PC TOOLS INTERNET SECURITY REVIEWER’S GUIDE LEGAL DISCLAIMER: THIS DOCUMENT ASSUMES THAT YOU HAVE A GOOD KNOWLEDGE OF THE WINDOWS® OPERATING SYSTEM AND HOW MALWARE INTERACTS AND INSTALLS ITSELF ONTO A COMPUTER. YOU AGREE THAT YOU ASSUME ALL RISK IN PERFORMING TESTING AND IN REMOVING FROM YOUR SYSTEM ANY SPYWARE, ADWARE OR OTHER MALWARE. YOU AGREE THAT, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, PC TOOLS® IS UNDER NO LIABILITY OR RESPONSIBILITY TO YOU WHATSOEVER FOR ANY DAMAGE OR LOSS (INCLUDING CONSEQUENTIAL LOSSES, ECONOMIC LOSS OR LOSS OF PROFITS) HOWSOEVER CAUSED TO YOU OR YOUR SYSTEM AS A RESULT OF USING THIS GUIDE.
PRODUCT OVERVIEW • • •
Product name: Release details: OS Compatibility:
MAIN GUI SCREEN
PC Tools Internet Security Version 9.0 Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP
NEW & IMPROVED FEATURES BRAND-NEW GRAPHICAL USER INTERFACE
ENHANCED USER EXPERIENCE [IMPROVED] Significant reduction in system impact: [ENHANCED] launch times for most common third-party applications - 14.4% faster than industry average for first launch of MS Word - 23.1% faster than industry average for first launch of Adobe Reader [IMPROVED] Windows start-up times - 10% improvement on PC Tools Internet Security 2011 [IMPROVED] network transfer and download rates - 33.2% faster than industry average [IMPROVED] performance on common Windows actions - 20.2% faster than PC Tools Internet Security 2011 on copy, move or deletion - 21.7% improvement on third-party application install [IMPROVED] MyAccount integration - Report card provides detailed information on protection statistics - Direct link to MySupport for latest upgrades and user registration information
[ENHANCED] PC Tools Download Manager - Manages download process to allow for interruptions in internet access - User installs 3MB download manager, ensuring that full software build with latest signature DB and updates are delivered seamlessly - Information provided throughout install process
IMPROVED BEHAVIORAL DETECTION ON DISK [IMPROVED] Combines whitelisting and verification of digital certificates with realtime behavioural scanning to maximize detection of potential malware - Avoids injecting behavioural scanning into good programs to minimize impact [ENHANCED] Minimal impact on programs when no malicious activity is present - Stops watching unknown programs after thresholds have been passed - Reduces system impact whilst maintaining detection levels of zero-day malware [NEW] Social on-disk protection, based on visual elements and deceptions - Allows early detection of Fake AV events such as erroneous warnings of virus infections to block installation of rogueware - Monitors Adobe PDF for Javascript exploits
IMPROVED BEHAVIORAL PROTECTION IN THE BROWSER [NEW] Scam Protection alerts users on potential ‘Work from Home’ and mobile subscription scams - [NEW] Detects potential scam sites based on keyword and webpage activity analysis to advise users on possible loss of personal data or financial information [IMPROVED] Anti-phishing utilising stronger source of block and warn lists - [NEW] Now supports Firefox 4, 5, 6, and 7 - [IMPROVED] Performance under IE 9 to reduce impact on startup time
NEW AND IMPROVED CLOUD DETECTION [ENHANCED] Download Guard - Defends against zero-day threats with cloud-based verification of files - Reputation-based analysis of downloads from network-facing applications [NEW] File Guard - During down time Idle Mode calls on cloud-analysis for MD5 hash checking - Reduced scan times due to improved caching of safe files [ENHANCED] Firewall - Cloud technology integrated in improved firewall feature [IMPROVED] Keylogger detection - Enhanced signature-based detection of commercial and non-commercial keyloggers
IMPROVED REMEDIATION TECHNOLOGY [IMPROVED] Threat Removal Tool offers additional remediation technology - Integrates ThreatExpert Memory Scanner for deep scan and detection of Fake AV - Uses behavioural techniques to trace presence of AV-killers – locates and deletes processes that discover and block AV installers [IMPROVED] Enhanced Self Protection - ESP is designed to protect PC Tools Internet Security by monitoring core registry keys, processes and files and ensuring that none can be modified outside of the program. This is in addition to the standard self-protection functionality available in all PC Tools protection products NEW PERFORMANCE TOOLBAR [NEW] Unique Performance Slider Bar - Intuitively determines optimum settings dependent on PC specifications - User can choose ‘Performance’, ‘Balanced’ or ‘Protection’ modes
NEW HITSCAN [NEW] Finds and remediates against stealthware that hides itself from the Windows operating system - Scans all files, registry, and MBR settings under Windows before repeating the scan under Linux and compares MD5 checksums of files to flag discrepancies - Finally, it repairs any infections with the clean versions of the files or MBR - ACCESSED THROUGH PROGRAM FILES DIRECTORY, USED WITH ASSISTANCE OF PC TOOLS CUSTOMER SUPPORT TEAM
IMPROVED ANTI-SPAM [IMPROVED] Larger, continually updated database provides improved detections and fewer false positives IMPROVED FIREWALL [NEW] Added NDIS6 support - [IMPROVED] Enhanced throughput and network efficiencies on Vista and Windows 7 - [NEW] TCP Chimney Offload (making it possible for the NIC to replace the Windows TCP stack with its own implementation) - [ENHANCED] Takes advantage of multi-core CPUs, sharing NIC load to all available CPUs [NEW] Web-based reputation analysis checks on applications to determine more automated allow/block behaviour, based on whether the application is known-bad or known-good ALTERNATE OPERATING SYSTEM SCANNER - Creates a bootable rescue CDs or USBs from directly within the application - Provides full scanning and remediation functionality, even on a computer that is so heavily infected that normal malware scanning/remediation is not possible. MALWARE DETECTIVE Runs scan to analyze system files and produces detailed information on files, applications, runkeys, registry entries and services to assist with support queries FILE AND REGISTRY TOOL - Maps stealth registry entries to allow user to directly edit both visible and hidden files – marks up in red for easy recognition - Allows the user to modify or delete hidden and locked files and registry entries individually or in batches to improve efficiency - ACCESSED THROUGH ADVANCED TOOLS WINDOW, TO BE USED WITH ASSISTANCE OF PC TOOLS CUSTOMER SUPPORT TEAM
INSTALLATION NOTES Run the installer as normal with all defaults. - Note: the installer package will download the latest full signature database from PC Tools during the install process to ensure that PC Tools Internet Security's protection is as strong as possible immediately after install. Subsequent automatic signature updating is incremental and requires significantly less network bandwidth. - Register PC Tools Internet Security with the supplied Name and License Code, by inserting the details provided. Following successful registration, PC Tools recommends checking for updates such that features only available to registered users, including advanced real-time protection and threat removal, are fully activated and updated. Upon completion of the installation: - PC Tools Internet Security will ask if the currently connected network can be trusted. For maximum security, PC Tools recommends that "Untrusted" setting (default) be selected if there is any uncertainty over the current network. - Immediately after installation PC Tools Internet Security will ask whether to commence an Intelli-Scan™ (quick scan) to detect running malware. PC Tools recommends selecting not to run Intelli-Scan for review purposes. - On heavily infected test systems, PC Tools Internet Security may not install correctly or may install particularly slowly due to malware specifically targeting the installer application and/or network connection interference. In this case, PC Tools recommends installing in "Safe Mode with Networking" (Press F8 on boot). Furthermore, some deeply imbedded malware can run automatically even in Safe Mode, therefore installation may fail in Safe Mode with Networking. In this case, PC Tools recommends booting from PC Tools' Alternate Operating System Scanner, cleaning all detected malware then re-installing PC Tools Internet Security after an additional reboot. Note: Alternate Operating System Scanner is linux -based and designed for non-virtual operation. Virtual machine systems, in particular those tuned for Windows guest operating systems only, may require custom tweaking.
SCANNING NOTES PC Tools recommends selecting Full Scan when testing known-infected PCs. As with install, pre-existing malware may interfere with smooth scan operation: if scans pause for more than one minute or if malware is still present after the scan, PC Tools recommends rebooting in either Safe Mode & then running a scan, running PC Tools Threat Removal Tool from ‘Tools’, or booting from the Alternate Operating System Scanner CD. PC Tools Internet Security has four different types of on-demand scan: o Intelli-Scan™: Quick scan that checks running processes and commonly infected locations o Full Scan: Comprehensive scan of all local drives o Custom Scan: For advanced users. Enables manual activation and/or deactivation of scanners and manual selection of folders to scan. Userconfigurable scanners include browser scanner, MBR scanner, file scanner, registry scanner and more. o Right-click (context) scan: Included for user convenience. Scans selected file(s) or folder(s) with File Scanner
SUPPORT NOTES Personalised support is available from: - Stuart Sang, Product Manager (
[email protected]) - Richard Clooke, PR Manager (
[email protected]) Customer support is accessible from http://www.pctools.com/support/ - Standard support - free for everyone - Comprehensive online product manuals o http://www.pctools.com/internet-security/help - Community forum: http://www.pctools.com/forum - Email support:
[email protected] - Online knowledge base: http://www.pctools.com/contact/support/ - Premium support - free for licensed users only - Phone support: http://www.pctools.com/support/phone/ - Live chat support: http://www.pctools.com/support/chat/ - License & support ticket management: https://secure.pctools.com/myaccount/
