Avast Internet Security 6 Reviews

Pros
I want to talk with a human.
Cons
I am NOT happy about having to sign up with CNET just to talk with AVAST (which I pay for).

Pros
There is nothing to recommend this product.
Cons
I purchased a one year subscription for Avast on Oct. 25th 2011 for $39.95 (now priced at $29.95 on their website today) and keep getting notices that my subscription has lapsed and must pay again! There is no one to call, no email address for customer support and I’m thoroughly disgusted. I want a refund!

I purchased Avast! Internet Security through Element 5 of Digital River. I am sorry not to have purchased it through Amazon because I am certain I would have been able to receive a refund! I purchased the 2-year subscription service thinking I was getting a good deal. However, it is not a good deal when you find that you do not like the product. I called Element 5 for a refund (that would have been well within the time if I had simply gotten a trial version). Avast! through Element 5 would not refund my money. Do not purchase through these companies unless you are certain that you like the product! I will not deal with Avast! again!!!

Pros
Once you get it going it is pretty good. BUT if I had known what it would cost me I would have just kept the free one. That is what I get for feeling guilty about a free year.
Cons
I signed up on line on 1/1/2011 & it took 10+ calls to iYogi, the install program people.iYogi poor poor compny. I was on the phone 4 hrs & still not get it installed. They jacked my Windws Progrm. I was down 4 wks had to hire private IT guy to fix.
Summary
I would not recommend the Avast program that you pay for. I had to end up hiring a local IT person to come in and it took him 2 visits to get my computer back to working condition after iYogi (the install people Avast hires) got done with me. My IT guy finally got Avast going but I will have to think long and hard about paying them another years subscription. I will go back to the free Avast. I complained to Avast about what happened to me but they just blew me off, saying they don’t have anything to do with the install people. What a crock. Avast hires these jokers that you can hardly understand and that do not have a clue as to what they are doing. The iYogi guy wanted to sell me his service and I swear he screwed my computer up because I would not sign up with them. Avast just turn their back on you, saying they have nothing to do with the install and the install people just say too bad. I am still disappointed about the whole thing.

Pros
Easy to install, easy to use. Does not seem to slow Win 7 or XP systems down noticeably. Background updates. Webpage advisor.
Cons
Missed a virus recently.
Summary
I liked this with its features and ease of use until recently (about 1 year after we began using it), it caught some viruses. It couldn’t “fix” the files, but it did “remove” them. After the removal, it said it needed to reboot and do a boot scan. It never fully recovered from that as the virus apparently took over all permissions for executables, rendering the laptop virtually useless. Fortunately, I have a neighbor who was able to get it up and going again – after 2 days of working on it.
Needless to say, my euphoria for Avast has faded quickly after this experience. Can I be sure that another brand would have fared better? No, but I do know for a fact that Avast didn’t perform in this case.

Pros
-Very good detection rates.
-Very light on system resources.
-User Friendly – Doesn’t burden me with tons of unnecessary pop-ups.
-Decent Disinfection capabilities. Sometimes it left executable files behind.
-Download checking: Caught almost all the viruses the moment they were downloaded.. 1 or 2 it caught using proactive methods.
-Very customizable; Good detail when reporting.
-Self Protection; I could not shut down the Anti-Virus or the Firewall components.
-The Anti-Spam component is good, but not great.
-The Virtualization Feature works good.
-Not very many false positives.
-User-Friendly Firewall; very quiet and doesn’t bother me.
-Safezone provided a little peace-of-mind as things could not penetrate its security.
-Web Reputation was fairly accurate, but I still see a-lot of grey ratings.
-Web-Site blocking allowed me to define a custom black-list; Wish it had more comprehensive parental controls.. but still good.
Cons
-The Firewall component is very leaky. Even in Public Zone Mode, it allows hackers to see my NETBIOS Name and my Media Access Control (MAC) Address. (This is very bad.)
-It didn’t always remove the malware.. sometimes It would leave enough traces behind to where another avast scan would report malware.. when there was no malware.
-The Behavior Shield doesn’t seem to be doing anything.. Auto-Decide mode really just seems to be another “Allow All” button.
-By Default, the program is not in it’s most optimal settings, in ex. (PUP detection is disabled by default.)
-Sometimes when upgrading the license from free – Internet security.. will not register it’s firewall component in Windows Security Center.
-Sandbox still has quite a few bugs. Some malware escaped being Sandboxed.
-Applications can-not peek into Safezone, but a computer can be hacked using safe zone. All you need to do is crack the Chromium-based browser code.
Summary
The Anti-Malware Component, the Anti-Spam Component, and the Web-Reputation Features are the best things about avast! Internet Security. The Firewall though proved to be good at stopping hack-attacks.. but it doesn’t do a good job of protecting my privacy. When I did seperate firewall benchmarks between Avast! Firewall and (for testing purposes) Online Armor Firewall.. avast! Revealed my NetBios data to hackers, my MAC Address, and even revealed my Internal IP Address.

I worry about this because if a hacker can see my MAC Address, then it means that avast’s firewall is not protecting my critical hardware infrastructure from attack and that means that there is still a way to bypass it.

A MAC Address is a unique 48 digit number/letter code (a-f, and #’s) that identify the hardware I use to connect to the internet. If a hacker can see this, there’s still too many holes.

Online Armor However did not let even a shred of my private information get picked up by any third parties. All my Windows Networking Data, my NetBIOS data, and my MAC Address.. were completely hidden from hackers. The Anti-Virus that came with it though was inadequate.. but the firewall component beats avast!’s easily.

One more concern: I was able to stop the netBIOS leak by disabling it under my TCP/IP settings in my connection.. but all that does is instructs port 139 to close. A firewall should be default protect that data from being seen.

That is my summary: There are some serious problems with the Firewall component that the avast! developers really need to fix before a way to exploit the hardware bug is found.