PHILADELPHIA, PA and MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA – January 20, 2010: Comcast (Nasdaq: CMCSA, CMCSK), one of the nation’s leading providers of entertainment, information and communication products and services, starting today is offering the #1 brand in Internet security, Norton from Symantec, to residential and business high-speed Internet subscribers for no additional cost. Norton Security Suite, powered by Norton 360 technology, includes PC security that protects against viruses, spyware, worms, Trojans, malicious bots, identity theft, as well as a range of customizable parental controls, which help keep children safe online and fosters communication between parents and kids. Comcast subscribers with Macintosh systems will receive Norton Internet Security for Mac.
According to Norton, a PC that does not have active and up-to-date security software can become infected within four minutes of connecting to the Internet. With the Norton Security Suite, Comcast customers can now take advantage of important Internet security features including:
* Virus scan – helps protect against viruses, bots, spyware, Trojan horses, worms and rootkits with traditional defenses and Norton’s new reputation-based security technology, which offers unmatched detection of the latest threats
* Identity theft protection – helps block phishing Web sites, guards against keyloggers and stores and protects Web passwords
* Parental control tools for family safety – an innovative approach to keeping kids safe online helps parents manage kids’ online activities, such as filters for age-appropriate Web site content, information about search terms kids are using, and information about their social networking accounts
* Two-way firewall protection – stops threats at point of entry using sophisticated behavioral security technology
* Windows protection – cleans and repairs Windows registry
* PC Tune-up – finds and fixes problems that slow your computer
* Industry-leading performance – fast and light security that will not slow down your computer
* 24/7 one-click customer support – via e-mail, chat or phone support
“Cyber threats are very real and this year we expect to see five new threats coming online every minute,” said Janice Chaffin, group president, Consumer Business Unit, Symantec. “By joining forces with Norton, Comcast can now bring world leading protection, performance and family safety offerings to its millions of customers.”
“The Internet is integral to our daily lives and online threats have become more sophisticated. Comcast continues to seek out the best partners to help protect our customers online. Whether they’re parents, individuals or business owners, each one of our customers has unique needs and concerns. So, as the leading Internet service provider in the country, we’re very pleased to provide the leading security suite from Norton to our customers,” said Cathy Avgiris, Senior Vice President of Communications and Data Services. “In addition to superior protection, the suite delivers fast performance, so it starts fast, scans fast and uses less memory on both PC and Mac.”
The Norton Security Suite, powered by Norton 360 technology, is valued at $160 for residential customers and the Norton Security Suite Business Edition is valued at up to $490 for business customers. It is available to Comcast High-Speed Internet subscribers for no additional charge in a download from the Security Channel www.comcast.net/security for residential customers and from http://businessclass.comcast.net/ for business customers.
The Norton Security Suite is a key component to Comcast’s recently announced Constant Guard Security initiative, which involves a comprehensive approach to proactively assist customers with online security issues. Comcast and Norton will also be offering customers co-branded fee-based virus removal and PC Tune-up services later this year.
The version of Norton AV/Firewall is a significant improvement over past incarnations. Previous versions had perfomance, installation (and uninstall) issues, and update problems. This was why I dumped Norton AV several years ago, but a lot of work went into this version and it works well.
This version removed McAfee, installed itself with no problem at all. It appears to run well with XP and no performance issues noted. It runs unobtrusively in the background. All I had to do was take a few minutes to disable a few of the items I never use (or plan to use).
So far a good product. I have to give it a thumbs up and worth the time to do the update.