antivirus

The bottom line: Low-impact performance, strong security, and useful features are the hallmarks of Norton AntiVirus 2012, one of the best antivirus suites available.

Review: Editors' note: Portions of this review are based on CNET's review of Norton Internet Security 2012.

Over the past few years, Symantec has completed a course reversal for its Norton consumer Internet security suites. The massive package of security tools works better than it ever has before, with an impressive set of features, some useful new tools including remote management and download stability analysis, and third-party security efficacy benchmarks that are at the top … Read more

The Web site that hosts uTorrent was hacked by an unknown person or group early this morning. After initially stating that the "mainline" BitTorrent site had been hacked as well, the company now says that it doesn't think that BitTorrent.com was affected. BitTorrent, the owner of the Web sites and the torrent clients hosted there, reported in a blog post that the breach occurred around 4:20 a.m PT.

According to the blog, the proper executable files for both programs were replaced with "a fake antivirus 'scareware' program" called Security Shield. The company … Read more

The last time we saw a wholly new version of ESET's NOD32 and Smart Security, ransomware didn't exist, Anonymous had just started its campaign against the Church of Scientology, and the first Stuxnet attack hadn't even been launched. The latest versions from ESET bring its suites up to speed with the competition, but except for an innovative education tool, ESET doesn't surpass what's already out there. The basic antivirus suite NOD32 version 5 (download) and the more feature-rich Smart Security version 5 (download) are available exclusively today from CNET Download.com.

ESET is known for … Read more

Microsoft has pulled a new AVG antivirus app from the Windows Phone Marketplace.

Brandon Watson, Microsoft's director of developer experience for Windows Phone, confirmed yesterday in a tweet that the app had been removed based on research done by two external experts and that the company had started its own investigation.

Launched earlier this week, AVG's new antivirus app for Windows Phone quickly triggered concerns among users, according to enthusiast site WinRumors. Digging into the app's codebase, Justin Angel, a former Microsoft employee, and Rafael Rivera, a self-proclaimed Windows hacker and author of the Within Windows blog, … Read more

Just in time for back to school, you can now save 50 percent on the all-new Bitdefender Total Security 2012 and get it for just $34.95 (reg. $69.95). As is often the case, you get a piece of software and you don't know how to customize the settings to fit your needs. Actually, with Facebook continuing to roll out new features, I always feel the need to check my privacy settings to make sure they haven't changed. I just want it to be easy--pick the right level of protection and leave it, forever.

Well, that's … Read more

Symantec's Norton updates for 2012 launched today with the expected slate of performance improvements and interesting ancillary features and with a hint of a much stronger connection between the company's desktop and mobile offerings. The robust Norton Internet Security 2012 (download) and slimmer Norton AntiVirus 2012 (download) introduce several new features and reasonable but not amazing performance bumps.

There's now a link at the bottom of the main interface to Norton's mobile version. Next to it is a link for Norton Management, a new tool which opens in your default Web browser that allows you to … Read more

The bottom line: Low-impact performance, strong security, and useful features are the hallmarks of Norton Internet Security 2012, one of the best security suites available.

Review: Editors' note: Portions of this review are based on CNET's review of Norton Internet Security 2011.

Over the past few years, Symantec has completed a course reversal for its Norton consumer Internet security suites. The massive package of security tools works better than it ever has before, with an impressive set of features, some useful new tools including remote management and download stability analysis, and third-party security efficacy benchmarks that are at the … Read more

ClamWin Antivirus is a free antivirus solution for Windows PCs. This open-source freeware integrates with Windows Explorer and Microsoft Outlook, schedules scans, and automatically updates virus definitions. It offers good, basic protection without the bells and whistles of premium antivirus packages.

ClamWin's installer let us choose to integrate the program with Explorer and install the Outlook module, both of which we selected. Right-clicking the program's system-tray icon let us configure and update ClamWin as well as schedule scans, display reports, manually check for updates, and attend to other matters. The program's main interface is utterly basic but … Read more

While AVG has made some important security improvements in its latest major release, including important protection against fake antivirus and ransomware, how the suite impacts your PC is the focus of AVG 2012. Available at no cost as AVG Anti-Virus Free 2012 (download), or as a paid upgrade to AVG Anti-Virus 2012 (download) or AVG Internet Security 2012 (download), AVG's 2012 offerings hang their hats on major performance gains.

Specifically, the company says that it has reduced by 40 percent the size on your hard drive of the virus signature database. That database is a major component of how … Read more