, we think that a $25 fee is nothing compared to Norton AntiVirus ($70). The virus database is updated often and it will be free forever for registered users.
Registering
You can register online at http://www.fansoftware.com and you will receive your registration code within 48 hours.
Distribution
Insecticide may be freely distributed (only the unregistered version) via electronic bulletin boards, user groups and person to person. When distributed, all accompanying files are to be distributed too.
We encourage you to put Insecticide on any other site or included on any magazine CD-ROMs, but please tell us if you do: we can send you updated versions when available.
Legal stuff
This software is provided "as is". Every effort has been made to ensure it will not cause any damage, but the author does not make any warranty. Fan Software denies responsibility for any damage caused directly or indirectly by the software. Use it at your own risk. Some jurisdictions may not allow this limitation of the warranty, so it may not apply to you.
