Hasta La Gadget!

This article was written on December 06, 2007 by CyberNet.

A few weeks back I finally broke down and bought the ESET Smart Security suite (review). I needed two licenses for it, and I decided to just buy the two-year subscription up front so that I could take advantage of the extra savings. In the end my total came out to $103.99, but it was worth it for two licenses and two years of protection from one of the best security companies around. And if the VB100 test is anything to go by it’s one of the best antivirus programs available.

The Smart Security comes with antivirus, antispyware, firewall, and antispam all rolled into one. Out of all the security apps that I’ve used ESET’s products always provide the best performance in addition to exceptional protection.

For those of you who want to jump on the bandwagon I just noticed that Newegg has a relatively good deal on both the Smart Security and standalone NOD32 antivirus apps. They all have free shipping, and that means you will receive a physical boxed product instead of just a username/password and download link. Here are the prices for the different apps:

• Smart Security 3.0 (Retail) – $49.99
• NOD32 Antivirus 3.0 (Retail) – $34.99
• NOD32 Antivirus 3.0 (OEM) – $29.99

Those are actually a pretty good deal if you’re not buying multiple licenses and don’t want to commit to two years. Here’s a price layout if you purchase directly from ESET (remember, you won’t receive a physical copy of the product with these):

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This article was written on July 08, 2008 by CyberNet.

It has been over a year and a half since the consumer release of Windows Vista, and the Sunbelt Personal Firewall is finally compatible with it. The new version has better network performance, enhanced packet filtering, improved stability, Vista (32-bit) compatibility, and more. Plus, like always, it comes in both free and paid flavors.

Do you need a third-party firewall when Windows comes with one? According to Sunbelt the “built-in firewall in Windows is worse than useless, since it is only one-way.” They aren’t completely telling the truth there. Windows XP’s firewall is indeed a one-way firewall that is only capable of blocking incoming connections, but that’s not the case with Vista. I’m sure that Sunbelt is a much better choice for protection, but I think they need to be more clear in the claims they are making.

Aside from the new Vista compatibility there isn’t much that I’m able to accurately test in the new Sunbelt Personal Firewall. Memory usage between the three processes (SbPFSvc.exe, SbPFCl.exe, and SbPFLnch.exe) totaled about 35MB for me, which is a bit more than I had anticipated. When compared to Comodo that is about ten times more memory being used.

If you do decide to give this a whirl it’s important to know that the free version and the paid version are both bundled in the same download. Once you download the “trial” you’ll have a full 30 days to play around with all of the features. After that it will fall back to the free version that doesn’t include things like ad blocking, identity theft protection, and remote administration.

Sunbelt Personal Firewall Homepage
Thanks Scott!

Copyright © 2013 CyberNetNews.com

Call the Power Pwn the champion of white hat hacking. Underneath that Clark Kent power strip exterior, there’s a Superman of full-scale breach testing that can push the limits of just about any company network, whether it takes 3G, Ethernet or WiFi to get there. Pwnie Express’ stealthy sequel to the Pwn Plug ships with a Debian 6 instance of Linux whose handy hacking tools are as easy to launch as they are tough to detect. There’s just one step needed to create a snoop-friendly Evil AP WiFi hotspot, and the box dodges around low-level NAC/802.1x/RADIUS network authentication without any help; in the same breath, it can easily leap into stealth mode and keeps an ongoing encrypted link to give do-gooders a real challenge. The hacker doesn’t even need to be in the same ZIP code to crack a firewall or VPN — the 3G link lets the Power Pwn take bash command-line instructions through SMS messages and doles out some of its feedback the same way. While the $1,295 device can theoretically be used for nefarious purposes, DARPA’s blessing (and funding) should help keep the Power Pwn safely in the hands of security pros and thwart more than a few dastardly villains looking for weak networks.

Filed under: Networking, Internet

DARPA-backed Power Pwn is power strip by day, superhero hack machine by night originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 22 Jul 2012 07:54:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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