Patent ID: 7543334

Claim:
A computer program product embodied on a tangible computer readable medium operable to control a computer to issue an alert for an out-of-date update status of a malware scanner, said computer program product comprising: (i) reading logic operable to read an update status field associated with a computer file to be scanned by a current malware scanner, said update status field being indicative of an update status of a previous malware scanner that has scanned said computer file and associated said update status field with said computer file; (ii) comparison logic operable to compare said update status of said previous malware scanner with an update status of said current malware scanner; (iii) alert issuing logic operable if said update status of said current malware scanner does not match said update status of said previous malware scanner to issue an update status alert indicative of an out-of-date update status for whichever one of said current malware scanner and said previous malware scanner has a most out-of-date update status; (iv) change logging logic operable to log changes to said update status field to create a change history in an update status tracking database to enable identification of weaknesses within update status management based on the change history; wherein, if said current malware scanner has a less out-of-date update status than said previous malware scanner, then said update status field associated with said computer file is changed to correspond to said current malware scanner; wherein said update status alert includes one or more of: (i) a user alert issued on whichever one of said current malware scanner and said previous malware scanner has a most out-of-date update status; and (ii) an administrator alert issued to an administrator of whichever one of said current malware scanner and said previous malware scanner has a most out-of-date update status; wherein, if there is no said update status associated with said computer file at a first malware scanning, then said update status field is generated and associated with said computer file, and said update status tracking database is updated; wherein said update status field is included within an update status file passed together and associated with said computer file between malware scanners; wherein said update status file and said computer file are combined into a combined file that is passed as a single entity between said malware scanners; wherein said combined file is a file compressed combination of said update status file and said computer file.