Privacy Shield 3.0.45

CNET editors' review

Reviewed by: CNET Staff

Although we have a couple of minor quibbles about this privacy-protection application, by and large it's a very solid pick. Privacy Shield's tabbed interface is simple to navigate, letting you check or uncheck boxes depending on what areas of your system you want to clean.

Similar to most apps in this class, this one can wipe away Web-surfing traces from Internet Explorer. And while it also supports Netscape and AOL, it can't clean up other browsers such as Opera and Firefox. Besides the ability to wipe tracks from common Windows system areas, Privacy Shield supports nearly 40 third-party programs, including popular toolbars, IM apps, media players, and file-sharing clients.

You can schedule cleaning sessions and shred files or folders, though the latter feature doesn't let you eradicate data using government-sanctioned algorithms. We'd also wish for a longer trial period than 15 days. But in the final analysis, this utility offers enough protection for the vast majority of everyday users.

Publisher's description

From Privacy-Shield :

Privacy Shield erases data by using government-level removal techniques. It completely "cleans" your computer of any Internet/Windows habits you want to guarantee won't get discovered. Privacy Shield covers your tracks for you, in seconds it will clear your browser history, browser cache, system cookies, visited and typed URL list, locked index.dat file, AutoComplete information, temporary files, recent documents, history and "Find" searches from the Start menu, Recycle Bin and the Windows clipboard, and Outlook/Netscape e-mail histories. It also will delete the full history of ACDSee, Acrobat Reader, AOL Messenger, CuteFTP, Google toolbar, ICQ, Kazaa, MSN Messenger, the MSN toolbar, Office2003, OfficeXP, PowerDVD, RealPlayer, Windows Media Player, WinRAR, WinZip, Yahoo Messenger, and Yahoo toolbar. You even can set it to delete any files or folders you want to completely disappear. In brief, it could save your marriage, job, reputation, and dignity.

Version 3.0.45 fixed a bug when running in Vista.

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