"Doug McIntyre" <merlyn@geeks.org> wrote in message
news:486bd948$0$60075$8046368a@newsreader.iphouse. net...
> "Will" <westes-usc@noemail.nospam> writes:
>>Can someone recommend an anti-virus solution that lets you build a boot CD
>>that will inspect the NTFS file system for trojans or viruses without any
>>need to boot the OS on the file system you are inspecting?
>
> Thats not going to be too common, because its not a very effective
> model for ongoing A/V protection.

Day-to-day protection has to balance many different issues like
intrusiveness and performance on a system under use. It's very easy to
subvert modern virus checking programs with root kit viruses. The rootkit
simply rewrites kernel functions and reports back to the virus checker only
the data it wants the checker to see.

Booting from a standalone CD is the only approach that guarantees that all
files on the file system can be inspected by an OS and application that is
not under control of a trojan or rootkit. It would be an extremely good
way of checking for hidden files or folders that would otherwise be hidden
from view if the rootkit were active.

It's a shame if no anti-virus vendor has seen to create such a bootable CD.

--
Will