McAfee DR SOLOMON S ANTI-VIRUS 8.5 User Manual page 298

Using Specialized Scanning Tools
298 Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus
Figure 8-10. Advanced Scan Settings dialog box
The presence of a sufficient number of these characteristics in a file leads
the utility to identify the file as potentially infected with a new or
previously unidentified virus.
Because the utility looks simultaneously for file characteristics that rule
out the possibility of virus infection, it will rarely give you a false
indication of a virus infection. Therefore, unless you know that the file
does not contain a virus, you should treat "potential" infections with the
same caution you would confirmed infections.
The ScreenScan utility starts out without any heuristic scan options
active. To activate heuristic scanning, follow these substeps:
a. Select the Enable heuristics scanning checkbox. The remaining
options in the dialog box activate.
b. Select the types of heuristics scanning you want the ScreenScan
utility to use. Your choices are:
– Enable macro heuristics scanning. Choose this option to
have the utility identify all Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel,
and other Microsoft Office files that contain embedded macros,
then compare the macro code to its virus definitions database.
The utility will identify exact matches with the virus name;
code signatures that resemble existing viruses cause it to tell
you it has found a potential macro virus.
– Enable program file heuristics scanning. Choose this option
to have the ScreenScan utility locate new viruses in program
files by examining file characteristics and comparing them
against a list of known virus characteristics. The utility will
identify files with a sufficient number of these characteristics as
potential viruses.