Portable Real Time Protection

[Spartaniz]

Hey guys.

Im gonna buy a External Hard Drive for backups- Im looking for a program so that when i plug it in, it will scan all files being moved, copied or trying to access the drive for any form of malware/viruses so that my backups wont get infected. Some sort of portable real time protection.

Can anyone point me in the right direction?

Thanks!

 

[Spartaniz]

come on guys!

 

[hilton]

AVG will scan the drive for you.

 

[Spartaniz]

i want it ON the drive- like a portable anti virus that scans files in real time without installation

 

[spiderz]

AVG portable?

 

[hilton]

http://portableapps.com/apps/utilities/clamwin_portable

It won't scan by magic though, you'll have to configure it somehow.

 

[The_Unbeliever]

...which means that it'll have to run on the PC the device is connected to.

Not good if the host PC's already infected.

 

[Spartaniz]

yea i dont want it to scan the host pc. just anything thats trying to access the drive, reading from it, writing to it.

 

[Azrael]

I don't think what you're looking for exists.

As mentioned, you can keep a portable Anti-Virus app on your external drive and execute this from any PC you're copying from to scan the files first.

But if that PC is already infected, and depending on what it is infected with, it might be of no use - your drive is probably going to get infected.

A bog standard external USB HDD wont be able to execute a program by itself..

 

[Spartaniz]

ahhhh- what about a program that stores all files in a file which viruses cannot penetrate? something like a virtual computers hdd or something

 

[Ian Parker]

Hi Spartaniz,

You are still going to have to copy the files over at some point. The only way to protect the drive is ensure you are only backing up from a computer that you know has the latest AV installed on it. You are obviously unable to "install" something onto the HD itself, and having a virtual machine isn't really going to help as you are still copying all your files into the VM and therefore potentially infecting the VM, and having the same problem you are trying to avoid.

You could create a VM and install AV onto that. Then having AV on your computer you could potentially check the files twice but a bit of a waste of time.