McAfee Site Advisor Plus 2009 1-User [Old Version]

by McAfee

Product Features

• Real-time comprehensive protection from web sites that can compromise your identity and your PC
• Anti-phishing--Alerts you to web sites that may try to steal your identity
• Prevents you from going to unsafe sites through your browser, email, or instant message
• Continuous and automatic updates keep you a step ahead of ever-evolving online threats
• Fast and easy to install and use

Product Details

• Shipping Weight: 1.6 ounces
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B001EJQTUG
• Item model number: MSA09EMB1RAA
• Date first available at Amazon.com: August 22, 2008
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (47 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #14,971 in Software (See Top 100 in Software)

Product Description

Amazon.com

With the daily emergence of new and more sophisticated Internet threats that could disrupt your digital life, you need more than a simple anti-virus program to protect yourself, your computer, your identity and your family. You need McAfee SiteAdvisor Plus for comprehensive protection against risky web sites so you can safely surf, shop and bank online.

When using popular search engines, McAfee SiteAdvisor's safety ratings appear next to your search results. To see more information about the web site, roll your mouse over any SiteAdvisor safety rating. Click to enlarge.

Stay safe with instant message and email link checking. Click to enlarge.

Unique Protection that Identifies and Shields You from Risky Web Sites

Simple to Use
McAfee's set-it-and-forget-it security works in the background and lets you focus on the online activities you want to do.

Powerful, Up-to-date Protection
Continuous and automatic updates keep you a step ahead of ever-evolving online threats.

The Trusted Security Provider
McAfee has been the leading computer security company for nearly 20 years and is backed by McAfee Avert Labs, a world-class security threat research organization.

Safely Search and Transact Online
McAfee SiteAdvisor Plus provides real-time comprehensive protection from web sites that can compromise your identity and your PC. Safety ratings warn you by using simple color codes. Link checking on email and instant messages shield you from risky web sites. McAfee SiteAdvisor Plus also offers a protected mode option for enhanced web security.

Product Features

Web Site Safety Ratings
Warns you about web sites with red, yellow, and green safety ratings

Anti-phishing
Alerts you to web sites that may try to steal your identity to gain access to your financial information

Protected Mode
Prevents you from going to unsafe sites through your browser, email, or instant message

Email and IM Link Checker
Checks links in both email and instant messages

The McAfee Advantage
McAfee's security products use award-winning technology, are easy to install, and come with unlimited email and chat assistance. With continuous and automatic updates, McAfee helps ensure that you are running the most current security to combat the ever-evolving Internet threats for the duration of your subscription.

Product Description

2009 SITE ADVISOR PLUS 1U

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent watchdog for the less than tech savy., October 11, 2008

By 

Canis Majoris - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: McAfee Site Advisor Plus 2009 1-User [Old Version] (CD-ROM)

(What's this?)

I was curious about this product, since I am a faithful user of the McAfee SiteAdvisor Firefox addon, which is free.

This product installed immediately, and I couldn't find anything new that it offered me. This program acts as a surreptitious bar down on your internet browser toolbar that uses a color coded system of letting you know when you are browsing user reported safe sites or bad ones. I find this product EXTREMELY useful for all users, advanced or novice, because you never know when you do happen to stumble on a website that is loaded with viruses and spyware. This program acts as an alert to tell you which one you are in fact visting.

It doesn't take up any CPU, that I can tell, and it does have a community feature that allows you to view what others have written about the site and why they thought it was good or bad. I think maybe I would just stick with the free add on that is offered on the web versus paying for this, because I did not see anything that was new with the "Plus" program.

Regardless, I recommend everyone to have this SiteAdvisor on every computer you own, this is coming from someone who has had to format countless times because of virus and spyware absconding into depths that my virus/spyware programs couldn't find.

Great Product.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My fave mcafee product, October 9, 2008

By 

GamerGrl1974 "Missy" (Canton,Ny 13617) - See all my reviews

This review is from: McAfee Site Advisor Plus 2009 1-User [Old Version] (CD-ROM)

(What's this?)

As a person who loves doing alotta online shopping specially during our christmas season which is coming up as you can find stuff on line you can't locally. Well its important to me where i shop and how secure the transactions are. whats nice about this is it can be incorporated into firefox as well as IE. It will show a green color if the site is good safe . it will turn yellow as a warning/neutral, It will be grey if it is a site which hasn't been tested yet and red for a site thats completely unsafe and bad known to send tons of spam /phishing etc. A good point too about t his is you can click on check it and view site report and read bout what alotta other people have noticed about a particular site etc and other opinions. Here is a trick if you wanna see it in action and how it works. type in any search engine "free wii" don't we all who own one wish it was that easy to find haha. Anyhow you will come up with all those lovely sites that insist you do some work for them before you get the product if you ever do but you end up getting tons of spam and ripped off in the end. Anyhow this is a good way to test out site advisor most of those sites are in the "RED"zone which show they are bad and bogus .I love having this on my computer it keeps me from unsafe websites and keeps my online shopping experiences a pleasant one ,keep spam down to a minimum. Great product as most of mcafee's products are and this is by far my fave product that they make. I will always have it on my computer good to know what sites are good and which aren't so good. I recommend this software to everyone not just us online shoppers but to everyone who surfs the web ,etc...

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Security Blanket, September 27, 2008

By 

mateo52 "invisible man" (State College, Pa.) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: McAfee Site Advisor Plus 2009 1-User [Old Version] (CD-ROM)

(What's this?)

SUMMARY

This product is one of growing number of security options to assist the end user in early detection of web-based threats and attacks where personal information and PC security might be compromised. According to McAfee, Site Advisor Plus is compatible with many other security products offered by other vendors and will not impede system processing. The user is alerted to phishing attempts or malware risks and has the option to enable a protected mode where all interaction with program identified suspicious sites is precluded. Site Advisor Plus is an enhancement to another product - one that is free - McAfee has had on the market for a few years. There are questions regarding the true utility of this version, in as much as many competitive Security Suites like Norton 360 which I use, already integrate similar capabilities, numerable browsers and search engines have built-in options that offer the similar forms of protection. There are also several freeware products that may be equally as effective. Overall, I felt Site Advisor could be a useful addition for those who are particularly sensitive regarding security however it failed to offer demonstrative added value for me over capabilities already available in my security suite in conjunction with the free functionality already existent in many browsers.

INSTALLATION

The end user agreement is one of the most restrictive I recall ever reading, requiring that the installer knowingly authorize debiting of a credit card 30 days prior to the expiration of the license term without any sort of advice from McAfee of the impending renewal charge. Software updates are not automatically included. Once the EULA has been accepted and installation begins, the program does not include a cancel option. An active internet connection is required for installation and utilization, and although not specifically stated, for completion of the key step of product registration.

There is a screen message indicating the software checks for compatibility issues before proceeding but I'm not convinced the process is valid for all vendor security suites and security products. Some products like One Care, specifically state Site Advisor is not compatible. As noted above, I have Norton 360, which is notorious for incompatibility issues, including with other Symantec products but I have not encountered any problems to date. This software has a paucity of supporting documentation, and McAfee's web site is of little assistance here. It appears to be the only McAfee product lacking a manual and the only provided documentation beyond the packaging verbiage is a flimsy quarter page quick start guide.

The install itself takes only a few minutes but it does not offer any advice to the restart the computer and it appeared to me the software would not function without that effort. The realization the software seems invisible, not appearing under installed programs, failure to provide a desktop icon or quick launch option on for the tray is a bit unnerving. But, it is clearly initiated as part of your startup routines and can be removed via XP/Vista control panel options. It is added to the GUI for explorer and Firefox and appears in gray tint until active on a specific web page or search. It's reasonably unobtrusive taking up less than 7MB of disk space and only uses around 2.5 Mb of memory. I did not notice any significant degradation of response time regardless of the browser or search utility employed.

The install procedure also infers registration is not required but my results indicate local installation can be completed but activation will not occur until the product is registered with McAfee. I installed on two computers, one with XP Pro with SP3 where I was unable to register the product via Firefox because the link was not recognized and on another with Vista Ultimate where I registered via IE7. In order to get it to work on each computer I did have to duplicate the registration process. Curiously, notwithstanding the EULA agreement I accepted, the process does not require any financial information so the annual renewal fee at conclusion of the first year should interesting. The agreement is somewhat of a semantics debate in as much as the software is labeled as "one user" as opposed to "one PC" which is actually what McAfee states is the intended use. Additional licenses can be purchased but I installed on two PCs without doing so.

OPERATION:

From appearances and integration, the product appears to have originally been developed for IE explorer and expanded to support Firefox where it is recognized as an add-on, but it works equally as well with either browser. To date, it is not compatible with Opera, Safari or Google Chrome. I did not try Flock, I already have enough junk on my hard drive. Yahoo has already integrated Site Advisor with its' search mechanisms so the scan results there are somewhat different than the checkmark patterns with the other facilities. With Ask.com and Live Search the color coded system is also visible and from what I can determine the program does not work with AOL, Lycos, About.com or Dogpile. Metacrawler and Webcrawler are automatically identified as caution sites before any searches are commenced.

Effectiveness is subjective. Site Advisor is not a real time application where live results are analyzed as is the case with some other vendors' products. Instead the product accesses a database of questionable sites maintained and updated on McAfee servers, and a number of websites and search responses will not return any results. One of my concerns is individual users can offer information about sites via webpage interface and the input information may be skewed as a result.

Under supported browsers and search engines, results are indicated by three color key code: Green indicative of safe sites or links, Yellow where the site may have minor security issues and Red, where McAfee has determined the site employs fraudulent practices. Additional information is obtainable by running the cursor over the indicator and the user may also access the Site Advisor web page for even more information. Prospective downloads can be submitted for individual analysis.

Via the Site Advisor button that is added to supported browsers, the user has the option to change software settings, add sites to an exclusion list, disable the program or enable the protected mode.

I tested by disabling redundant facilities under my browsers and existing security software nd I did not find any significant improvement in results but that may reflect my reluctance to explore really dangerous links.