10 Best VPN Services Of 2023

Using a VPN at home can keep your data safe from those who want to use your data for targeted advertising. On your mobile device, a VPN can protect your login details and other data you send when you connect to public Wi-Fi. It can be especially useful for businesses that have proprietary information to protect.

Here are five of the most common VPN uses:

Because of the relationship between you and your internet service provider (ISP), it can track what you do online, such as what sites you visit, the time you spend browsing, and more. Depending on the terms of service and what you’ve agreed to, your ISP may even sell your personal data to advertisers. Your stored data is kept confidential otherwise, according to most internet providers.

In the U.S., ISPs are required to keep browsing history logs for 90 days. If the government requests your internet history, an ISP must comply. In fact, in cases of national security, the government doesn’t even need a warrant to access your internet data. Theoretically, with a warrant, local law enforcement can use your data to help convict you of a crime.

Even if you’re a law-abiding citizen, you might not want your ISP documenting every URL you visit. If you use a VPN, you can cover your tracks. At the very least, it can give you peace of mind.

Whether you’re at an airport waiting for a flight and checking your email or at a local restaurant reading news on your phone, you may be tempted to use public Wi-Fi. It seems safe enough, right? The free internet connection is offered by the airport or business and they mean well.

The good news is that browsing online has become safer in recent years, thanks to most people adopting HTTPS over HTTP. That “S” is a security protocol that comes from a secure sockets layer (SSL) certificate and helps protect internet data that’s shared to and from a site. That’s what makes it safer for you to pay for products and services online, for example.

However, most public Wi-Fi connections are open and not password protected, so you might put yourself at risk of your connection being intercepted by a hacker who is trolling the Wi-Fi network.

If you have a VPN service to log into first, you can anonymously connect to public Wi-Fi and essentially remain hidden on the network. A VPN will hide your identity on an open internet connection and encrypt active data, so even if a cybercriminal is on the same network, you’ll be safe.

Lots of retailers offer apps and free Wi-Fi to shoppers and they make it hard to not use them. For one, if you get a retailer’s app, you may get access to exclusive coupons and deals, so that’s tempting. Also, a lot of physical locations block cell phone service simply because of the metal in structures.

Businesses that offer these perks for free or incentives to use their apps and Wi-Fi are doing so to collect your data, which is extremely valuable to them. This is another good reason to use a VPN if you want to protect your personal data. Plus, you’ll still be able to safely access your apps and use free Wi-Fi while you’re shopping at malls or stores.

Many companies adopted a remote or hybrid work policy recently, which is convenient for a lot of employees. However, there is a security concern about having remote workers log into company servers from home because you don’t know how secure an employee’s connection is. They could be working from home or in a coffee shop. If a connection is intercepted, there’s a concern that active data could go from an employee to a hacker, rather than the Wi-Fi the employee is trying to use.

Providing all employees with remote access and a VPN will help keep your company’s files and projects safe.

A VPN does more than protect your data—it can unlock your access to media you can’t get to now. There are benefits here for a few different reasons.

Some citizens in countries with strict governments may not be able to visit websites with opposing views to their politicians. A VPN can make it appear as though you’re located in a different location, so you can access otherwise blocked websites or media. Your connection to the VPN can keep your genuine location and IP cloaked, so you can’t be pinpointed.

Another benefit to using a VPN is that you can use it to find media you can’t get otherwise. For example, Netflix and Hulu offer different types of programming per location. If you’re in the U.S., you might not be able to watch what’s available on Netflix in the United Kingdom. A VPN can make it appear as though you’re in another country, thereby unlocking that exclusive content.

These are just a few examples of how a VPN can help protect you or help you access blocked information. There are plenty of other reasons why everyone should use a VPN.

Best antivirus 2023: Keep your Windows PC safe from spyware, malware, and more

Antivirus software has become a necessary tool in today’s online world. Even the most tech-savvy and cautious among us can drop their guard at times or be tricked into exposing themselves to a malware vulnerability. Antivirus protection is an essential backup against such threats. 

We’re not suggesting that PC security software is fool-proof, but it does a great job of protecting your computer against harmful malware and ransomware. Most systems come with security software baked into the OS, but this is often the bare minimum you need. Choosing to purchase more robust antivirus software will provide you with features such as an advanced firewall, sandbox environments for suspicious programs, and multi-device protection, among other things. Choosing to pay for these additional features will benefit anyone who actively uses email, clicks on links, and downloads programs.

When testing antivirus suites, they look for software that strikes a balance between excellent protection, a worthwhile selection of features, and minimal performance impact on your PC. For more information, you can read about how they test antivirus suites below their picks. 

Using a Mac? Their colleagues at Macworld have tested the best Mac antivirus.

Norton 360 Deluxe – Best antivirus for PC overall

Pros

Cons

Price When Reviewed: $49.99 for the first year

Norton Security Premium is no more, but their pick for best AV has stayed in the family, with Norton 360 Deluxe. There aren’t a lot of fundamental changes to the suite compared to previous iterations, which also means its just as solid. The pricing now covers fewer devices, a total of five, but you get a good number of extra features such as Dark Web Monitoring and VPN access, making for an overall excellent value.  

Avast One – Best overall runner-up

Pros

Cons

Price When Reviewed: $29.99 / 5 devices I $48.99 / 30 devices

Avast really upped its game with this top-tier product. The Avast One suite offers an improved design, excellent performance, and even more features to help offset its premium price. The individual plan covers five devices.

AVG Internet Security – Best budget antivirus suite

Pros

Cons

Price When Reviewed: $59.99

AVG Internet Security does an excellent job of protecting your PC, even if its interface could stand a polish. Nevertheless, with unlimited installs for $70 per year, it’s hard to beat this popular security solution when it comes to value.

Trend Micro Maximum Security – Best antivirus for beginners

Pros

Cons

Price When Reviewed: 5 devices: $49.95/yr

Many antivirus suites create an interface that’s as simple as possible for users to understand—but sometimes the software becomes too stripped down. That’s why their recommendation for novices is Trend Micro Maximum Security.

This antivirus suite, which provides highly rated protection, strikes a nice balance between complexity and simplicity: Four category icons at the top let you dive deeper into the suite, but if all you need to do is a scan, that option is right there in the center of interface. You can’t miss it. 

Overall, no matter what you need to get done in Maximum Security, the interface doesn’t leave you with any guesswork.

McAfee Total Protection – Best for privacy

Pros

Cons

Price When Reviewed: 5 devices: $89.99/yr

With its latest version, McAfee puts an emphasis on identity and privacy. While still offering its trademark malware protection, features like Identity Protection Service and a VPN for obscuring your online tracks, as well as app update checker address today’s added concerns.

Panda Dome Complete – Most feature-rich offering

Pros

Cons

Price When Reviewed: 1 device: $64.49 I 3 devices: $71.99 I 5 devices: $78.74 I 10 devices: $121.49

All of the deluxe antivirus suites offer extra tools as part of their package, but if they had to pick one that stands out in this respect, it’d be Panda Dome Complete. It has the usual PC maintenance utilities such as a disk defragmenter for hard drives and a startup apps manager. But it also has a VPN, Wi-Fi network scanning, a process monitor, a virtual keyboard, an application control feature, and more.

It also makes it very easy to find everything since it uses a tiled interface on a single screen, and the protection is good too. Granted, you’ll pay more for Panda Dome Complete than some other worthwhile AV programs, but it offers lots of value for power users.

Windows Security – Best free antivirus

Pros

Cons

Price When Reviewed: Included with Windows 10 and 11

If Windows is already working, why add anything else? If its built-in security suite, Windows Security, performs on par with the best of the free AV options—as they discovered in our roundup of the best free antivirus—why add the extra baggage of a third-party program? Sure other AV programs might offer marginally better protection, but not enough to outweigh the convenience of rolling with Microsoft’s home-grown offering. Windows Security also has ransomware protection, which many free options don’t. Plus, you avoid the nuisance of a third-party suite’s regular upgrade notifications. To learn more, see their video on How to use Windows Security.

However, if you’re looking for more features, such as online privacy tools, a VPN, or encrypted cloud backup, you may want to use a third-party program instead as these are not currently available in Windows Security. Nonetheless, it’s a free program that already comes pre-installed in most Windows machines and it does a good job of keeping you protected from most threats.

There are three basic requirements that an antivirus suite needs:

That’s not all to consider, however. These days, many security suites come with extras such as a backup service for your most essential files, Android apps for mobile security, a more advanced firewall, family protection (read: child restriction) features, and the right to use the program on multiple PCs. Whether you need those extras depends on your personal situation.

First, they take a look at the interface to determine how easy or complicated it is. Does the interface make it easy to get at essential tools like PC scans and password managers, for example, or is everything buried under multiple clicks? Are there elements that look like they should be clickable but aren’t? Are alerts interactive or purely informational, and does that make sense in context?

We also examine the features on offer. Every good antivirus suite should have the basics like scanning and real-time protection, but many vendors offer elements that go beyond basic security like password managers or firewalls. They try to discern whether any of these extra features are particularly useful, or just frills that look nice but don’t serve a practical purpose.

To test the suite’s demand on system resources, they run two benchmarks. The first is PCMark 8’s Work Conventional test, which simulates a variety of workloads including editing spreadsheets, browsing the web, and running video chat. 

We run the benchmark before the security suite is installed. Then they install the software, have it run a full scan on their Windows 10 test machine, and start a second run of the benchmark at the same time. Then they compare the overall scores to see if the decline between the two benchmarks is significant.

As a harsher stress test, they also use Handbrake to transcode a video before and after installing the A/V. On most home PCs, this encoding task utilizes 100 percent of the CPU. They then compare transcoding times to see if there’s any significant decline.

Our test machine is an Acer Aspire E15 with an Intel Core i3-7100U, 4GB RAM, and a 1TB hard drive. Each security suite is tested on a clean install of Windows 10 Home.

As for the antivirus suite’s detection capabilities, we’ll rely on the opinions of security researchers dedicated to this task. We’ll take into consideration reports from outlets such as A-V Comparatives, A-V Test and SE Labs. 

We’ll also take pricing into account and what you get for it. 

Whenever possible we’ll review security suites using a free trial to get a sense of what consumers see when they first try out a new product.

The short answer is maybe, but probably not. Antivirus software scans files and programs to ensure there is no malware or other harmful threat present. The longer the time frame between each scan, the more files the program will need to check. These intensive scans may have some noticeable effect on your computer speed. It’s therefore recommended that you schedule your scans to run more frequently or even at night so as to not impact your computer usage.

While antivirus software can affect the speed of your computer, it is most likely not the only factor—or even the most prominent. Other factors such as unnecessary startup and background programs, insufficient RAM, or even undiagnosed malware can have more drastic effects on your computer speed than a simple antivirus scan.

It really comes down to what features are most important to you in an antivirus software. Do you just need a program that will scan, detect, and remove malware? Then go with a free version. But if you are looking for more advanced features such as the ability to block webcam hacking, run suspicious apps in a sandbox environment, and permanently delete sensitive files, then you should seriously consider upgrading to a paid premium antivirus service. 

Overall, premium antivirus software is better suited to more complete coverage against threats—especially for inexperienced users. Children and seniors are particularly vulnerable to modern threats and therefore paid antivirus apps, which allow for multiple-device protection, may be a better option for families.

In a perfect world, your antivirus software will halt and clean the infected files for you. However, this largely depends on which antivirus program you are using.

In general, the antivirus will send a warning to you and try to quarantine the infected file in order to keep it from spreading. Once isolated, the software will give you the option to try to remove the infection or delete the file altogether.

A full scan performs a comprehensive and thorough check of your whole system. It usually checks your system memory, startup programs, system backup, email databases, hard drives, and any removable storage drives.

A quick scan only checks a few areas including startup programs, system memory, and boot sectors. It may not detect all malware, but it can usually give you an idea if your computer has a virus.

As to when you should do either, they recommend a full scan once per week, during computer usage downtime (such as late at night). A quick scan can be done anytime you like; however, it is usually only necessary if you notice suspicious activity on your PC.

Absolutely! Keeping your antivirus software up-to-date is crucial in helping you to avoid the most recent threats.

That being said, most antivirus software today—whether free or paid—will default to automatic updates. This way you don’t need to worry about manually updating your software. It may still be worth checking to confirm that your antivirus is running the most up-to-date version from time to time.

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