Need Alternative for Zone Alarm

malexous said:

Typical of Comodo not to mention "Insight Protection, SONAR Protection, and Automatic Live Update were turned off" for Norton.

First, these tests were not run nor published by Comodo this is a completely independent report.

If you carefully read the the Testing Lab's explanations of their own testing procedures you will see that they set up NIS 2011 to get the very best possible performance on this series of tests otherwise NIS 2011 would have gotten even less than 42/100...



Please excuse me for bringing these particular test results up but I had my System HOSTS file poisoned twice while using NIS 2009 and people keep telling me that NIS 2011 has improved, but I was shocked and disappointed to find out that this test showed that Norton 2011 still allows changes and redirection in the System HOSTS file.

~Maxx~
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Disabling SONAR is disabling a big part of Norton's "zero-day" (what the test was for) protection. It uses some information from the web (apparently, why it was disabled) but it also functions without it (it's a behaviour blocker so what it uses from the web is very, very little compared to the rest).

No one is going to be downloading files from the internet (or obtaining and running them from another source) with SONAR (and Insight) disabled (otherwise, I suggest you do not use Norton). An unrealistic test for any (potential) Norton user.

Compare those results with: AV-Comparatives - Independent Tests of Anti-Virus Software - Whole Product Dynamic Tests

malexous said:

Disabling SONAR is disabling a big part of Norton's "zero-day" (what the test was for) protection. It uses some information from the web (apparently, why it was disabled) but it also functions without it.

Could you possibly demonstrate how your knowledge these 100 tests that Norton 2011 only scored 42/100 on is greater than the security experts that invented and administered the test is because you are in effect saying that you know much more about the series of test that those who designed them?

Please don't obfuscate the point of these 100 tests with some blacklist Antivirus comparisons. This test is about a computer security system's ability to deal with Exploits because this a new Millennium and a whole new kind of Malware that 20+ year old Antivirus technology just can't deal with effectively on a zero-day security environment.

~Maxx~
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For on-lookers: only 20 malware samples were used for the Matousec report; the report explains the possible 100 score.

Maxxwire said:

some blacklist Antivirus comparisons

All the anti-viruses in the test have more than just a blacklisting technology. The malware may or may not be "zero-day", though, I've just realised.

Maxxwire said:

Could you possibly demonstrate how your knowledge these 100 tests that Norton 2011 only scored 42/100 on is greater than the security experts that invented and administered the test is because you are in effect saying that you know much more about the series of test that those who designed them?

I doubt I know more than these 'experts'... but then again, I wouldn't conduct firewall tests against firewalls, HIPS and behaviour blockers and call the tests a "Firewall Challenge", then change the name to “Proactive Security Challenge” and add HIPS tests while continuing to test firewalls, HIPS and behaviour blockers even after vendors have requested for their products to be removed because they were not designed for the tests and makes their product look bad. I also wouldn't half test products (or nearly not at all!) and display the results as if they had been tested as fully as other products. There have been many disservices to the end user and developers, brought upon because of these 'experts'.

SONAR 3: A new level of behavioral security in Nor... - Norton Community

SONAR 2 - Norton Community

These are legitimate and very simple tests to find out how well each Security Suite did when confronted with a set of 20 unknown viruses. This is not a specialized test just one that only the Security Suites with the best defenses against unknown viruses can prevail and not let the computer get infected, do damage and allow the virus to start again when the computer is restarted which is very common testing which the testing engineers did their best to prepare Norton 2011 for.

These days it is just simply not acceptable for a Security Suite not to be able to defend against unknown viruses and blaming the test or the people who fairly administered the test is not an excuse for a Security Suite that lets a computer get infected by unknown viruses.

~Maxx~
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They turned off some key features of NIS to prevent issues with new virus definitions. What issues are they talking about. I am calling BS on these tests as they look like they were rigged. Hey NIS we crippled your product and you didn't do too good. Total BS.

NIS is at the top in other legitimate tests by reputable organizations.

Jim

Maxxwire said:

fairly

Disabling two technologies in a product that are designed to help protect against what is being tested is not that.

Maxxwire said:

malexous said:

Typical of Comodo not to mention "Insight Protection, SONAR Protection, and Automatic Live Update were turned off" for Norton.

First, these tests were not run nor published by Comodo this is a completely independent report.

I'm aware of that. They did ask for the test and announce it, though.

Maxxwire said:

do damage and allow the virus to start again when the computer is restarted

One of the things SONAR checks before the malware even runs. "Again, this allows us to even challenge the existence of the file as it becomes part of the system, by registering itself to the OS and its various applications. Hence a file can be classified as a malicious and convicted much before it ever runs on the system."

Here is an interesting quote from the Matousec site.

The Recommendation column in the table contains links to the online stores or products' webpages of the vendors that we have affiliate agreements with. If you click on any of these links and then buy the target product or other product offered on the target webpage, we will profit from it. So, if you are going to buy a security software and you like our projects, you can help us! Even if you have the licence already, we can profit if you prolong the licence after you visit the vendor's website through our recommendation links.

So if you don't have an agreement to share the money you don't get a recommended score. Somthing smells on this site. Independent tests my a$$.

Jim

One of many controversies surrounding Matousec and his tests . Related: Matousec’s Firewall Challenge wrinkle: conflict of interests? « Smokey's Security Weblog