Scanning Your Computer - McAfee INTERNET SECURITY SUITE 2008 User Manual

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Scanning your computer

When you start SecurityCenter for the first time, VirusScan's
real-time virus protection starts protecting your computer from
potentially harmful viruses, Trojans, and other security threats.
Unless you disable real-time virus protection, VirusScan
constantly monitors your computer for virus activity, scanning
files each time you or your computer access them, using the
real-time scanning options that you set. To make sure that your
computer stays protected against the latest security threats, leave
real-time virus protection on and set up a schedule for regular,
more comprehensive manual scans. For more information about
setting real-time and manual scan options, see
Setting up virus
protection (page 37).
VirusScan provides a more detailed set of scanning options for
manual virus protection, allowing you to periodically run more
extensive scans. You can run manual scans from SecurityCenter,
targeting specific locations according to a set schedule. However,
you can also run manual scans directly in Windows Explorer
while you work. Scanning in SecurityCenter offers the advantage
of changing scanning options on-the-fly. However, scanning
from Windows Explorer offers a convenient approach to
computer security.
Whether you run a manual scan from SecurityCenter or Windows
Explorer, you can view the scan results when it finishes. You view
the results of a scan to determine whether VirusScan has
detected, repaired, or quarantined viruses, trojans, spyware,
adware, cookies, and other potentially unwanted programs. The
results of a scan can be displayed in different ways. For example,
you can view a basic summary of scan results or detailed
information, such as the infection status and type. You can also
view general scan and detection statistics.
In this chapter
Scan your computer....................................................54
View scan results .........................................................54