Author Topic: Avast service allowing Akamai port scans  (Read 7076 times)

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exocet

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Avast service allowing Akamai port scans
« on: August 01, 2011, 07:52:31 AM »
One of my many friends who I have gotten on to Avast Antivirus is getting port scanned on ports 135, 137, 138 ,139, 143, 80 By Akamai ,this is also coming through the avastsvc. Does avast have anything to do with this apparently seedy company, he is being port scanned and getting ack scanned by Akamai approximately 300 times a day from hours of 08:00 to 03:00 EST every day.

Why would some of these scans come through the avastsvc?
« Last Edit: August 01, 2011, 08:00:08 AM by exocet »

Offline Vladimyr

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Re: Avast service allowing Akamai port scans
« Reply #1 on: August 01, 2011, 09:19:16 AM »
One of my many friends who I have gotten on to Avast Antivirus is getting port scanned on ports 135, 137, 138 ,139, 143, 80 By Akamai ,this is also coming through the avastsvc. Does avast have anything to do with this apparently seedy company, he is being port scanned and getting ack scanned by Akamai approximately 300 times a day from hours of 08:00 to 03:00 EST every day.

Why would some of these scans come through the avastsvc?

Could be because avastsvc is scanning all your HTTP, email, network, P2P, etc, traffic.

What do you have against Akamai?
There is a way that seems right to a man,
       but in the end it leads to death
.” - Proverbs 16:25

Offline igor

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Re: Avast service allowing Akamai port scans
« Reply #2 on: August 01, 2011, 09:59:10 AM »
I don't really understand what you are trying to say.
Can you be more specific, especially on that "coming through avastsvc" part?

exocet

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Re: Avast service allowing Akamai port scans
« Reply #3 on: August 03, 2011, 05:38:46 AM »

What do you have against Akamai?

UDP/TCP and ack Port scans every 3-7 minutes, per 21 hours of each day is enough reasons to have against Akamai.

Ports are being opened to Akamai via the avastservice.

Ports being opened for Avast=Acceptable.
Ports being opened for Akamai=unacceptable.

If a program or product by Akamai was in use then perhaps this would be normal, however with just a desktop running and no programs running except Avast and firewall running Akamai port scans every 3-7 minutes or so.


Offline Vladimyr

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Re: Avast service allowing Akamai port scans
« Reply #4 on: August 03, 2011, 09:20:46 AM »
UDP/TCP and ack Port scans every 3-7 minutes, per 21 hours of each day is enough reasons to have against Akamai.

Ports are being opened to Akamai via the avastservice.

Ports being opened for Avast=Acceptable.
Ports being opened for Akamai=unacceptable.

If a program or product by Akamai was in use then perhaps this would be normal, however with just a desktop running and no programs running except Avast and firewall running Akamai port scans every 3-7 minutes or so.


For all I know there may be something terribly sinister happeninfg on your friend's PC but I cannot base that conclusion solely on what you have described.

AFAIK Akamai is a mirroring service used by hundreds of companies.

I hope I've understood you correctly. Are we talking 'avast! Free' and and a non-avast! firewall?
I don't understand what you mean by "Ports being opened" in relation to avast!. 'avastsvc' scans incoming traffic for malware on the ports you mentioned previously. 'avastsvc' is not a firewall. Who/what is indicating to you that the incoming "Port scans" are from Akamai and addressed to 'avastsvc'?

There is a way that seems right to a man,
       but in the end it leads to death
.” - Proverbs 16:25

Offline igor

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Re: Avast service allowing Akamai port scans
« Reply #5 on: August 03, 2011, 10:12:25 AM »
In any case, avast! has nothing to do with Akamai.
(Even though, like Vladimyr, I don't think there's anything wrong about Akamai - as far as I remember, it was/is(?) used even to distribute Microsoft updates, and certainly many other stuff... just an ordinary CDN, like a number of others.)

tech evang

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Re: Avast service allowing Akamai port scans
« Reply #6 on: March 21, 2012, 11:19:16 PM »
Didnt think this was worth a new topic since I found it by googleing "Akamai avast" to confirm that is who is hosting their services.
I saw it in the active connections for the service whilst net limiter was running (I was wondering what was chewing at my upload bandwidth) and saw avast was doing stuff despite being in "silent mode". I dont suppose it was anything nefarious though, just the program doing its thing with your net traffic.

Offline polonus

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Re: Avast service allowing Akamai port scans
« Reply #7 on: March 21, 2012, 11:41:40 PM »
Hi tech evang,


Akamai is a partner in aiding with various Cloud Services and is also is into protection with Akamai's Kona Site Defender looking to thwart online attacks.
So I would not worry that much,

polonus
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DonZ63

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Re: Avast service allowing Akamai port scans
« Reply #8 on: March 22, 2012, 12:18:52 AM »
Quote
Akamai is a partner in aiding with various Cloud Services and is also is into protection with Akamai's Kona Site Defender looking to thwart online attacks.
This is what causing the activity you are seeing. I have noticed a definite spike in Akamai connections since they implemented their Site Defender service. Time will tell if it's just another spyware facility. The Internet is such a cesspool today I guess another spyware service won't make much difference.

Offline polonus

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Re: Avast service allowing Akamai port scans
« Reply #9 on: March 22, 2012, 12:25:29 AM »
Do not always look for the dark side of it, also see the bright  :) side. I really cannot see what harm that could do you personally nor me for that reason.
This should be seen in a much wider cyber-perspective  :D. Besides they do it because they have the "rack-capacity" to do it,

polonus
« Last Edit: March 22, 2012, 12:27:15 AM by polonus »
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ja37

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Re: Avast service allowing Akamai port scans
« Reply #10 on: January 05, 2013, 12:09:00 AM »

You have been deceived. Akamai steels bandwidth, and I am FED UP with their port flooding! >:(

Dch48

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Re: Avast service allowing Akamai port scans
« Reply #11 on: January 05, 2013, 12:15:27 AM »
As had been said Akamai is deeply embedded in the entire internet structure and provides functionality and services for myriads of other companies. It is safe and pretty unobtrusive all things considered.