A start-up security company on Friday unveiled a beta of zero-day exploit protection software that it claims will protect users' PCs until they can apply patches from the likes of Microsoft.
SocketShield, which can be downloaded free-of-charge from the Web site of Exploit Prevention Labs, is a signature-based monitor that detects and blocks vulnerability exploits, not the worm or virus or spyware or Trojan horse payloads that traditional anti-virus software sniffs out.
"We actually recognize and kill the exploits as they come in," said
Roger Thompson, one of the company's co-founders and its chief
technology officer. "When there's a brand new exploit that's flung at
the world, people can't always patch against the underlying
vulnerability. Sometimes there is no patch, sometimes you can't patch just because Microsoft wants you to."
TechWeb