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Author Topic: Is an XP guest safer from malware?  (Read 2852 times)

Offline Maurice

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Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« on: March 03, 2011, 05:49:41 PM »
I have Pclos dual booting with XP plus I also have Windows XP as a guest in Pclos.

As a guest, is it as vulnerable to malware as the normally installed XP is or is it somehow 'protected' by being in a virtual box?

Thanks
« Last Edit: March 03, 2011, 05:52:46 PM by Maurice »
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Offline AndrzejL

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #1 on: March 03, 2011, 05:58:54 PM »
Vulnerable if connected to internet... VBox is not a "sandboxing" tool.

Regards.

Andy
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Offline T6

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #2 on: March 03, 2011, 06:07:30 PM »
you need to put antivirus, enable firewall and don't open suspicious files

a virtual machines is just a machine with limited access to your real hardware, nothing special can be added to make it more secure without risking the stability
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Offline parnote

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #3 on: March 03, 2011, 06:12:32 PM »
Agree with T6 and AndrzejL.

Win-anything isn't secure, even if ran in a virtual machine. You will still need to run anti-virus, anti-malware and anti-spyware software, if you want Win-anything to remain secure. However, if your virtual box copy becomes corrupted by any of the aforementioned plagues, you can either just reinstall, or even better yet, restore it from a pristine copy of your virtual machine (provided you kept a backup of your VirtualBox VDI file). Furthermore, any mal-anything that Windows-anything picks up should stay isolated to only that virtual machine, and should not have any ill effects on your host.

parnote
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Offline ElCuervo

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #4 on: March 03, 2011, 07:00:46 PM »
I would say it depends on you. If you don't surf porn and other stupid websites, it's relatively safe. I have had WinXP running for over two years as an unprotected guest, and not once has anything bad happened. However, I don't do any web surfing on Windows - but then why would I? It's a simple mouse click to Firefox in Linux!
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Offline Maurice

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #5 on: March 03, 2011, 07:10:15 PM »
Thanks for those very prompt replies chaps.

So now I know. ;D ;D
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Offline cphayes0882

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #6 on: March 03, 2011, 07:16:28 PM »
Exactly, no porn and XP will run perfect forever....
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Offline T6

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #7 on: March 03, 2011, 07:17:18 PM »
no porn?

terrible...
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Offline Archie

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #8 on: March 03, 2011, 07:27:24 PM »
How about if one takes a snapshot of say, an XP install with everything you need but the internet is not connected? Then everytime one finishes with a session, they can always discard any current session which might be infected and revert back to that perfectly healthy snapshot?

That is possible.  :)  8)  ???
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Offline T6

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #9 on: March 03, 2011, 07:29:08 PM »
yes but why bother?

i prefer to use pclinux, no snapshots required, not much to worry here
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Offline Archie

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #10 on: March 03, 2011, 08:18:25 PM »
Then if it is easy to revert to a healthy XP install after infections, one does not have to install anti-virus software and can surf all the porn site they want ... done in virtual state.

It would be wise not to enable Shared Folder, especially if they have read/write access to any of your Linux folders.
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Offline Maurice

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #11 on: March 03, 2011, 08:42:46 PM »
There's an interesting article on this at dedoimedo.com

You do not need anti-virus software. You do not need it in Windows, nor Linux. Blacklisting is an obsolete method of maintaining security of your operating system.
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Offline Archie

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #12 on: March 03, 2011, 08:48:34 PM »
Just an after thought... how much approximately would a CPU+RAM be using when running an anti-virus program both in the background and a manual scan?
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Offline Crow

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #13 on: March 03, 2011, 10:21:46 PM »
Do you want a light Anti Virus that does just what the others do and it's free? I just downloaded Placebo AV

Check it if you want  ;)  http://www.doxdesk.com/updates/2008.html#u20080129-placebo

I have it now in my taskbar and I'm sending it to all my friends   ;D
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Offline Archie

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Re: Is an XP guest safer from malware?
« Reply #14 on: March 03, 2011, 11:16:46 PM »
Gotta love that fanfare ... Until then...

That'll scare all potential infections. Nothing to see, please proceed. And the Plus Pro is a steal for $30!

Now, where did I put that rope?



;D
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