VirusTotal Scan Guide
This guide is here to help you make informed decisions, but the final call on file safety is yours. Use your best judgment and be cautious. If you're unsure, consider seeking professional help from a security expert.
When conducting a VirusTotal (VT) scan, follow these steps to thoroughly analyze the results:
- Check the Scan Date
- Check the Details Tab
- Check the Submitted Names
- If It's a Pirated Software
- Check the Relations Tab
- Check the Contacted IP Addresses/URLs
- Check the Behavior Tab
- Check the Detections Tab
- Check the Highlighted Actions
- Check the File Age
- Check If It Has Multiple Similar Detections
- Consider the Community Tab
Check the Scan Date
- Ensure that the scan date is recent. If not, rerun the scan to detect new threats and remove old false positives.
Check the Details Tab
- Creation Time, First Seen In The Wild, and First Submission:
- Creation Time may be unreliable if obviously fake (e.g., set in the future).
- Compare First Seen In The Wild and First Submission dates with the product release date to identify recycled malware.
Check the Submitted Names
- Ignore names resembling hashes or generic terms like 'sample1.exe'.
- Multiple names for unrelated products suggest potential malware.
If It's a Pirated Software
- For pirated software, signatures won't be helpful as cracks or patched files won't be valid, but typically if there was an invalid signature it would be suspicious.
Check the Relations Tab
- Execution Parents/Resource Parents:
- Focus on installers or archives that contained, dropped, or downloaded the file. Ignore if scanning an installer that wasn't extracted from another file.
- Dropped Files/Bundled Files:
- Examine files extracted from the scanned file, particularly useful when scanning archive files.
Check the Contacted IP Addresses/URLs
- Beware of overwhelming malicious results, but also consider false positives. (e.g. drive.google.com is currently flagged as a phishing site by one of the AVs)
- Suspicion arises if a file meant to be benign (e.g., a keygen or patcher) makes unexpected requests.
Check the Behavior Tab
- Opening and reading files, writing/deleting temp files, and expected installer activities are generally benign.
- Suspicion arises if the file exhibits unusual behavior or accesses unnecessary areas.
Check the Detections Tab
- Generic/gen/susgen detections (like W32.Trojan.Gen) or AI/ML labels may indicate potential malware that doesn't match known signatures.
- Common detections for cracks, patches, etc., include riskware, hacktool, and not-a-virus (last on is specific to Kaspersky).
Check the Highlighted Actions
- Although rare, alarming statements like 'all your files are belong to us', take immediate action.
Check the File Age
- New files may lack accurate detections, while older files should have more reliable results.
- A file's age can provide context; newer files warrant closer scrutiny.
Check If It Has Multiple Similar Detections
- If numerous specific detections align, it indicates higher risk.
Consider the Community Tab
- While often cluttered, occasionally valuable insights or warnings are found.
Conclusion
- Even with thorough analysis, some uncertainty may remain. Exercise caution with older files with generic detections.
- If unsure, refrain from using the file.
Credits
Old owner - Unknown (Not a username)
New / Current owner - Clara
(With <3)