AVGLinkscanner vs Peerblock vs WOT

They may be working differently, but for the purpose of blocking web based attacks, which one is more effective?

 

if I had to chose one I would go for WOT

 

I would choose sandboxie to prevent web based attacks .

Ill choose peerblock from ur options.

 

I haven't used Peerblock before.

Out of the other two, WOT. Overall, I don't like WOT.

 

for blocking web based attacks? AVG Linkscanner fits your description.

 

WOT and alike services are a no go for me. How so ? Community based ratings is the honest answer.

If you want to be protected when it really matters, then go with AVG Linkscanner. It will check the site when it counts, the time you enter it.

No matter how hard services like WOT try to verify if any real threats are present in a site, I highly doubt they can keep up the pace. Not to mention hackers can easily create multiple accounts and rate bad sites as good sites and vice-versa.

So, the answer is AVG Linkscanner + Peerblock (if you must use it).

Edit: I know you didn't ask it, but you also have PC Tools Browser Defender, which also checks sites real-time. It also has community based alerts, which you can easily disable. But, unlike AVG Linkscanner, it will only work for IE and Firefox. AVG Linkscanner will protect regardless of the browser; you just won't see the ratings in browsers than not IE and Firefox.

 

there's also LinkExtend addon for Firefox. this, you might want to check.

 

Regarding AVG LinkScanner, it doesn't always detect the threat that is on the website.

Regarding LinkExtend, I have used it before and recommend it, as long as you use Firefox or Flock and don't mind the slightly extra bandwidth it must use.

 

You aren't bringing any news, really. No single security application will protect you 100%, therefor it does make sense that it doesn't always block threats.

But, what sort of threats are we talking about here? Exploits? Drive-by downloads? Infected file(s)? Rogue application sites?

 

Not one of the ones mentioned by the OP, but how would Mcafee SiteAdvisor compare with these?

 

McAfee Site Advisor is like WOT - community based ratings. Again, nothing prevents hackers from creating multiple user accounts and rate bad sites as good and good sites as bad.

Also, let's not forget that if today while checking with WOT, Site Advisor and others which ratings come from users, report a site with a green card, it doesn't mean the site is fine right now. The same goes for red cards; if it reports a link with red color, it doesn't mean the site still has active malicious code.

 

I'm bringing news to the thread. One might think (and has thought) that because it works real-time it will always detect a threat (people are ignorant). I should have mentioned that for (minus the real-time) WOT, LinkExtend, etc.

I'm talking exploits.

 

"These site ratings are based on tests conducted by McAfee using an army of computers that look for all kinds of threats (detailed below)."

 

You're right. When I first heard about it, like a year and half ago, I saw the part where people make comments. I must have made confusion with ratings.

Thank you for correcting me.

And, you're right, people do tend not to be aware that no security tool will be protecting them 100%. I interact with such people everyday. Something that needs to be changed on a daily-basis.

 

Absolutely NOT. No way. And, while talking about it, the community-based ratings in WOT are a whole lot more reliable and uptodate compared to SiteAdvisor. Everyone can check the SiteAdvisor ranking site and see the angry comments there about McAfee failing to update the rating and flagging bogus stuff as malware (notably, competitive security solutions are a victim of these false positives quite often).

 

I did say I was wrong after ALiasEX pointed it out. After all, we all make mistakes at some point.

SiteAdvisor never inspired that much confidence. I remember reading some article, like a year and half ago, about the same time I first hear about SiteAdvisor, saying that the free and paid versions displayed some different ratings. If the difference were that huge or not, I can't say, for I haven't tested it my self.

Still, about WOT, which is based on community alerts, there's no way they can check all sites their community reports as being safe or unsafe. Nor can they check them to the most small part of a second, which leaves room for hackers to rate safe domains as unsafe and unsafe domains as safe.

It doesn't matter if 2 seconds ago a bunch of folks reported xyz domain as safe/unsafe; it needs to alert users for active malicious content when it matters - upon entering it.

I do agree that between SiteAdvisor and WOT, I'd go for WOT. But, among SiteAdvisor, WOT, Linkscanner and Browser Defender, I'd go for Linkscanner because it works with every browser.

Browser Defender is also a great choice for those who use IE or Firefox.

 

Taking adult sites as an example in the WOT community. Many that have a red rating are rated so without any explanation from the many that have rated it. Other times the only explanation given is that it is an adult site.

That's not very helpful. I just ignore the rating. Yet to be bitten by any of those sites.

 

Well, presumably you could get "better rating" (read - more relavant to you) in this case if you exclude the child safety from rating. This can be done both for IE and Chrome, don't have FF installed ATM anywhere but don't see a reason why it shouldn't work there as well.

 

I agree with ALiasEX and it's one of the reasons I got rid of WOT (the other being performance). It seems that a lot of people grade porn sites low in all categories, not just Child Safety, simply because they are porn sites.

 

Clarify please?

 

Obviously by its definition WOT has to access its database before loading pages. The difference in speed was quite noticeable to me when doing a lot of browsing. If you browse around and do it with WOT enabled compare doing it with WOT disabled and don't notice a difference then it isn't an issue for you. For me it could be quite annoying at times.

 

Yeah, indeed no such issue here.

 

No, that's not it. Once again, it'd help to know which browser you are using.

 

Linkscanner is horrible when it comes to site ratings from my experience. Sites that are red on WOT are green on AVG and when you enter the site you would get infected because the program says its safe when its not really. I have not tried Peerblock yet so I don't know about that program.

 

I find WOT to be very reliable. A lot of users use it, so most of the sites are already rated (hence more secure browsing).