Solved Can you disable FF's virus scan?

[RoloDman]

1.) Can I stop FF from scanning downloaded files?

2.) If I stop this feature, will the file still be scanned by OS?

Basically, I have this feeling that FF is making the file get scanned twice and why not eliminate 1.

FYI, I use the Download Manager Tweak 0.9.5 ( https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/download-manager-tweak/ )

 

[RealPetChicken]

i don't which firefox version you have but you can check this out

Browser.download.manager.scanWhenDone - MozillaZine Knowledge Base

 

[RoloDman]

i don't which firefox version you have but you can check this out

Browser.download.manager.scanWhenDone - MozillaZine Knowledge Base

Thank you very much for that link, BTNH108464.

The article does not seem to address FF 4, which I am using, so I decided to try setting the values to false and seeing what happens. Pleasee see attached image for the exact changes I made.

After setting both values to false restarted FF and went to: eicar | THE ANTI-VIRUS OR ANTI-MALWARE TEST FILE

I downloaded some normal safe files and then downloaded some virus test files from EICAR. FF 4 did not scan files but MSE did catch the eicar files. I assume this means that the FF values are not overriding Window's security policy checks.

is this a safe assumption?

Thanks again

 

[seekermeister]

I think that it boils down to how quickly an AV finds a problem, as well as which ones it finds. Since FF only triggers which ever AV that you use, there would be no difference in it's detection rate, and even if it causes a double scan, it does not seem to cause any problems on my computer. The fact that I can see that the scan is actually performed makes me feel a bit more secure, whether I am or not.

 

[RealPetChicken]

i don't which firefox version you have but you can check this out

Browser.download.manager.scanWhenDone - MozillaZine Knowledge Base

Thank you very much for that link, BTNH108464.

The article does not seem to address FF 4, which I am using, so I decided to try setting the values to false and seeing what happens. Pleasee see attached image for the exact changes I made.

After setting both values to false restarted FF and went to: eicar | THE ANTI-VIRUS OR ANTI-MALWARE TEST FILE

I downloaded some normal safe files and then downloaded some virus test files from EICAR. FF 4 did not scan files but MSE did catch the eicar files. I assume this means that the FF values are not overriding Window's security policy checks.

is this a safe assumption?

Thanks again

Sounds great, on older versions of firefox it would override windows security checks, guess not in ff4. Safe to assume? Yes, but it is never a bad idea to do more tests

 

[RoloDman]

services.sync.prefs.sync.browser.download.manager.scanWhenDone

This preference should be left alone. It controls whether or not Firefox Sync includes your virus scanning preference when syncing. Keep it set to "true"


[FINAL UPDATE]



thanks to everybody for helping