Being properly secure

I have spent years trying to keep the defences up on the computers and network in our household and currently have the freeware versions of ZoneAlarm, Microsoft Security Essentials, Ad-Aware, Spybot and Malwarebytes on each machine with one or other of the programs running a full scan during the night.

Now that each of the vendors is widening the scope of their programs to include capabilities which were previously the province of another stand-alone program, do I need all of those separate bits of software, or can I rely on the enhanced capabilities now being offered to slim things down and rely on fewer but more wide-ranging bits of software? And if so, which to keep and which to bin?

I am sure there is enough knowledge here to help me, so any advice gratefully received.

Edited by GonePostal (Mon 14-May-12 11:16:03)

Ad-Aware and Spybot are not what they used to be and should be replaced by MBAM and/or SuperAntiSpyware. Another useful tool is Javacool's SpywareBlaster.
Zone Alarm, again, is not what it used to be whilst I certainly wouldn't trust MSE. Comodo Internet Security is a very effective combined AV/firewall.
Turning off any unnecessary services and uninstalling any unwanted Windows components etc will almost certainly enhance performance as well as security.

All of the software listed below is free:
MBAM
SuperAntispyware
SpywareBlaster
Comodo Internet Security

You need to reduce the paranoia level - the system isn't as insecure as you think.

I run a single security product on my machines, either GFI VIPRE or Forefront/System Center Endpoint Protection (the enterprise edition of Microsoft Security Essentials), some of my servers don't have any antivirus on them.

On the firewall side of things - the built in Windows one.

At the very least I'd get rid of Ad-Aware, and probably Spybot -- remember to reverse all the settings it screws with (Immunizations I think it calls them) before uninstalling!

As a side note have you ever actually had malware on your machine?

Thanks for the advice.

I've been doing a bit of digging and delving and the bench mark tests I have seen quoted give very little difference in performance between Comodo and MSE so maybe MSE gets a bad rap just because of origins.

In regard to the paranoia bit, the only reports we see are the odd tracking cookie which one of the defences picks up. I can't recollect ever having any significant malware. However, the paranoid part of me says that this is because of all the defences we have not because it isn't out there.

However, AdAware has gone and I suspect that SPybot will not be far behind.

I install MSE on all the machines which I repair, never had an issue and clients seem pleased with its detection rate and unobtrusiveness.