Free stuff has been a vendor mainstay to build a customer base, and start-up Dasient is trying that with a lightweight version of its open source technology for detecting and fixing Web pages compromised with malware.
Mod Anti-Malware Lite is a free software module that's added to an Apache Server in order to detect infected Web pages so they don't end up on black lists maintained by Google and several security vendors. According to Neil Daswani, Dasient co-founder, the Lite version does not have the full functionality of the server software module used as part of the Web Anti-Malware service announced earlier this year, which is able to detect and clean a Web page.
The Lite version, available for limited free trial, is designed to block an infected Web page and alert the Web visitor that the page is “experiencing technical difficulties,” Daswani says. Mod Anti-Malware Lite “gives a taste of how our technology works,” he says.
In addition to announcing the Lite version of the Anti-Malware service, Dasient says it has established a partner center that invites Web hosting providers to upload the list of domains they post “and we will inform the Webmaster if it falls on the Google black list,” Daswani says. “The Web hosting provider can use the partner center to send e-mail to sites getting blacklisted.” The intent is not to come between the Web hosting provider and the customer. “It's their customer,” he says.
Several Web hosting providers are said to be taking up Dasient's offer. These include Vexxhost, Consolidated Communications, Ultrahosting, Nerds on Site and India-based Diadem Technologies.
