Download file safely

Even if you just get the free version, it's worth having a defense against a multitude of threats. Type the name of the website on a WHOIS site and it will find you lots of details that help you decide whether you can trust your download. Helpful 3 Not Helpful 0. If you receive an E-mail from an unknown sender with a file attached, delete it immediately. That has 'virus' written all over it. Helpful 2 Not Helpful 0. Virtual Machines or sandbox programs such as Sandboxie can provide a safe way to test files.

Try an add-on, such as VTzilla. It can scan files before you download them and can also scan links. Try this: Open command prompt. The type the command: ping www. If you use Kaspersky, it is a great idea scanning the file with a virus check before running it - just to be extra sure that your computer isn't at stake!

Submit a Tip All tip submissions are carefully reviewed before being published. If you downloaded something suspicious and ran it, download and install an appropriate program to find any threats on your computer.

Avast, AVG, or Malwarebytes are good and free programs. Helpful 18 Not Helpful 9. If you're totally worried and don't know whether you should trust the file or not, don't. There's no point downloading something if you don't trust it. Some software that looks and is legitimate can actually be hacked. When in doubt, always scan the file for viruses! Related wikiHows How to. How to. About This Article. You can now use web based multiengine antivirus scanners, which are basically online services that allow anyone to upload files and have them scanned with a number of different antivirus programs, including the majority of the most popular ones like Avast, Bitdefender, Kaspersky, Malware, Panda, and Symantec.

There are a handful of such services now available, with the most popular being VirusTotal. It scans the files you upload with over 70 scanners, confirming whether it contains any malware like virus, Trojans, worms, and more. VirusTotal is one of the foremost multiengine online virus scanners around.

It launched all the way back in , but was acquired by Google in This means that it has access to the best infrastructure, when compared to its competitors, and the most antivirus engines. This is a very feature rich service, and can not only scan your files, but also comes with URL scanning, additional information on the analyzed files, support for multiple languages, as well as voting and comments.

If anything, the community aspects of VirusTotal are second to none. In terms of its UI, VirusTotal is the cleanest of the bunch. It puts up a handy safe-o-meter that lets you gauge at a glance whether your chosen file is safe or not.

And you can also click on the tabs to view detailed information about the product or company, version numbers, even original file name.

And not only can you scan files, VirusTotal can also check if a website is safe to visit — very much similar to a good browser or internet security suite that come with browser addon. You can scan and analyze URLs to double check whether you should proceed to visit, or avoid suspicious sites altogether. VirusTotal is simple enough to use. Either drag the file that you wish to scan into the selection box on the VirusTotal website , or click on the Choose File button and navigate to it.

Once the upload is complete, the service will begin scanning the file using all the scanning engines it has at its disposal. After the scans are completed, you are presented with a summary page that contains the results of all the individual scans.

You can use VirusTotal to not just scan program installers, executables and firmware files, but the service can be used to detect malware in any file — from Word documents and PDFs to images, sounds and videos.

For common files, you will probably see a popup that notifies you that your file has already been analyzed recently. You can either view the analysis, or if the date was months ago, reanalyze it. If your file gets a clean bill of health from these scans, there is a fair chance that it does not come packing malware.

In case of a false positive, you can also perform a web search on the file name and often find people discussing whether it is a virus or not. If you see one of these files, you can be guaranteed that it is unsafe. There are sites online, like VirusTotal, which allow you to scan any file before you download it.

The site will return results telling you either that the file is safe or that there has been a virus detected. If you are alerted that no viruses have been detected, you can download the file safely. If you remember the Internet blackout that took place in July of this year, you know just how wide-reaching computer viruses can be.

Protect your computer systems at all times with up to date software and by being constantly alert to the dangers of downloading. Shelly is an avid reader, and the love of reading takes her to content writing eventually. She loves writing on various topics. All the data shown above will be stored by Techtricksworld.

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By using this form you agree with the storage and handling of your data by this website. A few days ago one of PC got hacked and the reason is downloading things from insecure websites.

I lost all my data. This blog is really awesome and informative for me. Thanks for sharing. Our digital devices can hold a number of precious items—photos, phone numbers, and more—and certain types of viruses and malware can render your devices useless, making it impossible to access anything.

If you do fall prey to a virus, Fontana recommends that you reset your device and restore your backup to prevent hackers from stealing your data or locking you out of it. By Alice Williams Updated March 03,