By Rob Pegoraro
Sunday, June 18, 2006
Depending on how you feel about Microsoft, its new Windows Live OneCare security service either amounts to a welcome helping hand or a particularly sleazy protection racket.
If you place yourself in the latter group -- if you think nothing justifies paying Microsoft to fix its own mistakes -- you might as well stop reading now. (But then you should rethink using Microsoft software at all if you trust the company that little; Linux isn't that hard, and a Mac isn't that expensive.)
If, however, you'll grant Microsoft the right to compete for the money you might otherwise spend on a security suite from Symantec, McAfee, Trend Micro or another vendor, OneCare deserves a look.
Like other all-in-one security packages, the $49.95-a-year, Windows XP-only OneCare aims to provide the software equivalent of an in-home cleaning service: You pay to have somebody show up and make the problems go away.
OneCare's cleaning crew consists of five programs: an anti-virus utility, a firewall to stop break-in attempts, the Windows Defender spyware remover (also available as a separate, free download), a system tune-up tool and a file-backup application.
Microsoft sells OneCare in stores but offers a 90-day free trial of the service, with no credit card required, from its Web site ( http://onecare.live.com/ ). Downloaded copies of OneCare installed successfully on two computers, but the experience had its shaky moments.
First, this Web setup requires using Internet Explorer, then downloading and running an ActiveX program in that browser -- exactly the sort of insecure conduct you should avoid. The ActiveX download checks your system for conflicting software, but it doesn't always give useful advice. On an old ThinkPad laptop, it incorrectly referred to CA's eTrust Personal Firewall as "ZoneAlarm." (The eTrust firewall is based on Zone Labs' software, but how many non-IT types know that?)
After a restart, the only sign of OneCare in normal use was a small green blob at the bottom right of the screen, indicating that computer's security state was "good."
OneCare's anti-virus component is equally low-key, automatically updating its database every day but keeping out of sight until you download or try to open a virus. In some cases, it blocks virus downloads before they even start; in others, you may be able to land a virus on the hard drive, but OneCare still won't let it do anything.
Unless, that is, it doesn't know about a virus. Of three that arrived Friday, OneCare didn't catch any in a spot check ordered up via the "Scan for viruses . . ." command it adds to the Windows desktop's right-click menu. It recognized and stopped one of them after it was double-clicked -- but let the other two begin infecting the machine.
OneCare's firewall is about as simple to operate as the one built into Windows XP. But in addition to stopping unwanted break-in attempts from the Internet, it polices all online access by programs on your computer: Only programs that it recognizes as legitimate, plus others you specify, are allowed to connect to the Internet.
In practice, that added defense will probably help only if you already have spyware or a virus loose on your machine. The rest of the time, it can be a nuisance if the firewall keeps asking if programs X, Y and Z may connect to the Internet. OneCare's list of allowed software only partially minimizes that work; it omits such well-known programs as Corel's WordPerfect X3 suite, the Mozilla Thunderbird mail program and Google Pack's updater.
Windows Defender, the spyware-removal part of OneCare, has changed little since its second test release earlier this year. It can tame all the background programs that run each time Windows boots up and should block most of the hidden, malicious applications lurking inside some "free" downloads.
But it hasn't been stitched into OneCare in the most obvious way: You can't check a new download for spyware as well as viruses in one command.
OneCare's tune-up and backup components represent the dullest knives in its drawer. Tune-up automates only chores already performed by Windows or OneCare -- for instance, cleaning up excess files, defragmenting the hard drive and checking for missing Microsoft updates. It doesn't even touch Windows' stickier problems, such as scrubbing out the system registry.
The backup tools in OneCare work well only if you have the right hardware -- an external hard drive eight gigabytes or larger, required for automatic backups. It can copy your files to a recordable CD or DVD, but not on a regular schedule, and it doesn't accept USB flash drives or online file storage.
OneCare's backup software helpfully gathers files and settings by category: "Financial files," "Music files," "Picture files" and so on. Its default selections cover files produced by most popular applications but also skip some should-be-obvious choices: OneCare will back up your Quicken data and iTunes downloads but not Firefox bookmarks or Eudora or Thunderbird mailboxes. You can also add files and folders of your choice.
OneCare's restore procedure, however, doesn't always finish the job: It didn't put Outlook Express and Outlook files in the correct directories.
OneCare meets or beats its two best-known competitors in price -- that $49.95 covers use on three computers, while McAfee charges $70 a year for coverage of one computer. Symantec's Norton Internet Security 2006 costs $70 for a year's worth of updates, then $40 for the next year's worth. And Microsoft also provides around-the-clock tech support over the phone, while Symantec and McAfee offer help only online.
On the other hand, OneCare doesn't match the competition in features, leaving out a spam filter and parental controls.
Neither OneCare nor any other suite can replace your own healthy skepticism about strange software. If you haven't heard of the program you're about to download or the attachment you're about to open, run a Google search on its name to see if other people have been burned by it.
As is, OneCare isn't good enough to put any security suite out of business. But it should push competitors to improve the quality -- and in particular the reliability -- of their own suites. Windows users, who too often have had to fend for themselves in these matters, deserve at least that much.
Living with technology, or trying to? E-mail Rob Pegoraro atrob@twp.com.
View all comments that have been posted about this article.