file extention

[arnous]

hello everybody,
what are the type of files that can never be infected? i think that by adding them in the exclusion list i can reduce the scanning time, isn't it?

thanx

[arnous]

no suggestions?

[DavidR]

I don't think you have had an answer because the question is vague. These would help determine if your scan is taking a long time.
- You don't say if you are finding the scan long?
- what your OS is? what your CPU is?
- How much RAM you have?
- what your scan settings are? How often do you scan?
- how big the HDD/s are that being scanned?
As you can see a little vague.

Things have changed and are changing and what was thought safe before may not be now. Not so long ago people thought .jpg files were safe, now that is not the case.

You can change the scan sensitivity to a Standard Scan instead of Thorough Scan and you don't always have to archive files.

What ever you choose, you should run your Scan at a time when you are not busy on your computer, then it doesn't really matter how long it takes.

[Lisandro]

Until some time ago, picture files were not infected...
Nowadays, some of them could exploit the computer due to vulnerabilities of Windows  

Text files (*.txt) files are harmless as far I know.

[fannymites]

I don't think so.  One of the EICAR test files is a .txt file

[shgoh]

I don't think so.  One of the EICAR test files is a .txt file

as far as i know....txt files should be fine

as what technical has mentioned...picture files do have some vulnerabilities these days :'(

anyone knows anything about movie/music files?

[Lisandro]

I don't think so.  One of the EICAR test files is a .txt file

Well, it's a test file, not a real virus  

[Gene Johnson]

If you have done an archive scan once, you should not have to do it each time, since all new files downloaded will be scanned when downloaded.

[Eddy]

Every file, no matter what extension, can contain harmfull code. However if this harmfull code will be executed, well that depends.

Example:
- I write some malicious code in basic, run it thruth a compiler ét voila, there you have a .exe or .com which will be harmfull when run.
- Lets say I only send you the code in a .txt file. You do not rename or change anything else. If you double click the text file it will just open and nothing bad will happen.
- Now you set your system to open .txt with a basic compiler/interpreter with a /run switch. You again double click on the .txt file. Now the code will be executed.
- The same .txt file with the same code. You rename it to .bat and double click on it. Depending on the exact code inside it may be executed.

- I send you a mail with a .gif. In the mail I tell you to change that to .exe and that I did it just because my ISP wouldn't let me send .exe
- You change it and run it. See, .gif can also contain harmfull code.

As you can see, every file extension can contain harmfull code. If the code will be excuted depends on a lot of things. What fileextensions you want to scan and if you want to scan archives by default, is entirely up to you.

[Lisandro]

As you can see, every file extension can contain harmfull code. If the code will be excuted depends on a lot of things. What fileextensions you want to scan and if you want to scan archives by default, is entirely up to you.

The wisdom in words...
Thanks Eddy