The web-based downloader in Internet Explorer 9 also warns about the .exe files 
(not the tar.gz or Zip ones).  The message is clearly a no-reputation-yet 
warning.  

This is an on-line check.  When the file is known to be regularly downloaded, 
the report will change automatically.  

I have seen no AV warnings about the downloaded files themselves, although 
there is a standard OS warning on use of such files when they were downloaded 
from the internet and/or are not signed.  (In Windows 8 Consumer Preview, it is 
necessary to click "details" to see that there is a "Run anyhow" selection.)  

I saw no AV warnings after the installation on any systems having Microsoft 
Malware detection and regularly-updated Windows Security Essentials.

 - Dennis

-----Original Message-----
From: Rob Weir [mailto:[email protected]] 
Sent: Friday, March 02, 2012 07:00
To: [email protected]
Subject: Symantec WS.Reputation.1 Errors: What we can do

Several testers have mentioned this anti-virus error when installing
the AOO 3.4 dev snapshot build.   This is not a virus.
"WS.Reputation" errors come from Symantec Antivirus based on their
"reputation-based" threat assessments.  Essentially, they evaluate
software that you are about to install according to a range of
factors, including how new the file is, how many other people have
installed it, whether the installer is digitally signed, etc.  It is
not just one factor, but a proprietary mix of weighted factors.

We're probably getting penalized based on several of these factors.
Note that with the final AOO 3.4 release we'll be in the same
position, since that installer will also be new,etc.

A few things we should consider doing:

1) Make sure the readme file and install instructions cover this case
and explain what the user should do, e.g. "Run anyways"

2) We can make a request to Symantec to "whitelist" our installer.
This takes a couple of weeks for them to process.  And we can';t start
this work in advance since they need the SHA-256 hash of our
installer:

https://submit.symantec.com/whitelist/isv/

3) We could digitally sign our Windows installers.   Apache already
requires a detached signature.  But Symantec has no idea about these.
We need traditional Windows exe code signing.  This will help us with
Windows 8 as well.  So it is something we probably want to look into
at some point.

My recommendation:

Plan on doing 1.  Do 2. as soon as we have a release.  Look into 3. for AOO 4.0.

Regards,

-Rob

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