How to scan network computers for viruses ?

Question

My computer is part of a Local Area Network and I want to scan all the computers connected to this network to see which one is infected with viruses. Is it possible to do that and which program should I use ?

Answer 1

Do each one individually and use the trial of Panda

Answer 2

There's no easy way to do that. Going to every single computer and starting a manual scan isn't an option because it's time consuming and you can't be sure if every single computer has an antivirus that's updated with the latest virus definitions. Creating shares isn't a viable option either because, depending on the size of your network, it might take several days before the computer finishes scanning all the shares.

The solution is to adopt a client/server antivirus solution (Symantec is a good choice). All you have to do is install the server and configure it to get the latest updates automatically. But that's an easy task. After that, from the server console you can push the clients to every computer in the network. In other words, the server acts like a remote install server which installs the antiviruis clients on each computer you specify. So let the server do the work for you. After he infrastructure is ready you can go ahead and create groups, update plans, security warnings and so on. besides the obvios advantages (the server will push updates to the clients so on every computer the virus definitions will be up to date) you also have the posibility of remotely starting scans, you'll get notifications when a virus was found on one of the computers and so on.

The client/server infrastructure applies only to well organized networks and it's best to have active directory installed. Of course you must be a domanin admin or have an account that has administratve priviledges on the client computers. Otherwise the deployment will fail.

If you are in a network where clients have nothing to do one with eachother, like the network of an isp the there's no way you can do a scan for viruses. The best thing is to protect yourself by taking into account the worst case scenario. Every computer in the network is infected.

Answer 3

.
If there is a virus on your network,
then all of the computers could be infected.
To clean one using program from the Server
makes no sense to me. You're still connected to the network, so you are still connected to the virus
and remain open to REINFECTION from the network.

COPY the anti-virus to each computer individually.
DISCONNECT every computer individually
and run the anti-virus tool on each one individually;
making sure ALL computers are clean
BEFORE reconnecting all to the Network.

If you don't want to copy the anti-virus tool you have
then you can download free Home Edition of Avast.
Go to www.avast.com

h2h

Answer 4

The answer is simple, simply have one system (pref the fastest system available) be the virus scanner, then put every computer on the same workgroup, create shares of all drives then map the drives as letter drives on the computer that is the virus scanner, then scan away.

Answer 5

I have not tried this but it is what I would do. Click on START. Choose ALL PROGRAMS. Left click on ACCESSORIES. Choose WINDOWS EXPLORER. Expand you C: drive by clicking on it. You should now see a list that has PROGRAM FILES in it. RIGHT click on Program Files. You should now see a menu with PROPERTIES at the bottom. LEFT CLICK on PROPERTIES and you should see a dialog box with 2 tabs at the top 1 of which says SHARING. This is your destination as within the SHARING tab are the options for sharing files on the network. Good Luck