SECURITY SOFTWARES

AVAST!




AVAST 4 HOME EDITION is a full featured antivirus package that is available for free for home users and non commercial use .In situations where the PC is used for any non commercial use .In situations where the PC is used for any commercial purposes ,a Professional version is available visit http://www.avast.com/eng/avast_4_professional.html for more information.
Avast! Can exclude a look and feel that is different from other security software.It supports skins something that is rather uncommon for security software .Being light on system resources and simple to use ,Avast! Home Edition makes for a good antivirus solution for your home PC

AVG

You can find the following AVG products on our PC world April 2007 DVD:AVG internet Security 7.5 and AVG antivirus free .The free software is meant only for single user home use in a non commercial environment only.The AVG internet security 7.5 includes firewall and spam protection, besides virus scanning while the free edition is a standalone virus scanner.
For use of AVG Products in offices or other commercial scenarios visit http://www.grisoft.com/ for details .The version 7.5 has a better heuristics and NTFS data streams scanning ,an improved user interface and smaller installer and update files as compared to the previous versions .If you are using an older version this is a nice time to upgrade.


AD-WARE
AD-WARE SE PERSONAL , a free antispyware tool from Lavasoft is one of the most popular anti spyware tools.It can detect and remove Trojans ,worms ,tracking cookies and other malware that can harm your computer and compromise your privacy.With its user customizable scanning options you can choose to selective ly scan memory ,system folders or the entire hard disk
.This personal edition identifies malware that already exists while the SE Plus and SE Proffessional editions offer real time protection which can stp a malware from entering your PC.The latter of the two also includes powerful features like a process watch and command line interface .A home user who surfs a variety of sites is advised to use a tool like D- Aware and regularly scan his PC for Malware.

SPYBOT- S&D
SPYBOT SEARCH and DESTROY is a very powerful software that can remove malware from your computer .It has an easy mode for new users and an Advanced mode for professional users and for those who want more control over their software.Apart from Malware removal it can block threatening ActiveX content and tracking cookies for Internet Explorer ,it has a command line parameter for automating tasks and ability to change skins for a different look and feel.This program does not tax your system and you can use it in conjunction with an antivirus software for added security.

SPAMBAYS

SPAMBAYS is an open source spam blocking tool that works with outlook 2000/2002(XP)/2003 with an OS that is Windows98 or higher .However it does not work with Outlook Express.You train SpamBayes by showing the software a bunch of email that is valid and a bunch of spam.SpamBayes will then analyse the piles for clues as to what makes the two different and accordingly sorts further mails in appropriate categories .Depending on the ‘Spamminess’ rating based on the calculations ,mails that can not be classified for sure can be directed to another folder which you can review at a later time .


JETICO PERSONAL FIREWALL



This free and lightweight program help you to keep your PC safe from intrusion when networked or connected to the internet .To do this you can choose from and edit exiting pre defined policies or create your own .You can monitor selected applications that access the network as well as network events .Jetico can examine the states of all internet connections ,looking for the telltale signs of hacking .such as source routing or IP spoofing .Connections that exhibit these characterstics are dropped .

AXCRYPT


If you want to send sensitive files by email or CD and wish to keep the file accessible only to the intended recipient ,you can simply encrypt the file so that it can be opened only by keying in a ‘pass phrase’.this pass phrase can be shared with only those persons who are intended recipients of the file .
Axcrypt is a free and extremely simple tool that allows you to do just that .Once installed ,Axcrypt shows up when you right click on a file through which you can encrypt it and supply a pass phrase.You can even make it exe file so that the recipient need not have Axcrypt installed in order to decrypt it .By simply supplying the original pass phrase it will be possible to extract the file.


ERASER


Very often ones feel that a sensitive file he wanted to delete is gone forever if it is removed from the Recycle Bin.
The truth is quite the opposite –only the reference to the file is removed from the file system table ,while the stream of 0’s and 1’s that make the file are still present on the hard disk because of which the deleted file can be recovered by using file recovery software .Only when another file is written onto the same location as the deleted file by operating system ,recovery software will not be able to recover the file .Advanced forensic hardware may still be able to recover a deleted file even if the concerned disk area is overwritten, by studying the magnetic field patterns on the hard disk.
Eraser is a free tool that can get rid of your files once and for all by overwriting the file’s area on the disk repeatedly with different patterns and remove magnetic traces of files that were once on the disk.It has a simple interface and is easy to use.

AUTOPATCHER




AUTOPATCHER as the name suggests is a program that contains Windows updates from Microsoft in an automated installed fashion,where in you can apply several updates in one go.These updates are available separately for Windows XP,2000 and Server 2003 in form of a ‘full’ version containing updates upto November 2006 and therefore as a collection of updates every month.Apart from security patches , Autopatcher also includes Windows Addons such as a clear Type Tuner .,Webcam Timershot ,Powercalculator as well as Windows tweaking tool called TweakUI provides a frontend to registry entries that effect the look and feel of Windows .You have to note while for most parts these powertoys work,they are not guaranteed to to be glitch free and are not supported by Microsoft.This however should not stop you from installing the ‘Critical Updates ‘ that contain security patches.