Here’s a simple and of course safe way to test if your antivirus is working. It may happen for some reason that your anti-virus get’s damaged and stop detecting viruses. By doing this test you can know if it’s protecting you.
Steps:
- Open Notepad or any other text editor.
- Paste the following text into it:
- Now save the file by giving a name and with any extension like .txt, exe or any other.
X5O!P%@AP[4\PZX54(P^)7CC)7}$EICAR-STANDARD-ANTIVIRUS-TEST-FILE!$H+H*
If the anti-virus is properly working, you will get a notification for the file. You can also try running the file if nothing comes up, and if even then it’s not able to detect the file it’s time to change your anti-virus.
You can also download the file from these links:
- eicar.com.txt [68 Bytes]
- eicar_com.zip [184 Bytes]
This test file is provided by eicar.org and is a legitimate DOS program that only prints the message “EICAR-STANDARD-ANTIVIRUS-TEST-FILE!” when run. It is safe to pass around, because it is not a virus, and does not include any fragments of viral code.