Best Security for Computers?

Greetings,

My Mcafee that was pre-installed on my laptop when I bought it is about to expire and I now need a new security for my computer but after looking through the web I've dwindle it down to 3 which among many reviewers are the top 3 best.

Norton
Bit Defender
Kaspersky

But many reviewer site rate this 3 differently so I find it hard finding a definitive one that I want.

So now I need people's opinion on what they think is the best security. Price is no problem so don't consider that when you make your opinion. I just want opinion of which is best in terms of security and protection.

Thank you.

>Norton
Gods no.

MSE is a good free alternative.

I'm using Avira and MSE, never had a problem.

Microsoft Security Essentials

Pretty much the only thing you need. I used to pair it with Avira; but, the only real benefit was the sandbox mode Avira offered.

Really MSE..Looked up some review of this product and although it is decent - it's not really the same level as Bit defender and Kaspersky.

Expert reviews rated at least 3 to 3.5 out of 5. Although MSE is good enough as an AV if your safe with your usage with your computer. Let's face it from downloading visual novel games to downloading things on the internet I can't really say I'm very safe with my computer.

So therefore I need something that can protect my computer despite my adventures around the internet.

P.S The reviewers I looked at are PC Mag, PC Advisor and TechRadar and others.

P.S.S Currently I have a pre-installed Mcafee which is about to expire 4 days from now and System Mechanic.

I'm using: Nod32 antivirus and Outpost Firewall Pro. Never had any problem.

I'm using norton 360... No issues thus far. Was told by a store that it's better than kerspasky... I'm not sure I believe it, and am inclined to believe it's sales bullshit purely because it was staff at harvey norman... Only got it because gf at the time got it for cheap with her laptop, and it could be installed on 3 computers.

MSE has got real-time protection too, what else do you need?

Kaspersky is good but can get pissing if rules are not set beforehand. Norton used to work before the whole 360 rebuild. I found Nod32 meets my needs well though I'm using business edition. MSE is the backup but it don't see any action.

I use MSE, because I trust myself to not expose myself to malware. If you don't trust yourself, good idea to go with Nod32 or Kaspersky if you're willing to pay, or avg if you're not. Norton has become waaaay too heavy over the years.

Norton for virus scans and my firewall.


-Ad-block plus
-NoScript
-SireAdvisor


For firefox.

In soviet Russia virus scans for you.

For a Firewall your average household router manages just fine, if you want extra protection add another router or two. If whoever is trying to hack you manages to get past three routers, there's probably not much you can do to stop them from getting through past disconnecting yourself from the internet.

As for virus protection the best defense is really just being pro-active; I haven't used virus protection software on my personal computer in over several years, and haven't had an unintentional viral infection for even longer thanks to my experience & safe habits.

MSE would be my choice for free protection if I had a need for it, it's unobtrusive and does it's job quite well.

well there isnt a super good security system
every system has its own holes in it

so the preinstalled is good so dont spend money on other ones

Like Tsuvian said, it's really just about being proactive. I don't use protection software, but I do keep Malware Bytes handy in case I think a file is rather dubious. I never have to use it though. It's not hard to tell a good download from a bad one.

As for Norton, I have never used it on my computer, but I've helped disable it on others' computers since Norton is pretty bulky and takes up a good chunk of CPU.

Take it from someone, who was quite averse to continuous protection schemes due their resource hogging:

Frankly, there's no reason why you shouldn't install MSE. It's free, it's gets its definitions with Windows update and uses very little in terms of system resources.

Is it the "best" as far as virii recognition or removal goes? Nope... however it's still decent, and for something free and with modest resource demands it's damn good.

I have to disagree with the "router" part, most routers are fairly easy to hack, such as WEP key routers (My at&t and comcast routers were wep routers). Then again I have not hacked one myself, this is from acquaintances/friends who have/do. From what I hear, it takes less than 20 seconds. When I used to keep track I would get counts of 5-8 hacks per month getting through my routers.

Most well versed hackers will get past most all firewalls anyways. There not very much you can do to stop them. The best way to deal with this, is to have a pc/device/mac that holds all the important information, dedicated to only that type of conduct, and another used for everything insecure.

I, myself, have gotten to the point of which I can find, isolate, and eliminate most viruses on my own. Luckily I've yet to encounter a hard ware damaging one though. Though as a precaution I always carry a updated version of mal ware bytes (speaking of which its been more than a week since my last scan). Though I have not tried many others I can say with confidence it is one of the best virus scanning software on the web, free even.

Also big problem with norton, I haven't kept track of it since, but nortons source code was spilled all over the net (by anon) a short while ago (sometime over the summer). Even before then, norton sucked.

A out of the way alternative would be to buy a mac and run bootcamp (I myself have never used either). You won't get a virus with a mac and bootcamp should give you the windows experience.

Please take your bullshit somewhere else.

Macs have had viruses written for them for quite a while now, even Apple admits that iOS is not "virus proof".

As for the routers:

WEP has been cracked for ages, hence why us IT professionals keep insisting that one should use WPA 2... which hasn't.

Sure, WPA 2 can still be brute forced, especially if you use "Protected Setup" instead sharing a passphrase (allowing Reaver to do its magic).

It's still not trivial. Script kiddies (like your friends) will have a hard time cracking it.

To be secure do two things:
1. Turn off "Protected Setup" (also called WPS)
2. Use a strong password, keeping some guidelines in mind. Hackers like to use dictionary attacks combined with rules most people use for their passwords:

a) Most passwords start with a Capital letter
b) End in a number.
c) Use common letter-number substitutions.

...so choose a password that doesn't conform to these guidelines and you've just made your password a lot harder to crack with a dictionary based brute force attack.

http://blog.roboform.com/password-face-off-can-you-guess-which-passwords-are-stronger/

About firewalls:
No, circumventing a firewall is not trivial. It forces the attacker to do port-scanning and unless he gains access to the management features of your network (in which case it wasn't your firewall that has been compromised) they can prevent virii and other malicious code from making in- and outgoing connections.

Finally:
I doubt you could find a key-logger program or other malicious code that doesn't hog the system resources. Claims that one can do this "by hand" is extremely dubious, as even security professionals rely on software to scan the memory and look for suspicious entities.

These are all you'll need:
1. Avast = Antivirus;
2. MalwareBytes/Windows Defender = Antispyware;
3. Norton Ghost(propietary) = backup;
4. www.bleepingcomputer.com = online guide on how to tackle malware problems;

Sorry about the mac part, I had said I never used them myself. My opinion of mac's are from the people who brag this. I've never been interested enough to bother looking into them.

I'm not a hacker, I dunno anything about wpa, but I do know (or at least to me) that wep is the most common household router. It's the one I've encountered most.

Hearing McAfee as being "one of the worst in security" and Norton having its source code spilled on the net, doesn't give bearing to how likely hackers are to get by them them? If not my mistake. I was under the impression that most pc's defaulted one or the other. So I assumed that since most pc's use these 2 (like op's) they'd be easy targets for "well versed" hackers.

Never said I get rid of everything by hand, most viruses I encounter are minor threats (that appear in processes), that I have and do rid. When I encounter something I can't get rid of I use Malware bytes, worst case scenario I reboot the partition. Other types of viruses than key loggers exist from my understanding. I probably have one of these that neither I nor malware bytes have yet to see yet.

I can't talk tech, so I can't argue with you over it. I'm simply echoing things I've heard (I know that doesn't make it better but I hardly consider such a harsh response called for, but I'll say sorry for not knowing the "right and wrong" in what I thought). Your more than welcome to correct me, if what I say is false. I don't intend to have someone take it as truth if so. I've had trojans work through either McAfee or panda-something (fairly certain wasn't from downloads) assumed a hacker placed it, never looked into how it happened was awhile back when I was new to pc's then (all I used it for was maple story).

^
Bakapink, Windows is a fairly secure OS. Indeed, it is possible to insert malicious software into a remote system (a hacker forcing a download into your system), but would require the following: a complete understanding of Window's permissions implementation (how permissions were coded), a complete understanding of your firewall's implementation, and a diagram of how your individual system is connected to the "internet".

Ok, so the hacker is a smart guy - he has complete understanding of Window's permissions - hell, let's give him a complete understanding of ALL different types of firewalls out there. How does he know what system out of the billion or so devices out there is your system? Simple, you connect to a site and upload to the server that hosts the site a message saying, "Hey, give me this web-page." The server complies, tosses you the web-page, and keeps your message somewhere in their logs. Ok, Mr. Hacker, can you crack this server's firewall and try to figure out which one of these logs, from all these log files (which are probably encrypted) are my connection's details? Sure you could! Give it one to a few years.

Now you may be wondering, why there are so many virus infected systems out there. Simple, users do not know how to avoid common malware inducing practices. When you install software, don't keep pressing "next", actually read and don't install that ask toolbar (which is a known adware) that came packaged with that software. When an ad pops up don't click on the buttons, alt + f4 and close the window itself. It's the users themselves falling for simple tricks and not a guy trying to attack you, individually.