AVG Internet Security 9.0

AVG Free provides the bare necessities when it comes to security, but that should be enough for savvy Windows users. You'll get a combined antivirus and antimalware engine, LinkScanner, and e-mail scanning. AVG Free 9 introduces a few new features, with improvements focused on performance, including claims of faster scan and boot times. One new feature is the Identity Theft Recovery Unit. Only for users in the United States, ITRU is a business partnership with Identity Guard which provides "consumer identity theft solutions," accessible only from the AVG toolbar in Firefox and Internet Explorer.

The LinkScanner feature protects you from third-party code exploits before they load in your browser and for ranking search results. Annoyingly, when you install its optional toolbar, it commandeers your new-tab page, decidedly inappropriate behavior. AVG also detected some image files as threats, when two other scans decided they weren't--we decided these were false positives. AVG might not be the fastest or the most effective free security option, but it still gets the job done and you're better off with it.DOWNLOADS