The Symantec/Norton Thread.

I just tried Norton Security for the second time. It was surprised how light it was the first time I installed it. I wasn't expecting it to be really heavy but did think it would slow down my system as it is really old. I was quick to uninstall it due there being no way to get it to always prompt for action when a threat is found.

I thought I'd give it a second try due it being light, and I thought I could live with restoring and whitelisting any found items I wanted to keep. I ran a full system scan, and this was not only was very slow, but lead to frequent high CPU use. After the scan finally finished I went to restore any non threats that were quarantined. This was problamatic considering I wanted to restore every single item in the quarantine. Some of the items quarantined were originally in zip file, and to restore them you have to manually select a folder to restore the file to. So, you will get the file back - just not in its original zip file. An issue that would have easily been avoided if Norton were smart to realise that power users want to decide what action to take when a potential threat is found, rather than having the threats quaratined without prompting first. Another problem is that you actually need to individually select each item in the quarantine, and then select more options to view the name and location of the file that was quarantined as the listining of the threats in the quarantine just lists the threats name. This is just a hassle when you are dealing with a number of quarantined files.

I can certainly live with high CPU use when doing scans, as I rarely do a manual scan, and just let the on access protection do its job, and Norton seemd quite light when not doing a scan. However, I can't live with the quarantine issues, so I have uninstalled again. Unless Norton add the option to prompt for action when threats are found, I won't be using this again.

 

You can disable the "Compressed File Scan" in the settings and that should take care of that problem. It may not resolve all of your issues but it would take care of that one.

 

I noticed that Norton has a delay to block "infected" websites in Chrome, using Firefox it is instantly.

 

Don't know if I should post this here. But since this is a Norton thread...
Norton Internet Security antivirus update 'borked Internet Explorer'
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/02/21/norton_antivirus_update_kills_internet_explorer/

 

The problem was caused by a faulty IPS update and resolved some time after with a new IPS update.

 

Unfortunately, this type of thing happens. This is a good reason to have a secondary browser installed.

 

Exactly!

 

https://support.norton.com/sp/en/us...serProfile_en_us?inid=hho_supp_supp_iecrashes

 

I have no issues with Norton 2015 plus backup on my win 8.1 64bit OS. Believe me I have tried them all every since Norton wrote Bill Gates first windows OS system and sold it to him for 30 or 40 grand.

 

How can I see quarantined/deleted files in the latest version? I can't find it in the GUI.

 

Click on Security then History. On top in the case "Show" you can change to indicate quarantine

 

Norton 2015 is a great product. No matter what else I switch to, I am always back to Norton 2015.. Never thought I would see the day...

 

Security>History>Resolved Security Risks

"The security risks include the suspicious programs that can compromise the security of your computer.

The Resolved Security Risks view in the Security History window displays a list of security risks that your Norton product has detected and then repaired,quarantined,removed.

The quarantined items are listed in the Quarantine view."

See NS Manual at pg 268.

Full Manual is Available here - all 356 pages of it : ftp://ftp.symantec.com/public/english_us_canada/products/norton_security/manuals/Norton_Security_Windows_Manual.pdf

 

Antarctica/hawki - thanks. It actually ended up being the browser that was deleting the file.

 

The security packages from Avira, Avast and BitDefender, the latter is bottom of the test would show significant weaknesses in its core range: the defense currently Coursing malicious programs. Only the solutions of overall winner Kaspersky, G-Data, Norton and McAfee are well prepared for the defense of new viruses. Good for the users: In the revised and extended test with infected USB sticks, infected web pages, e-mail, downloads or pests none of the candidates failed completely. "Only the otherwise good G Data Software, leaving the user with too many important decisions," adds tester Voss. Is exemplary in this respect Value winner was Norton Security: The software identified all malicious websites completely. Thus, the Norton anti-virus software from all the products tested had made the biggest leap to the previous year.

http://www.channelobserver.de/artikel/schlechte-noten-fr-Antivirus-programme-3164/

 

@Mayahana I use Norton antivirus as Norton security is not available in my location. Do I need the safeweb toolbar to block malicious websites? I have uninstalled it and changed my DNS to Norton. Will it affect my web protection?

 

Some say you need Norton's toolbar, others say you do not. I do not think we have a consensus about it yet, or an official answer. I personally disable it due to additional protections I deploy, but I would probably enable it if it will improve protection levels. I'd say Norton + Norton DNS would be sufficient.

 

It puzzeles me...obviously my experience differs from some of others includingmalexous and 7tutrials. On my system, Norton successfully blocked malicious sites even when I use non-supported browser like Comodo Dragon and old Opera. I don't know what causes this difference.

 

Surely the blocks in Comodo Dragon and old Opera was a block by Norton IPS and not the same as a Norton Toolbar or Norton ConnectSafe block.

 

IIRC, it blocked site itself, not IPS. Addons called Norton vulnerability protection/Norton security toolbar is for browser protection which is 2nd layer against exploit. Theoretically web protection and IPS are browser independent, only browser protection which protects you from exploit which bypassed IPS by investigating scripts on browser is browser dependent.

It seems currently in NIS2014 Norton only install Norton Toolbar for Firefox, I can't find Norton vulnerability protection so maybe on Firefox you have to enable toolbar for better protection.

 

Toolbar protects against things like phishing, verifies websites, encrypts personal info such as credit/debit cards.
Without this you miss this protection.
You're still protected from various threats though.
This toolbar is more for protecting against data loss

http://us.norton.com/products/tutorials/features.jsp?pvid=n3604&tutid=norton_toolbar

 

Bullseye

 

Actually, it just says Toolbar displays colored status icon which ofc aren't displayed if the Toolbar is off, and also IDSafe integration.

Bad websites (shown as red) will be blocked regardless of if Toolbar is on or off, so icon only make a little sense that it shows yellow sites i.e. potentially dangerous sites (most of them are sites hacked in the past), and for IDSafe it's only relevant who use this, if you use other pwd mgr NP.

 

At least for Norton Security 2015 I can say with 100% certainty that malicious websites are not blocked if the toolbar is disabled.

You can test it here:

http://www.amtso.org/check-desktop-phishing

 

NIS2014 on Win7x64, blocked immediately, Toolbar disabled in IE11.

http://i.imgur.com/XRhoEdQ.png

All right, but in Firefox and Chrome, it was not blocked and I had to enable Toolbar.
So I was wrong, probably NIS2014 won't block malicious sites in non-supported browser.