Malicious Software Removal Tool

Topic

New Reply

Hi, Win 7 Pro user here, 1st time posting so I don’t know if I’m on the right place. The Febuary Update of Windows Software Removal Tool just poped up in my WU. Weren’t the Febuary Updates only supposed to come next month? Is it safe to install or should I ignore?

Reply | Quote

Replies

MSRT updates are safe to install

4 users thanked author for this post.

Sailor, Pepsiboy, Noel Carboni, TheSuffering

Reply | Quote

But is it normal to pop up now? Shouldn’t it come with the rest of the febuary updates together with the March ones?

Reply | Quote

There is usually one included with the monthly updates. There were no monthly updates in Feb.
Maybe MS is taking security seriously after there was an outcry about not releasing the Flash and 0day fixes sooner?

Reply | Quote

Probably. Thanks for replying, I will install it when I get home since it’s safe

1 user thanked author for this post.

BrianL

Reply | Quote

“For all other tools, there was at least one malware sample that they either failed to detect or for which they were not capable of removing the active component. The Microsoft Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool, with 27 undetected malware threats in 42 tests cases, was completely off the charts.”

https://www.av-test.org/en/news/news-single-view/put-to-the-test-for-12-months-this-is-how-well-security-packages-and-special-tools-help-after-an-at/

This is MS taking security seriously. A 50% failure rate is pretty impressive.

Reply | Quote

“The tool removes only specific prevalent malicious software. Specific prevalent malicious software is a small subset of all the malicious software that exists today.”

The Microsoft Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool helps remove specific, prevalent malicious software from computers that are running supported versions of Windows

Reply | Quote

“Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool – February 2017 (KB890830)” is
listed at https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/894199/description-of-software-update-services-and-windows-server-update-services-changes-in-content-for-2017.

1 user thanked author for this post.

TheSuffering

Reply | Quote

Yeah, I saw this update (KB890390) as well and immediately hid it. Need to see and hear more before I download that.

Reply | Quote

I, also, received this update on thursday, the 23rd. I immediately hid it until further investigation could be completed. If it is hid, it will show up again in March’s (Feb-Mar) update package. You would be safer to hide it for now.

Reply | Quote

I don’t know of any good reason to avoid running Microsoft’s MRT. A single scan for malware during the Windows Update process isn’t really going to break the bank regarding resource usage, and it might just catch something on your disk and eliminate it.

The one thing that the MRT might do that some wouldn’t care for is that it does report some information to Microsoft’s servers (e.g., spynet2.microsoft.com, spynetalt.microsoft.com, wdcp.microsoft.com, wdcpalt.microsoft.com). That can be mostly deconfigured via settings in Windows Defender, and with some additional tweaking blocked altogether.

-Noel

2 users thanked author for this post.

ch100, Chris M

Reply | Quote

Agreed, but it brings up an interesting question.

Has anybody, ever, been warned of malware when running MSRT? I haven’t, and I’ve used it on many machines, over many years.

Microsoft reports on bad stuff that MSRT has captured, in their quarterly security reports. But are the results ever shown to the user? And if not, how does the user know if something was cleaned off their machines?

Still, I’ll stand by my original recommendation – go ahead and run MSRT. As best I can tell, it does no harm.

4 users thanked author for this post.

Sailor, ch100, Pepsiboy, Chris M

Reply | Quote

I’ve never seen it personally, but have always had the expectation that the information would show up in the Windows Defender (or Security Essentials) application’s History panel.

I presume they don’t want it to take all day to run, which is why the set of malware it checks for is limited. FYI, by comparison a full scan with MalwareBytes AntiMalware version 3 nowadays seems pretty efficient. It takes only 7 or 8 minutes on my system to scan 1.3 million files on my 2 TB C: volume (an SSD array). MBAM version 2 used to take 30+ minutes.

-Noel

Reply | Quote

The MRT reporting back is blocked by a different configuration than the Defender configuration.
It is documented here, but not really required or recommended for home users.
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/891716/deployment-of-the-microsoft-windows-malicious-software-removal-tool-in-an-enterprise-environment

Reply | Quote

I have been getting update(s) every day or two. Just check on AskWoody and you will get a ya or na. MS is not in the best of health right now.,for some reason.

Reply | Quote

woody wrote:

Agreed, but it brings up an interesting question. Has anybody, ever, been warned of malware when running MSRT? I haven’t, and I’ve used it on many machines, over many years. Microsoft reports on bad stuff that MSRT has captured, in their quarterly security reports. But are the results ever shown to the user? And if not, how does the user know if something was cleaned off their machines? Still, I’ll stand by my original recommendation – go ahead and run MSRT. As best I can tell, it does no harm.

Question: What’s MRT and MSRT? Thank you.

Reply | Quote

MRT/MSRT is the Microsoft Malicious Software Removal Tool – a quick malware scanner/remover. A new version of is made available at pretty much each Windows Update, listed as a separate item. See the last line listed in this screen grab, for example:

-Noel

Reply | Quote