Several Techinline users have recently reported cases of Techinline not being recognized as a trusted application by Norton anti-virus products. We would like to address this issue in greater detail.
Techinline’s components (ie browser plug-ins and executables) are updated after each new major version release, the last of which took place on November 7th.
In today’s day and age, the purpose of any anti-virus software is to protect users against any threats (viruses, malware, spyware, etc) that may exist. One of the methods used by anti-virus programs to determine the reputation of a particular software is to analyze the usage frequency of its components and determine whether they may pose a threat to a user’s machine. Unless found to be harmful and/or malicious, the component is whitelisted after a specific number of users recognize it as a trusted application. It should also be noted that various anti-virus vendors have their own policies for determining the “trust level” for any application and its components. In other words, some anti-virus products are much more tolerant when it comes to permitting a particular application or module than others, and therefore an application found to be suspicious or unrecognized by one anti-virus program may be deemed 100% acceptable by a different anti-virus.
We would like to reassure our users that Techinline’s components are 100% safe, authentic, and pose absolutely no threat to any user’s computer. Techinline’s integrity and transparency of our application are backed by a Code Signing Certificate that was issued to Techinline by Comodo Certificate Authority. Therefore, any anti-virus warning prompt for the Techinline application should be looked at entirely as a false positive.
In Techinline’s case, the updated components in the recent release on both the Client’s and Expert’s ends were recognized by Norton’s File/Download Insight features as an entirely new software without any prior history or reputation. Techinline’s reputation will be eventually restored to the previous level as the required number of Norton users accept it as a trusted software.
We are aware of the inconvenience and possible disruption that any anti-virus warning flag may cause for our users, and make a constant effort to address such problems as they arise. Earlier this year, Techinline was able to resolve a similar issue with Panda Anti-Virus by submitting information about our components to Panda’s development lab. As a result, Techinlne has been “permanently” whitelisted by Panda.
Despite of our effort and willingness to contact Norton and provide any information required for them to whitelist our application, Symantec has proven to be far less cooperative in resolving this issue. Nevertheless, we will continue to make an effort to contact Symantec for this purpose.
Based on experience, Norton usually takes several weeks to remove the flag after an update in Techinline’s components. This takes place after a specific number of Norton users have clicked the “Run This Program Anyway” button on the warning prompt or “Trust Now” link on the File/Download Insight dialog. As Techinline’s user-base continues to expand, we expect this validation process to gradually shorten. In other words, the required number of “ Run Program Anyway“ clicks will be reached sooner as an increased number of users launch the Techinline application.
In the meantime, one work-around that we found for temporarily whitelisting Techinline in Norton is to add our application to the “Exclusions” list. Although not an ideal resolution, this procedure will allow you to launch the Techinline service on your or the client’s end.
We ask users who experience any issues with using Techinline in parallel with any anti-virus program to contact us.
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