I have never...

I've had this installation of XP for almost 8 months now (has to be some sort of a record, I know), and I have never found anything with Kaspersky, Nod32, AVG, Avast, CA, or ClamWin.

Does it have to do with my browsing habits? Or am I just lucky. I am behind a router, and I know having the hardware firewall helps, but it just seems too phenomenal.

I've never had a virus period, but I've dealt with false positives on some rare occasions. It's just a matter of having the right security installed; firewall (software or hardware), anti-virus, and anti-spyware.

Edit:

And browsing habits do play an important role, such as not visiting and downloading anything from naughty sites, warez sites, etc.

I've never had a virus period, but I've dealt with false positives on some rare occasions. It's just a matter of having the right security installed; firewall (software or hardware), anti-virus, and anti-spyware.

Edit:

And browsing habits do play an important role, such as not visiting and downloading anything from naughty sites, warez sites, etc.

Well I consider myself lucky I haven't had a virus in the past 4 years considering there 4 people using here. I did get one trogan on one of my computers but my security software picked it up when the fake email was opened and I was able to remove the remnants of it off my system. You just have to practice safe computing as best as possible along with a good security plan. One of the things that ticks me off the most is so many of the computer that I set up with good security and plain instructions on keeping them clean end up infested. When I check out the security programs they haven't been updated or even run but a few times if any you just want to throw up your hands at times. But they keep me in extra spending money.

I've had a few on and off, but since I started using hardware firewalls haven't seen one since.

Last time I ever got a virus was when a cousin used my pc to check their email. They clicked on some fake ebay email and it tried to put a worm on my pc. Etrust caught it before it actually did anything and it wasn't really a problem.

I guess my router is the most reponsible for blocking a lot of crap but also keeping windows up to date helps too. :D I do have good habits and I have my pc configured in a way where I think its pretty much impossible to get infected unless I physically download and open something.(but even then etrust would cach it and I usually right click>scan with etrust and avg as before I open anything anyway)

Last time I ever got a virus was when a cousin used my pc to check their email. They clicked on some fake ebay email and it tried to put a worm on my pc. Etrust caught it before it actually did anything and it wasn't really a problem.

I guess my router is the most reponsible for blocking a lot of crap but also keeping windows up to date helps too. :D I do have good habits and I have my pc configured in a way where I think its pretty much impossible to get infected unless I physically download and open something.(but even then etrust would cach it and I usually right click>scan with etrust and avg as before I open anything anyway)

Which is exactly why when my Sister and another friend of mine wanted to check their email I said sure, bring your laptop and I will connect you to my router, but you are not using my computer to check your email. I trust my Sister but I don't trust her browsing habits.

It have todo with many things.

Surfing habits, common sense, security thinking, etc.

I had about half a dozen virus`s while I was using the free 90 day trial security software that came with my pc. Not sure if I should mention the name.

Never had one since changing to Norton Internet Security, and I haven`t changed my browsing habits.

The only spyware I`ve had, if you can call them spyware, have been tracking cookies, which CCleaner has actually shifted.

I was curious, so I ran AdAware, which flagged these cookies, and then I left them alone and ran CCleaner.

Ran AdAware again and they were all gone.

Regards

my mate had 59 viruses and around 700 pieces of spyware(ewido scanned that much,probably a lot of tracking cookies) when i scanned his pc.strangely enough seemed to run quite well