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        Virtualization and Viruses

Section(s): Security , Security
Published on Apr 26, 2006.
Last Modified on Apr 26, 2006.
Last Modified by MitchTulloch.
Rated 1.7 out of 5 based on 3 votes.

How to protect your virtual machines without degrading performance.

Viruses can infect not just physical machines but virtual ones too, so if you're running Virtual PC or Virtual Server on a box in a production environment (or any environment with Internet connectivity) then you should install antivirus software on both your host OS and all guest OSes as well. However, on the host OS you should exclude virus scanning for certain types of files to ensure that your VMs don't take a performance hit. These excluded file types include *.vhd, *.vud, *.vsv, *.vfd and *.vmc files.

About MitchTulloch

Mitch Tulloch was lead author for the Windows Vista Resource Kit from Microsoft Press, which is the book for IT pros who want to deploy, maintain and support Windows Vista in mid- and large-sized network environments. Mitch was also the author of Introducing Windows Server 2008 and technical project lead for the Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 Resource Kit, both books also from Microsoft Press. For more information on these and other books by Mitch, see www.mtit.com .