What I want to know (Firewall Question)

starrchestnutt81

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I know this is off topic, but being a writer, I trust writers, and though all of you may not be tech savvy, I know that most of yall are.

I have a friend who recently got hacked and all of their computers (they were network sharing on windows 7) were raped. I don't know a lot about what virus software works best and what firewalls are best, but I found out that a lot of times if you have high speed internet your cable company may provide free softwars so you don't have to shell out that 80 bucks, and I found a free firewall here: http://www.zonealarm.com/security/en-us/zonealarm-data-lock.htm. It is called zonealarm and it sounds good, but does anyone else here know anything about it? When it comes to trying new things, I like to hear some feedback first.

What I have read is that it is easier to use than the winxp firewall.

Any techies in the house?
 

Adam

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I've used Zonealarm for years, and never had an issue with it. :)
 

Silver King

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Star, I've moved your question to Tech Help from Office Party, where you are more likely to generate the answers you are seeking.
 

Lhun

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There is no reason to pay for any of this. Free anti-virus software is actually better than the commercial ones, and firewalls are mostly a matter of taste. I prefer comodo, but ease-of-use is a non-issue for me, i want certain features i don't get from zonealarm. For antivirus software get avira antivir.
 

monkey see monkey do

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Zonealarm use to be good back in the day, but I'd go Comodo as Lhun suggested. For free antivirus, I've used Avira, AVG, and MSE. I currently prefer MSE.
 

Matera the Mad

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I'm using Comodo, and I'm reasonably happy with it. I really like the new "sandbox" feature that lets you run any program in a virtual environment where it can't mess things up. IE should always be run that way :ROFL:

Long time ago I tried ZoneAlarm and it bugged the crap out of me.

Comodo is hell on an old machine with insufficient RAM, but should do fine on anything newish. Also, it's the only free one in x64 that I know of (my #1 reason for using it).
 

stephenf

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I have had a problem with all the security programs I've installed.Have a look at WWW.reviewcenter.com/products2167.html Here there are reviews for 188 different products and for every one, the reviews are mixed. I think it's a lottery and the software producers are unable to supply the product we would all like.Anyway have look and take you pick.
 

kuwisdelu

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Turn on your software firewall, but don't trust it alone. Any decent router should come with a hardware firewall.
 

RandomJerk

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I've used ZoneAlarm on my Windows box for years, and I love it. The best thing is that it can drop packets (or chunks), doing a mild job of "hiding" your machine. I'd say that plus Firefox with NoScript is more important than having an AV. Windows machines NEED firewalls, no exceptions (unless they're on a sneaker-net).

All this being said, the best defense if having a brain, using it, and keeping up-to-date on threats and so on. Oh, and update your boxes.