Symantec Intros Vista Security Software

By NewsFactor Network | November 29, 2006

This week, Symantec released public betas of Norton Internet Security and Norton AntiVirus for Windows Vista. The betas work on both 32- and 64-bit versions of Vista, itself in beta until Steve Ballmer, Microsoft’s CEO, formally unveils Vista on Thursday at an invitation-only event in New York.

Microsoft also plans to formally introduce new versions of Office and Exchange, its corporate e-mail solution, at that time.

Symantec’s new betas are meant for consumers, not companies. The Norton Internet Security application is designed to protect end users against a range of online threats, including adware, hacking, phishing, and spyware, as well as virus attacks and worms, which infest a user’s computer, then replicate and spread to other machines.

Consumers Only

Norton Internet Security also guards against crimeware, or malicious code that promotes financial crimes such as identity theft, which ranks among the fastest-growing forms of Internet threats.

As the name implies, Norton AntiVirus is smaller in scope, protecting computers against virus attacks only. Symantec intends to release final versions of both programs when Microsoft rolls out the consumer version of Vista in January of next year — although much-publicized delays have left Microsoft’s self-imposed launch date in question.

In a written statement, Symantec’s Rowan Trollope, vice president for consumer engineering, said the firm wants “to reassure our more than 50 million active users” that Symantec’s products will function with Vista as soon as it becomes available.

PatchGuard Problems?

Trollope’s comments fed into a larger debate — one begun by Symantec, McAfee, and other top-tier security firms — over access to Vista’s kernel, or core code.

In October, leading security firms claimed their software would not fully protect users’ computers unless Microsoft gave them access to Vista’s kernel. Microsoft declined, and continues to block access to Vista’s kernel with a system called PatchGuard, which keeps programs like Symantec’s antivirus tools…

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