Secunia Personal Software Inspector RC3 0.9.0.4 scans a Microsoft Windows PC for software with security issues and recommends ways to fix it including direct links to updates for the software. I heard about it a while back but didn't take a close look at it. Then, while catching up on listing to podcasts, I learned more about it on the Security Now podcast #145.

I ran it on my main Windows XP PC to see what my own PC looked it. It found what looked like a long list. But, it was not as bad as the list looked at first. A number of the issues it found were older apps that had been updated but whose update routines had not completely removed the older application (Java was especially bad at this having left hundreds of megabytes of useless files on my PC). In one case (FileZilla), the installer had changed the way the installation folder is named. The folder used to be called FizeZilla but is now called FileZilla Clinet. So, deleting the old directory fixed that problem.

Four pieces of software are listed as insecure right now and stay that way even after downloading and installing the latest versions. These four apps are Adobe Flash Player 9, Apple QuickTime 7.5, Microsoft XML Core Services (MSXML) 4 and WinSCP 4.

My XP PC looks a lot better from the Secunia PSI point of view now and I'm glad I downloaded and tested it out. It definitely goes in my recommended toolbox.