Best Free Utilities and Security Apps
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Great Free Software Downloads
A word to the wise: All of these downloads should work with Windows 7, and most will work with earlier versions of Windows, too; but always double-check the OS and system requirements of a program before making a home for it in your computer's memory. It's also not a bad idea to make a full-system backup and create a new system restore point before installing each new program.
Utilities
7-Zip: Available in 32-bit and 64-bit versions, 7-Zip can compress and decompress WinZip-compatible AES-encrypted .zip files. That capability is vital if you need to email sensitive data, because the .zip format's standard password protection (the only kind that Windows supports) is notoriously easy to crack. 7-Zip also allows you to compress and email files in one easy step. It even has its own compression format, though you should probably stick with the .zip format to avoid compatibility issues. Unlike WinZip, 7-Zip can't compress a .zip file into an .exe file. But for most compression tasks, 7-Zip performs the job quite well.
Security
CyberGhost VPN Free: Concerned that when you're connected at a public hotspot, such as at a café, a hacker can intercept everything you send and receive--including passwords and other personal information? Give CyberGhost VPN Free a try. This program creates a virtual private network connection when you're on the Internet, replacing your normal IP address with a CyberGhost IP address and connecting you to anonymization servers for further protection. Once you've connected, you are anonymous online. The free version of CyberGhost VPN works for only 6 hours at a time or for 1GB of downloads at a time, whichever comes first. You'll get disconnected after that, though you can immediately relaunch it.
TrackMeNot: Bing, Google, Yahoo, and a number of other search engines create profiles of you based on the terms you enter. To counter this, TrackMeNot--a Firefox and Chrome add-on--inundates the engines with a blizzard of search terms so that they can't build a practical customized profile of you. The add-on generates the terms from RSS feeds, including those of CNN and NYTimes.com. TrackMeNot gives you considerable control over how you use it, including which search engines to send the searches to and how many searches to perform per hour.
Avast Free Antivirus: In our recent malware scanner tests, Avast Free Antivirus detected 94.8 percent of the samples we threw at it, which is neither particularly good nor especially bad. But Avast Free Antivirus was the only free product we looked at that didn't falsely identify a single safe file as a piece of malware. With fast scan speeds and low impact on PC performance, Avast is the most well-rounded free antivirus software program out there.
Great Free Software Downloads
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