"Avast! Leaves PCLinuxOS Sites Aghast" - I'm dissapointed by PCLOS Mag

[Abraxas]

I had a situation recently where the Avast! for Windows AV was flagging http://pclosmag.com/index.html as containing Malware.
It seemed after some investigation to be a False Positive. I guided people such as the owner of the Server to resolving the problem by contacting Avast!, however, it seems rubbishing Avast! in an illogical way was paramount, to a few.

The PCLinuxOS Magazine staff is pleased to announce the release of the November 2013 issue. The PCLinuxOS Magazine is a product of the PCLinuxOS community, published by volunteers from the community. The magazine is lead by Paul Arnote, Chief Editor, and Assistant Editor Meemaw. The PCLinuxOS Magazine is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share-Alike 3.0 Unported license, and some rights are reserved.

In the November 2013 issue:

* Avast! Leaves PCLinuxOS Sites Aghast
SEE the HTML version, easier for my purposes: http://pclosmag.com/html/Issues/201311/page02.html
To Download:
(http://pclosmag.com/download.php?f=2013-11.pdf)

**There are a few things I felt got out of hand with this situation which I want to get of my chest here, where I feel comfortable.
First, no AV is perfect. The fuss that was made by some at the PCLinuxOS Forum was quite over the top.

Let's have a look at some of these issues.
First this is an example of one of the Threads started announcing people using Windows, wanting to download PCLOS Mag, and using Avast! for Windows, found it flagged as Malware.
http://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php/topic,121994.0.html
parnote    Reply #1 on: October 12, 2013, 10:46:26 PM

Boy, oh boy! Isn't Avast on a roll this week!

There is NO virus in or attached to the magazine cover image. Earlier this week, Avast was marking the Sept 2013 cover as having a virus. THAT is a false positive, and so is this cockamamy report.

There are NO viruses in the wild for Linux.

Consider the source. Avast doesn't have the best reputation for virus detection.

*I show the email reply from Avast!.
http://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php/topic,121994.msg1020369.html#msg1020369

*After some efforts by the site owner using the ticket lodged with Avast! I felt we'd resolved this FP, which reasonably should've been the end of it. 
http://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php/topic,121994.msg1020471.html#msg1020471

Now to the Magazine article, which I feel is over stated:
Intro:
"Besides the “events” in October with Avast! labeling the PCLinuxOS sites as containing
malware, much of this month’s magazine was already planned to center around computer security
issues.
It became quickly apparent with Avast Antivirus announcing a false positive over the September magazine cover graphic on the magazine’s October website (hereafter referred to as the Avast Fiasco), that many users are still concerned about malicious software under Linux. But let’s set one thing straight, right up front: there are no viruses “in the wild” for Linux."
http://pclosmag.com/html/Issues/201311/page02.html
Avast! Leaves PCLinuxOS Sites Aghast

by Paul Arnote (parnote)

"During the month of October, both the PCLinuxOS Magazine website and the main page of the PCLinuxOS site were marked as containing malware by Avast! antivirus software. As a result, many visits to both sites were blocked (we'll never know exactly how many), and Avast! users were left with a misleading impression that PCLinuxOS and The PCLinuxOS Magazine contains malware and viruses. The damage is unmeasurable, and the reputation of both sites is at peril, thanks to the erroneous label..."

"...The original report came from PCLinuxOS forum member Crow, on October 6, 2013. Meemaw, assistant editor of The PCLinuxOS Magazine, confirmed the problem happened to her on October 4, 2013, when she attempted to bring up the magazine website from her place of employment (as she always does), on a computer running Windows 7, "protected" with -- you guessed it -- Avast! antivirus...."

"...Subsequent scanning of all of the files on the magazine website by YouCanToo, using ClamAV (in the PCLinuxOS repository), showed no virus or malware signatures, whatsoever."

*"...Meanwhile, PCLinuxOS forum member Tony, returned to one of his old "haunts" in an attempt to help clear up the false positive. Tony, as it turns out, used to be very involved in the Avast! forums, where he seems to still have quite a very good reputation. Tony's post got other Avast! forum members checking out the magazine's web page, and they all gave it an excellent "bill of health" as well. That made the magazine's web page twice vindicated, at least in my eyes.


"...While there is no certainty or evidence that the Avast! "engineers" actually visit or listen to what's posted on the Avast! forum, it was nonetheless reassuring that the magazine site was found to be free of malicious software -- which is something that all of us who work on the magazine and the magazine's website already know with a high level of surety. "

Yep, whatever. 

Regards,

Tony