Labs

PC-cillin Internet Security 14 combines Trend's desktop anti-virus scanner with a bundle of other utilities, including a firewall that has impressed us before with its simple interface and powerful set of features.

The program offers to disable the Windows firewall. The default protection settings secure the PC from any incoming connections. It's not hard to allow some incoming traffic, though, by lowering the security level to Low.

A profile management screen lets you choose

ADVERTISEMENT

customised security settings for different situations, such as when you're safely connected behind a hardware firewall at home; at work, where you may need access to file servers; and on a direct connection that has no extra protection.

Granting access to the web server was easy and, while you can force a website rule to work only with IIS, we simply opened port 80. The program quietly logged our normal port scans, which is good, and went mad when it detected our web probes, throwing up lots of pop-up alerts. Such an effective IDS is admirable, and you can be sure you won't miss serious attacks on your site.

The Exceptions settings handle application control and should feel familiar to anyone who has used the built-in Windows firewall. PC-cillin's system has more options, though.

The firewall's mixture of simple controls and flexible settings makes this a handy tool both for newcomers and experts. It also comes with a capable anti-virus program. It costs more to renew than Steganos's suite, though, and its anti-virus protection is not quite as strong.