Black Ice Defender

List Price: $39.99

Customer Reviews:

Works great [Posted on 2002-12-24]
As for the person with AOL, Black Ice shouldn't run with AOL. After all, AOL is constantly selling your info. anyway. Only YOU can stop that problem. I have been using Black Ice Defender for over two years now. I think this is the best firewall out there other than using a router to block ports. I have never been hacked and my PC runs 24/7. It is really easy to use and gives detailed info. on the attacks on your computer. The software even describes what the attacker is attempting to do! I highly recommend this software. It will prove to be a highly effective tool in keeping unwanted visitors out.

RUN, HIDE, BUY SOMETHING ELSE [Posted on 2003-01-21]
This is a case of tampering with a great product, and fouling it up.

The original Black Ice was wonderful. It operated quietly in the background, keeping bad guys at bay. Then they "upgraded it". They made it obtrusive and a nag, interrupting all normal computer use with nagging messages and questions. The problem is, if you set it at the highest security questions, you get nagging messages at every turn. Even if you want to open a game, offline, with broadband disconnected, you get a Black Ice pop-up.

To decrease the interruptions, you have to lower the level of security. Not a good trade-off.

Then the other day, it just went crazy and seized control of my computer, basically locking me out. No matter what I wanted to do, it shut me down. Kind of like the Matrix. I finally had to reboot and restart in safe mode to uninstall Black Ice. I've gone out and bought a new firewall program.

No Support [Posted on 2003-03-31]
This product is worthless. It says plainly on their website that they offer NO phone support. That is danger number one. It locked up my computer all four times I tried to install it. I was unable to boot. It is hard to get web support when your computer will not boot. Avoid this software.

Not for dummies. [Posted on 2003-08-29]
I've been a user of BlackICE Defender for quite some time now. I've used it for many network sercutiry jobs, and businesses in the past. In true tests I've proven to different companies the vulnerabilities of BlackICE vs. the competition.

One of the problems is that if you plan on buying this product and you belive you can just throw it onto your HDD, you will come up short with your home/office network. This product takes a bit of configuring with different ports and IP addresses. Once you've done all of this though, you have yourself a VERY good product that will not only block exploit from being run on your computer, it will simply terminate them and erase them in the progress due to it's application protection option.

BlackICE is worth every penny....if you know what you're doing with it.

Long time user, fabulous product [Posted on 2006-12-30]
I've been using different versions of BlackIce for about 3 years now, and I'm thoroughly satisfied with it, albeit with a couple of mitigatable concerns.

The first concern is the system's defaulted application protection. This should be turned off at all times, as the program will continually spam you with requests to block applications, which include such basic system processes as explorer.exe, rundll.dll, and Windows Media Player. The memory function, which is supposed to help the program learn which programs to block and which to allow, does not work, and never has. Turning this feature off is an absolute must. The other annoying feature, is the yearly subscription this thing requires for its license. I bought the **** thing, let me use it. Fortunately, this is an easy fix.

Black Ice does require a good bit of setup, as you'll have to spend time blocking off ports commonly targetted by hackers, as well as blocking ports and addresses as they are scanned or scan your computer, this does take some time, and I recommend having a second firewall setup while you 'teach' Black Ice.

Without application protection, however, the program runs quickly and smoothly in the task tray, giving you messages on the tray icon for different levels of attack activity. You can also set Black Ice to play a .wav file to alert you. It detects many different types of attacks, such as Subseven port probes, PC Anywhere port probes, syn-ack shenanigans and others, even giving you a rundown of what each attack involves via the web.

All in all, I recommend this program, but only for the computer user who is serious about taking the time to protect their data. This program is not for the faint of heart.

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