For some time Norton security products have been slowing down every PC they're installed on. Some performance improvements started to appear in the 2008 products range but it's taken another year to make things adequate. Not only does the new NIS 2009 install in about a minute but its CPU and memory usage are down. Both scan speeds and boot times are significantly reduced. Updates are shorter but much more frequent.

 

System requirements

Interface

Norton Internet Security 2009 has a glossier user interface (UI), is streamlined and simplified with users having to contend with three categories - Computer, Internet and Identity. Most security tasks happen in the background during idle time, entirely without user intervention. The installation takes a minute and a half; activation takes another minute; and the initial LiveUpdate of malware definitions requires one more minute.

Performance

2009-year edition of the suite is all about performance. The main window includes a big CPU usage meter that tracks separately system’s and Norton’s specific usage. This helps to track the source of the problem when the system bogs down.

Downloading new virus definitions or scanning for malware occurs only when the system is idle. A link above the CPU meter opens a chart of CPU and memory usage over the last 90 minutes. Another link below the same meter launches Norton Insight tool which identifies files that don't have to be scanned and speeds up the scanning performance that way. If the full system check is not forced by the user, it completes the analysis during idle time. Norton's LiveUpdate runs every 8 hours; however, "pulse updates" feature checks for new malware signatures every few minutes.

Boot time measurement using a script that identifies when the system is ready with no security suite running showed almost 60 seconds. Security suite added 15 seconds to a boot time - about the same as KIS 2009.

Real-time anti-malware inspection usually slows file operations. A series of file move and copy operations with and without the suite installed showed that Norton adds less than 5 percent to the time (just as KIS 2009 did), about 25 percent to the time required for a massive set of zip and unzip tasks (ZoneAlarm doubles the time, and BitDefender's performance is even worse) and impressive 13 percent (average) to the time required to fully load a big and busy home page (65% for Kaspersky and 30% for ZoneAlarm).

E-mail downloads take twice as long with the spam filter active (5 - 6 times slower for BitDefender, 20 times slower for F-Secure). Installing the suite slows down installation and uninstallation of several large Windows Installer packages: It took about 25 percent longer; but complete audio-file format conversions are hardly affected at all.

Antivirus

Independent antivirus testing labs, like West Coast and ICSA Labs, all certify the effectiveness of Symantec's antivirus technology for both detection, cleaning and Trojan detection. Virus Bulletin has not been a problem for Symantec since 1999. European lab AV-Comparatives tested the 2008 edition's ability to detect and remove known malware as well as to proactively detect malware without using signatures. AV-Comparatives rated it Advanced+ (the top rating) for signature-based detection but just Standard (the lowest passing grade) for proactive detection. It's possible, though, that the 2009 edition would score better. AV-Test, another European lab, tested both the 2008 and 2009 editions in August and rated them in a dozen significant areas. The 2008 edition received Satisfactory, Good, or Very Good on all tests, with Very Good being the highest rating. The 2009 edition ranked Good or Very Good in every category.

Norton's antivirus scans files on access, on demand, and on schedule. The scheduled scan is turned off by default, because real-time protection and the automatic idle-time scan render it unnecessary. For added protection Norton scans incoming and outgoing e-mail messages and attachments as well as files received via supported instant-messaging clients.

Installation of Norton on a system infected with malicious software of many types doesn't require a reboot. That post-install reboot is a stumbling block for many suites. If a kernel-mode malware sample is partially disabled, the system may crash on reboot before antivirus can take control over it.

Full scan takes longer if compared with competitors. However, the rescan is much faster due to the fact that unchanged files are not scanned repeatedly.

Most threats are quarantined automatically during the scan process. Other threats get removed at the end of the scan, due to requirement to close any open programs. In a number of cases, the scan reported that full cleanup would occur after reboot, but as long as the malware was completely deactivated it did not insist on rebooting immediately.

Norton leaves few traces of malware after system clean-up. About 40 percent of the samples were completely removed during the test. The program scored 9.3 out of 10 points. Only Spyware Doctor with AntiVirus 6 did better (9.8 points). Among this year's suites, Kaspersky previously had the best score with 8.0. ZoneAlarm swallows the dust with its 6.7 points. Besides, Norton beat all the competitors on a test using commercial keyloggers (9.5 out of 10). Norton's successfully keeps malware out of a clean system when attempt to install the same set of malware samples is made. The change of malware filenames doesn’t change the situation.

Fishing Protection

The Norton blocks about 90 percent of the verified phishing URLs; it is quite good if compared with IE7 (caught almost 75 percent of them) and Firefox (close to 60 percent). It's clear that Norton's anti-phishing protection goes significantly beyond what's built into the browser, but the result is not so impressive if compared with Norton’s competitors. Beta feature called Norton Safe Web integrates with the Norton toolbar in your browser and extends its protection beyond just phishing. The feature is offered for installation at the time the Norton is installed. It resembles McAfee's SiteAdvisor Plus designed to block access to dangerous pages. Safe Web focuses on sites that host malware or exploits and blocks three quarters of them. The site-blocking features in ZoneAlarm and Spyware Doctor only caught about 40 percent of those sites, so Norton's beta feature looks pretty good.

Support

Help is available in all kinds of ways. You can work through Web-based troubleshooting guides, request help via e-mail, use live chat to contact a support agent, or talk on the phone. Best of all, it's free, even phone support. There is still a fee-based premium support level, but it is required only when the system has glitches unrelated to Norton that must be fixed to let Norton install or run properly.
Over the years there were plenty of complaints about Symantec support, most aimed at phone support. Some users object to the cost, others complain about difficulty understanding the support agents. The 2009 edition support is all free now, and, in any case, live chat with remote control is much easier on the user than phone support.

Firewall

Norton's firewall easily passed standard barrage of port-scan attacks and other Web-based attacks. Norton puts the ports in stealth mode so that no ports are exposed to attack; That's a good thing, but most Firewalls can do the same.

The difference confines to the way the programs are controlled. Programs control keeps programs on your system protected from abusing access to the Internet or network. Norton handles program control completely on its own. It watches the behavior of any unknown programs and blocks them only if their actions appear malicious. To be fair, ZoneAlarm (the original too-many-questions firewall) has all but eliminated those confusing queries in its latest edition.

Norton's exploit-blocking ability was tested on the system using the Core Impact penetration tool. The results were stellar. Norton blocked and identified by name all but one of the sample exploits; the other one was blocked by Auto-Protect. Some exploits just fail, because the system is fully up to date; Norton identified even these.

This firewall covers all the bases: It keeps hackers out, prevents programs from misusing the Internet, and actively blocks sites that try to exploit vulnerabilities in your operating system or applications. Unlike previous editions NIS 2009 carefully protects its system files from modifications or shut downs.

Spam Protection

Spam protection is no more an add-on and is now built into the main product. It filters incoming POP3 e-mail and integrates with Outlook and Outlook Express only (drawback). The spam protection automatically diverts spam to a Norton AntiSpam folder and adds a toolbar button for marking specific messages as spam or not spam. Those using other e-mail clients should create a spam folder and an appropriate message rule.
The product supports white and black lists of senders. Mail from white-listed senders will never be blocked. There is a possibility to adjust the sensivity of the spam filter to catch more/less spam (and probably more/less valid mail as well). AutoBlock is turned on by default. Mail delivery crashed repeatedly during the test, aborting the e-mail download. The problem was solved by turning off the e-mail antivirus protection. Even though, the sorted e-mail messages were analyzed and the results were not much different from those obtained during the NIS 2008 test: more than a third of valid personal mail was in the spam folder. Moreover, the current edition missed nearly 30 percent of undeniable spam. As a result it is advisable to use Cloudmark, iHateSpam, or SPAMfighter.

Identity Protection

Norton's Identity Safe feature is a password-protected safe way to store credentials and log in automatically. It also fills Web forms with your predefined personal data. The first time you use Identity Safe, it prompts you to define an overall password. During installation Identity Safe offers to import credentials from IE. By default, Identity Safe requires the password the first time you use it in a given Windows session. The form-filling feature is also offered by the NIS but it requires the creation of an identity card which includes general information like name, birth date, and gender.

Parental Control

Symantec doesn't include parental control in the suite's standard installation package. However, it can be easily located and installed by clicking a link followed by detailed instructions. The Installation requires a reboot and a 20MB Live-Update session before it is ready to use.
Norton defines profiles for adult, teen, and child users, similar to Kaspersky and F-Secure. Unlike the other two, Norton allows custom profiles, so you could actually define separate settings for each child. But, also, unlike the other two it offers no control over when or how long the kids can use the Internet. Norton logs all sites blocked for users under the teen and child profiles. Parental-control feature is completely browser-independent.  The feature cannot be fooled by using an unsupported browser.

Norton's parental-control is limited in scope. It doesn't offer the Internet time-control feature found in Kaspersky, F-Secure, and BitDefender. But at least it does its one task wel.

Privacy Protection

Norton's Privacy Control comes as an add-on pack. The feature allows recording private information and prevents its leakage via Web forms, outgoing SMTP e-mail, or supported instant-messaging clients. The sensitive data is available to anybody who has the privacy/parental password. When privacy control detects that private data is about to be transmitted, Norton pops up an alert and asks for permission to use the data. In this case no password is required, so that the information is not completely protected. If the user chooses to block the data – it is replaced with asterisks.

Conclusion

Norton Internet Security 2009 represents an improved product compared to its predecessor. Security became more robust where it counts and responsiveness was improved considerably (less intrusive than Norton 360, sometimes it's hard to tell if NIS 2009 is running). The protection it offers is hard to beat though its antispam is useless and the parental controls are rudimentary. Overall conclusion: Highly Recommended!