Angry IP Scanner is a threat??

I have been using Angry IP Scanner for a long time and probably use it at least once a week. It’s an awesome, easy to use freeware utility. But as of today, Symantec thinks it is a threat to my system, and has quarantined all instances of ipscan.exe. I need to investigate if this is true, or if this is just a false positive.

Symantec thinks ipscan.exe is a threat

From the Symantec listing:

Hacktool.Angry is a tool for scanning ranges of IP addresses to find computers. It is also a port scanner that can be used to probe ports on computers.

Update 1: Found some chatter on the official Angry IP forums at SourceForge. But no official word from the software company or Symantec.

Update 2: Andy has posted a link in the comments to a Symantec page for reporting false positives. So if your here because you’re experiencing this issue, please fill out the form and let’s hope Symantec does the right thing.

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10 Responses to Angry IP Scanner is a threat??

  1. Andy says:

    hmmm – thats the third or fourth screwup in less than 4 weeks – first chinese windows, then autoit scripts, then this

  2. Dismayed says:

    I’m seeing this too, as of June 19, 2007.

  3. Neil B says:

    Me too.
    As engineer, its great at finding out what server is on what IP.

    Every time i claw it back from Quarantine, about 5-10 mins Symantec puts it back! Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

  4. James says:

    I’m glad I’m not the only one. It won’t even let me download a new copy.

  5. Andy says:

    Another reason why tech’s need to have control over av definitions and quarantine policies!
    You can request the software gets removed at https://submit.symantec.com/false_positive/index.html
    I’ve just done it as I’ve unquarantined this file 3 times now and it’s getting on my nerves.

  6. Rob says:

    Mine’s being blocked as well on my work PC. I can still get it to run though by putting it elsewhere on a shared drive and then running it by a shortcut on my desktop.

  7. Rob says:

    Also noticed that Symantec claims it “arrives as an executable file that must be manually installed on the computer.” Not true, there is not install it’s a regular 32-bit executable.

  8. Chad says:

    Thanks for that link Andy. Let’s hope it does some good!

  9. prasanna says:

    If you are in a centrally managed environment, chances are that, you will not be able to exclude folders, however, I was just trying the various options in the SAV and seem to have found one option to exclude files, Users can exclude Security Risks by doing:

    Open SAV
    Click Configure
    Click Actions
    Select Security Risks
    Select Exceptions
    Click ADD.

    I am not sure if a novice user would get to do this, however, could this be exploited by malware applications?

    Regards,
    Prasanna

  10. LouiseJ says:

    Even not AVs are flawless… best way to protect your files is to take them off your computer to a safe mobile / backup storage, with no overwritting allowed (Still, magnet fields among others can destroy it! So, have two or three to trick out…). Keep the low-information-diet. Give hackers some treats but not the right ones ;-)Way back in hi-ranked IT school and factory they would say… hum… unplug it! Go to the beach, go to the mountains, take a walk and enjoy life!

    Cheers!

    Lou

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