Wanted: Best Free Internet Security Software

bazster

Used to use AVG, but the last couple of release have been horrible (it can go berserk and start using 100% CPU for long periods - and once it starts doing it, it keeps doing it). I now use Avira, which seems fine.

You can download Windows Defender for free from Microsoft, but for me it has never once complained about anything, which leads me to suspect that it's not doing very much!

AdAware finds lots of nasty stuff, but the free version isn't automatic, you have to remember to run it regularly.

Spybot S+D is good, but the user interface is a bit messy and overly technical.

Firewall-wise, the best single thing you can do is to make sure that your broadband router is set to ignore anonymous internet requests. That way, the baddies will never even know that your computer exists.

Leopard

OneADay wrote: »

:eek: Blooming heck - thats good advice - get a mac for a fortune because you want to save on £14 for internet security software (which can be bought from ebay).

You miss my point and put the cart before the horse.

Mine was an observation, not advice. The benefit of having neither the expense nor the hassle of needing to battle against malware on a daily basis is welcomely incidental to ownership and use of a Mac – not (for most people) the reason for buying one.

And if, moreover, somebody is of any useful worth work-wise, the cost of the time they spend combatting malware on Windows very greatly exceeds the financial price they pay if they choose to do so with commercially available software.

aliEnRIK

enigma52 wrote: »

forget all about this programme and that programme, just use Sandboxie whenever you go on the internet and you will never ever get a virus/malware infection. Another one that does this is Returnil, google for both Returnil is free Sandboxie you have to buy.

Sandboxies very good (I thought it was free?)

But it wont do anything about ~
cds/dvds etc with infections
infected emails
phishing scams
keyloggers etc etc

Also, there ARE security issues with them (A bit like when microsoft release updates to 'plug' gaps in defenses of operating systems)

To 'completely' depend on a sandboxie is not something id ever recommend personally

enigma52

AlienRik,
but Returnil will combat anything and is free

ian2211

I use Comodo on my windows box. They do a security suite now that is free for life, with probably one of the best firewalls around. It comes with firewall, AV and defense plus. They also do many other free security products such as verification engine which is a web browser add on that detects "false" and untoward web sites and iVault which is a password generator and vault, and many more at comodo.com. You will get a few notifications from the firewall at first but it is very customizable and you can set the notifications to the level you want.

Crawler also do some good free products such as spyware terminator, web gaurd, system protect and many more.
crawler.com/products

As mentioned Sandboxie is good and free too
sandboxie.com

You could also utilise a virtual pc. You install the virtual pc on your computer and then install an operating system onto the virtual pc. It runs on your pc but is essentially a different machine. You can transfer files between the virtual pc and the host PC that you know are safe. Any virus' you may get in the virtual pc cannot harm the pc you are running it on. You can get a free virtual pc program from microsoft or Virtual box virtualbox.org/

You could of course use Linux which is a totally free operating system, and is about as virus proof as you can get. You can get many different versions or "distros" and they all come with lots of software to get you going out of the box. It can be awkward to get used to at first if you are used to windows, but most distros do a "live cd" to enable you to try them out. you download and put the disk in your drive drive and the computer runs from the disk, or you could allways install one in a virtual pc to see if you like it.
distrowatch.com/

Free Linux online training at
linux.org/lessons/

aliEnRIK

enigma52 wrote: »

AlienRik,
but Returnil will combat anything and is free

How would it stop phishing and keylogging??

Nicklt

As not you say you are not much if a computer wizz, and (i may be incorect) i presume you are not one that would use advanced features of a PC nor Anti Virus software, so i don't really see a point in telling you about all these different software packages you could get nor do i think you would benefit much from having 4+ software packages. Personally as (i presume) a basic user i would stick with the Windows Firewall as it does the job fine, i would also get microsoft security essentials which is a anti virus program from microsoft which is pretty good, i've used many antivirus packages in my time and security essentials is pretty good i think and its free. You can find the download here http://www.microsoft.com/Security_Essentials/

chunter

Did I read somewhere this week that only 3% of "troublesome" software is "viruses" (must be the old distructive type) as we know them?
The majority are malware, scareware, routekits, keyloggers and all that other stuff..

I think what they're trying to say is that the old style computer virus problem (which just tried to break your computer) is now dwarfed by all the rubbish that aims to coerce money out of you..

ladouche999

I wouldnt rely on the windows firewall too much, in xp it only blocks incoming nasties, so if u have a trojan on your machine your personal data will sail straight through it. in vista and win 7 it is 2 way but you have to set it up correctly as it still only blocks incoming connections by default. I personally use online armor ( google it, srry cant post links yet lol)as a firewall and have had no problems.

parcival

I have used the three main ones over the past several years.

AVG - used to be great but the detection rate fell away. Also had some issues with upgrades to new versions. Replaced it with......

AVIRA - Very good and with a small footprint on the machine. Recently had some update issues on my XP machine. Seems fine with VISTA. Now replaced Avira with......

AVAST on my XP machine. Seems very good, updates regularly.

Also use ZoneAlarm free firewall.

Also Malwarebytes.

Zonealarm and Malawarebytes seem excellent.

Hope it helps.