Norton Internet Security 2011 Download:

Most of Norton Internet Security 2011's new features are enhancements to existing functionality. The exception is Norton Safe Web for Facebook, available from the Scan menu off of the Dashboard. With a single click, Norton scans your Facebook Wall for any links that lead to malicious Web sites, and removes them on your behalf. Given the prevalence of Facebook-based scams, this is a welcome addition to Norton's suite of protections.

Several other features have received major upgrades. In its previous version, Norton Internet Security kept track of the reputation score of files, which it calculated based on the file's trust level, its age, and its prevalence on other computers. Norton Internet Security 2011 adds Reputation Scan, which can provide a reputation report for either your full system hard drive, or select files and folders on your local disks.

Finally, Norton has greatly increased the scope of Download Insight, which scans file downloads for malware. Download Insight now supports every major browser (including Chrome, Safari and Opera), most chat/Instant Messaging platforms (Google, MSN, Yahoo, etc.), major e-mail clients, and the most popular peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing clients.

Besides its bevy of automatic protections against both known and unknown threats, Norton provides a number of utilities to safeguard against malicious data and Web sites. The Safe Web feature (available by clicking Safe Web on the bottom right of the Dashboard) enables users to review safety reports on Web sites prior to visiting them.

Norton places a premium on system performance. Its Performance tab displays how many resources it is using relative to the rest of the system, and also measures spikes in CPU and memory usage caused by other applications. If an application starts hogging too many resources, Norton will produce a System Tray pop-up.

One feature we found disappointing was Norton's Online Family, which is available from the Dashboard by selecting the Parental Controls link. In order to monitor family Internet activity, you must sign up for Online Family on the Norton Web site using your Norton.com log in, and then download the Norton Safety Minder application. This seemed senseless, especially considering that Norton's rival Kaspersky includes a rich set of parental controls directly in Kaspersky Internet Security 2011.

Sandbox execution is a feature offered by Norton's competitors, but lacking in Norton itself. Kaspersky's Safe Run or Avast's Sandbox can both execute potentially malicious applications in a limited execution environment, which limits the damage they can inflict. Norton seems to rely more on a combination of quarantining dangerous files, performing pro-active scanning, and providing reputation reports to users.