Solved No database updates over the weekend? (Solved)

[Anthony Qian]

I noticed that F-Secure's virus definitions had not been updated over the weekend, and according to their official website (F-Secure Latest Database Updates for F-Secure Capricorn), virus definition updates had stopped on Friday, March 24th.

However, upon checking the virus definition update records of F-Secure's engine provider, Avira (Avira VDF History), I found that Avira had continued to release virus definition updates over the weekend (March 25th-26th).

I am curious if anyone else has noticed this update issue with F-Secure and if they have any thoughts on it.

Thanks.

 

[M4RT1NE2]

Unfortunately, this is how it works when you use external scanning engines. Delayed updates can be.
Arcabit, for example, runs on BD's engine as well as its own. BD updates are also delayed.

 

[Ink]

Is this a regular occurrence for definition updates, especially over weekends? Does F-Secure update definitions using other methods ie. streaming or cloud updates that you may not be aware of?

You can try using their Support to find out why.

Get support for your F‑Secure products | F‑Secure

Find answers to your questions or reach out to an F‑Secure expert for help or advice.

www.f-secure.com

 

[Anthony Qian]

Is this a regular occurrence for definition updates, especially over weekends? Does F-Secure update definitions using other methods ie. streaming or cloud updates that you may not be aware of?

You can try using their Support to find out why.

Get support for your F‑Secure products | F‑Secure

Find answers to your questions or reach out to an F‑Secure expert for help or advice.

www.f-secure.com

This incident should have happened before... F-Secure, Total without any Capricorn updates, since the 24/3 2023.... AGAIN!
F-Secure does not provide streaming updates, but cloud-based detection is available.

 

[M4RT1NE2]

I agree. For the availability of databases , the program uses the cloud. The same goes for Arcabit which uses the BD engine.
There is some delay but it does not affect the security program which uses its own databases.

 

[Ink]

This incident should have happened before... F-Secure, Total without any Capricorn updates, since the 24/3 2023.... AGAIN!
F-Secure does not provide streaming updates, but cloud-based detection is available.

In another thread created by your friend MNielsen, this information was shared: Capricorn-updates ONLY HALF THE WEEK - still the same - SEEMS to be solved, for now

Hi @MNielsen

Thank you for your comment.

Capricorn and Hydra are supplementary databases of our products. We will only release database updates for some signature updates if the need arises because we mainly use the Security Cloud analysis. The Security Cloud offer 24/7 protection in real-time as our backend has rules and automation to process file/URLs to obtain the verdict. Database signatures are not updated every day if there is no update or causes and that should not be an issue because the Security Cloud system which acts as the main component takes care of primary protection.

Despite the update issue last time, there was no issue this weekend and no need for any updates. You can go to this link to view the latest updated database from F-Secure.

F-Secure Latest Database Updates

On the other hand, we would like to reiterate that Capricorn and Hydra are supplementary database signatures of the Security Cloud. Security Cloud is a priority in this modern technology with real-time cloud detection that we want to introduce to the user which will grant a more productive, rapid response in real-time protection.

What is Security Cloud? - F-Secure Community

f-secure-security-cloud.pdf

I hope we're able to address your concerns at this point, however, if I have more information from my team on this matter, I will rely on them in due course.

Thank you for your understanding and patronage.

 

[Anthony Qian]

In another thread created by your friend MNielsen, this information was shared: Capricorn-updates ONLY HALF THE WEEK - still the same - SEEMS to be solved, for now

Thanks for sharing.
However, I do not think Capricorn (Avira) engine is only a supplementary database of F-Secure. Based on my personal observations and those of other users, Capricorn (Avira) detections constitute a significant portion of F-Secure's overall detection rate. Therefore, I believe that it is reasonable to expect a daily (at least) update frequency for Capricorn (Avira) and not to overly rely on the Security Cloud system.

 

[M4RT1NE2]

Thanks for sharing.
However, I do not think Capricorn (Avira) engine is only a supplementary database of F-Secure. Based on my personal observations and those of other users, Capricorn (Avira) detections constitute a significant portion of F-Secure's overall detection rate. Therefore, I believe that it is reasonable to expect a daily (at least) update frequency for Capricorn (Avira) and not to overly rely on the Security Cloud system.

The same applies to the Arcabit product, which uses Bitdefender databases. The majority of detections are via BD. I know this from experience.

 

[Ink]

Thanks for sharing.
However, I do not think Capricorn (Avira) engine is only a supplementary database of F-Secure. Based on my personal observations and those of other users, Capricorn (Avira) detections constitute a significant portion of F-Secure's overall detection rate. Therefore, I believe that it is reasonable to expect a daily (at least) update frequency for Capricorn (Avira) and not to overly rely on the Security Cloud system.

I am unsure how you are going about to resolve this here. I recommend forwarding your feedback to the F-Secure Community and receiving an official response to your beliefs and expectations.

Home - F-Secure Community

Find discussions on F-Secure's products and services in our English or Finnish Help Forums, or solutions to common issues in the Support Articles.

community.f-secure.com

 

[SeriousHoax]

I am unsure how you are going about to resolve this here. I recommend forwarding your feedback to the F-Secure Community and receiving an official response to your beliefs and expectations.

Home - F-Secure Community

Find discussions on F-Secure's products and services in our English or Finnish Help Forums, or solutions to common issues in the Support Articles.

community.f-secure.com

Anthony is not looking for a solution here really. As you can very clearly see from what he wrote in the main post,

I am curious if anyone else has noticed this update issue with F-Secure and if they have any thoughts on it.

There are many F-Secure users here on MT and it's really great that he shared what he noticed about F-Secure and informing the forum members and asking whether they have noticed this before.
Avira engine is a big part of F-Secure and not updating in weekends is a serious and unacceptable issue for a paid product. So, users should be aware of it and keep an eye on it if it happens again in the coming weeks. It's a post for the F-Secure users of MalwareTips.
It's March 27 now and according to F-Secure's website, still no Capricorn aka Avira engine update while Avira has updated theirs 18 times since then at the time of me writing this.

 

[Lord Ami]

Strange thing is: FS Protection beta's Capricorn database was updated during this time period

 

[Ink]

Anthony is not looking for a solution here really. As you can very clearly see from what he wrote in the main post,

There are many F-Secure users here on MT and it's really great that he shared what he noticed about F-Secure and informing the forum members and asking whether they have noticed this before.
Avira engine is a big part of F-Secure and not updating in weekends is a serious and unacceptable issue for a paid product. So, users should be aware of it and keep an eye on it if it happens again in the coming weeks. It's a post for the F-Secure users of MalwareTips.
It's March 27 now and according to F-Secure's website, still no Capricorn aka Avira engine update while Avira has updated theirs 18 times since then at the time of me writing this.

I am aware of what he wrote in his initial post, however I clearly quoted a follow-on post by where his views opposes to the quoted F-Secure representative's comment.

As far as I am aware, the F-Secure Community is the best place, not here, and not any unofficial social media platforms where communications aren't monitored by F-Secure cm/devs.

By all means, if an F-Secure CM wants to join, then they are free to do so.

 

[SeriousHoax]

I am aware of what he wrote in his initial post, however I clearly quoted a follow-on post by where his views opposes to the quoted F-Secure representative's comment.

As far as I am aware, the F-Secure Community is the best place, not here, and not any unofficial social media platforms where communications aren't monitored by F-Secure cm/devs.

By all means, if an F-Secure CM wants to join, then they are free to do so.

The official reply that you found was informative indeed and a very good find from your part. But he is not wrong to have doubts over the particular reply from FS representative. They work for F-Secure so they will try their best to keep users calm by giving replies like that. It's common on every product's official forum and there's not much wrong with that. Avira is a big part of F-Secure despite what the representative says.
Edit: Anthony is correct that we're ignoring the main part which is there is still no updates. It's Monday now. Monday is already almost over in this part of the world.

 

[Anthony Qian]

I am aware of what he wrote in his initial post, however I clearly quoted a follow-on post by where his views opposes to the quoted F-Secure representative's comment.

As far as I am aware, the F-Secure Community is the best place, not here, and not any unofficial social media platforms where communications aren't monitored by F-Secure cm/devs.

By all means, if an F-Secure CM wants to join, then they are free to do so.

Well... The post you mentioned on the F-Secure forum was posted a few months ago and I was afraid that replying to that post violated the forum's rules.

Anyway, let's focus on the update issue itself. Until now, there has been no update.

 

[Ink]

Can you share details of the version of F-Secure you have installed?

---

If it is an on-going issue, frequent without notice and compromises the security of your protected device, then I recommend to start looking at other consumer products. It might be worthwhile to verify that other vendors guarantee daily updates before jumping ship.

Or you could wait it out, later confirming with F-Secure Community to figure what, why and how it happened and ways they can prevent that from reoccurring again in the future.

Have you ruled out that other vendors using Avira's SDK are not affected by this blip? Could it out of F-Secure's control?

References:

F-Secure Latest Database Updates

dbtracker.f-secure.com

Avira Update | Download Avira Virus Definition File update

Update your Antivirus protection to keep your computer safe from malware, spam and other threats - Download the latest Avira VDF update

www.avira.com

Edit:

I was afraid that replying to that post violated the forum's rules.

F-Secure Community User Guidelines

F-Secure Community is a peer-to-peer space where you can post questions and ideas, engage in constructive discussions with other participants, and share your knowledge. We have a set of guidelines that are designed to keep the Community running smoothly and to help everyone get the most value...

community.f-secure.com

 

[blackice]

Man, I just renewed. Only to consider going back to MS Defender if this is how it’s going to be.

 

[mlnevese]

Most major vendors offer updates on weekends. From my experience these last years, Avast, Bitdefender, ESET and Kaspersky update normally, sometimes multiple times a day even on weekends and local holidays.

 

[Trident]

Maybe inflation pushed F-Secure/WithSecure to cut on expenses and they cancelled the weekend maintenance with Gen Digital. I don’t see any other reason why updates will not be pushed over the weekend.

 

[harlan4096]

Maybe inflation pushed F-Secure/WithSecure to cut on expenses and they cancelled the weekend maintenance with Gen Digital. I don’t see any other reason why updates will not be pushed over the weekend.

F-Secure, Total without any Capricorn updates, since the 24/3 2023.... AGAIN! NOW, 3 days!!!!!!!!

Why hasn't that been better? We are paying for this! Perhaps, I should use AVG free, instead.......... When this still is absolutely the same. Do something!

community.f-secure.com

 

[Oldie1950]

I think F-Secure's response to the problems with the Avira signatures is very good. FPs can also cause damage and unsettle users.