TrendProtect - new protection from bad search results
review from ClifNotes, Jul 2007, permalink Security Tools
Mindblower recently mentioned a fairly new safe searching tool for the IE and Firefox browsers. He's very knowledgeable about web security so I thought I'd take a look at it.
Message from Mindblower:
To anyone still using SiteAdvisor. A newer product TrendProtect (from Trend Micro) is far superior in providing site feedback. Only one of the two functioning on your computer. Having used SA in the past, it's ancient history for me, Mindblower!
This week, my wife, Respect2Glory, had some troubles with her SiteAdvisor plugin. I sometimes see plugin issues for a short time after Firefox sends out an update, so I'm guessing that's what the problem was. I saw this as an opportunity and asked her to try out TrendProtect instead. She downloaded TrendProtect and installed it with no problems we could detect.
TrendProtect is a browser plugin similar to SiteAdvisor and CallingId. Each service has it's strong and weak points. TrendProtect is most similar to SiteAdvisor and here's a quick comparison of TP versus SA.
+ TP rates individual pages not just a domain
- TP doesn't rate downloads or check for spam emails
- TP doesn't tell you why a site is flagged
- TP has no site summary with user comments or explanations by the site owner
If I was a big user of sites like MySpace or other user generated websites, I might consider TP because it rates each page based on it's content. SA rates only the domain as a whole and doesn't have individual ratings on each page in a site.
I'm sorry Mindblower. I don't see any good reason to switch to TrendProtect. I find too much value in the site summaries at SiteAdvisor.com. I can still get those without the SA plugin, but it only takes a single click with SA installed.
Quote from the website
TrendProtect is a FREE browser plug-in that helps you avoid Web pages with unwanted content and hidden threats. TrendProtect rates the current page and pages listed in Google, MSN, and Yahoo search results. You can use the rating to decide if you want to visit or avoid a given Web page.
http://www.trendsecure.com/portal/en-US/free_security_tools/trendprotect.php
