Hi Jim,

If the AV software was running on the company's machine acting as the host, I don't think it will always catch writes of the virus to the hard drive.

Some software is what I call Remote Access (where you are just like another machine on the network; you run EXEs in the remote machine's memory and the host machine is like a gateway to the network, but you don't run EXEs on it). I don't think AV software running on the host machine will catch the writes made to its hard drives by the remote machine. It would catch the virus later during a scan, which may be too late.

Other software is what I call Remote Control (where you actually run EXEs on the host machine and all that is sent back to the remote machine is the screen image from the host). I think AV software running on the host machine will catch the writes made its hard drives by the remote machine.

This could be simulated kinda, I think. On a LAN, run an AV program on a machine and on another virus-infected machine (with a memory resident, EXE affecting virus), run an EXE on the other machine. Is the EXE infected? If it is, the AV software didn't catch it. I don't think it will. I think it will only catch it with the scan. Now, any volunteers?

Joe



>Hi Barbara,
>
>But I guess what I don't "get" about this is. . .
>
>If the home-installed software can catch it, then surely the same copy running on the business machine(s) will catch it too.
>
>If the software bought by the business is dependent on the presence of home software to assist it to do the complete job, then it sounds to me like there is likely a problem with the 'base' (business) software.
>
>And if the permission to have employees/contractors of the business run it legally on their home computers is a marketing gimmick, then that is smart, but surely the most important thing is that it does the job it was bought to do.
>
>Cheers,
>
>Jim N
>
>>A case in point is the recent virus affecting email. If a home-based worker has it, it can spread into the office system very quickly.
>>
>>>Hi Jim,
>>>
>>>I think possibly that if you have a virus on your home machine (one running in memory like a TSR) that affects all EXEs, COMs, etc. that you access, and you run an EXE on the RA server machine (the company machine), the file could be affected.
>>>
>>>I don't know for sure, but I would think that this is possible. I don't know if virus detection software checks every write to the hard drive made by remote machines. If it doesn't, a virus could get through.
>>>
>>>Again, I am no expert on this subject. I am just presenting what I feel might be a possibility.
>>>
>>>Take care,
>>>Joe