Chris said:
I posted earlier concerning "ESET Internet Security"and how I feel it
is a very good product. However, one of my friends who is a software
sales person highly recommneded I use "Webroot Internet Security". He
says it is light years ahead of any of the other Internet Security
Suites and would serve me well.
Unfortunately, I have heard little about this product. Can anyone add
any feedback concerning this product? Should I reconsider ESET and go
with Webroot Internet Security instead?
Webroot is a software publisher, not a software developer. They slap
their brand on other products. Many software publishers do this. CA
slaps the EZ-Armor name on the firewall they get from Zonelabs.
Webroot Antivirus: A rebranded Sophos antivirus product. Poor coverage.
Webroot Firewall: PrivateFirewall from Privacyware.
Haven't bothered to track down from where they got the other products
they slid under their label.
From
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/22/AR2009012204236.html:
"In AV-Test.org's malware detection tests, Webroot identified only 89.56
percent of the huge "zoo" of worms, bots, and other evil creations
pitted against it. Top performers caught nearly 10 percent more. ... In
tests with two-week-old signature files, Webroot placed second to last
once more, with a detection rate of just 39.8 percent (top performers,
by comparison, averaged around 55 percent)."
"Webroot's backup feature offers 2GB of online storage space for free,
but we weren't able to create an account and test the feature because of
Webroot server problems."
You get 50GB with a free adrive.com account. There are better choices
for online storage, some of which are free.
For an equivalent to Webroot's privacy component, and if still using
Internet Explorer, get the free IE7Pro and use its privacy cleanup
module. There are also a slew of other free products to do browser
cleanup. Of course, you could run the web browser inside a sandbox
(many are free) or virtual machines (also many are free) to completely
and thoroughly eradicate all traces of what you did inside that web
browser session along with the protection of running the web browser
under an isolated environment.
Don't expect a salesperson to be technically expert regarding the
various methods used to detect pests on your hosts. Detection is also
only one part of the equation. Detection without eradication is mostly
worthless (well, if eradication isn't possible after detection, you get
stuck having to figure it out manually or do a wipe-and-reinstall).
Many tests regarding pest coverage only quote a detection rate and say
nothing about the effectiveness of disinfection (and without deleterious
side effects). Sales people only need to know enough about the product
they sell to make some sales of it. I bet your sales friend sells this
product or it is pushed by his company Sales department.
You probably guessed by now that I'm not impressed with Webroot
products. You sure your sales friend said Webroot was light years
"ahead"? Why pay for Webroot when you can get free products that do the
same as the components in their suite and which do an equivalent or
better job?
