1. Verify that your username and password are entered correctly. The following are EXAMPLES only:

   User name: EAV-1234567

   Password: abcde12345

   NOTE: Please remember to enter your username and password exactly as they are written. The username and password are case sensitive and the hyphen in the user name is necessary. The password is ten characters long and all lowercase. If you are copying and pasting, make sure a blank character is not being included in the string. Also, we do not use the letter L in passwords (use the number one (1) instead), a big 0 is the number zero (0), a little o is the letter o.

2. From the main program window, press F5 to open the Advanced Setup window. From the Advanced Setup tree, click Update. Then, clear the update cache by clicking the Clear… button. Click OK and restart your computer. Open the main program window and click Update → Update virus signature database. If you still receive the "Virus signature database update failed" message, continue to step 3. If not, you are finished.

3. If you are using a third party firewall (such as Norton Personal Firewall, ZoneAlarm, Outpost, Kerio, or others), please ensure that these are allowing your ESET security product to connect to the Internet to receive updates. If you are using the built-in ESET Smart Security firewall, disregard this step.

4. Configure your Proxy settings. From the main program window, press F5 to open the Advanced Setup window. From the Advanced Setup tree, click Update and then click the Advanced Update Setup… button. Click the HTTP Proxy tab. If you are not using a proxy (using a proxy server is not common) select the Do not use proxy server option. Click OK to confirm settings.

5. From the main program window, press F5 to open the Advanced Setup window. From the Advanced Setup tree, click Update. Make sure the Update Server: is set to Choose Automatically.

6. Test communications with our update server by following steps a-e

a) From your desktop click Start → Run. The Run window appears.

b) Type cmd in the text field and click OK.

c) Enter the following text:

ping u20.eset.com

d) Press the Enter key on your keyboard:

e) If you are able to connect to the update server, you will see Reply from… followed by the IP address of the server to which you are trying to connect.

If you do not receive replies, it is likely that a firewall is preventing communication with ESET’s servers, or your internet connection is not active. Open your web browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox, etc.) and make sure you are able to browse web pages. If you are able to browse web pages, there is either software on your computer blocking the virus signature updates, or your ISP is using a firewall on the connection, which could also block the update process.