Norton 360 is designed to protect the security of your PC. When you install it with the default settings and allow it to update regularly, Norton 360 can provide effective protection.

About total protection

Norton 360 offers total protection of your PC, including antivirus and spyware protection, online identity theft protection, backup, and PC tuneup capabilities. It provides a full circle of protection against a full circle of threats, leaving you free to work and play confidently on your PC.

After you install Norton 360 and set up a backup storage destination, it then does all the rest. You do not have to do anything else to be protected. But if you like to customize your firewall or adware protection, or set your own schedule for automatic activities, Norton 360 lets you do that, too.

Norton 360 is grouped into the following four categories of protection:

PC Security - Blocks and removes viruses and spyware from email and downloaded sites, protects against emerging threats, scans and cleans email attachments

Identity Protection - Helps guard against identity theft, verifies authenticity of popular Web sites

Backup - Backs up photos, music, and documents to a variety of storage locations

PC Tuneup - Finds and fixes common computer problems, cleans up unwanted cookies and files, and defragments the hard disk to optimize PC performance

Understanding how to stay in a secure state

Norton 360 automatically protects your PC when you install it and it updates itself regularly to maintain protection. However, you can increase the security of your PC further by learning how to avoid threats against your PC and your data.

To avoid email threats, do the following:
* Only open email attachments that come from a trusted source and that you expected to receive.
* Delete all unwanted messages without opening them.
* Do not respond to email that you suspect is spam. Just delete it.
* Be extremely wary of emails that request confidential information, and confirm the authenticity of the request before you reply.

To protect yourself from phishing attempts, do the following:
* When you visit a Web site, type the address directly into your browser rather than clicking a link.
* Provide personal information only on sites that have "https" in the Web address or that have a lock icon at the bottom of the browser window.
* Do not provide personal information to any unsolicited requests for information.

To avoid viruses, worms, and Trojan horses, do the following:
* Transfer files to your PC only from a well-known and trusted source.
* Do not send or receive files over instant-messaging connections.
* Terminate an instant-messaging connection if a person on your "buddy list" sends strange messages, files, or Web links.

To avoid spyware, do the following:
* Do not approve suspicious error dialogs from within your Web browser.
* Be suspicious of "free deal" offers because spyware may come as part of such a deal.
* Carefully read the End User License Agreement for programs that you install, and do not install if other programs are installed as part of the desired program.

About updating Norton 360

Norton 360 automatically receives updates over the Internet to its virus protection files and its program files. These updates continually enhance the technology that Norton 360 uses to keep your PC protected.

Automatic updates require an Internet connection. If you do not normally keep your PC connected to the Internet, you can manually update Norton 360 when you do connect to ensure that you have the latest protection and program updates.

Updating manually

If you disconnect your PC from the Internet, we recommend that you check for Norton 360 updates after you reconnect.

To update manually
1. In the Norton 360 main window, do one of the following:
* Hover your mouse pointer over PC Security, and then click Check for Updates.
* Click Tasks, and then click Check for Updates.
2. In the Results window, click Close.

Checking for the latest virus and spyware definitions

Virus definition files contain information that allows Norton 360 to recognize and alert you to the presence of a specific virus or security threat. Norton 360 shows the date on which you last updated the virus and spyware definitions.

To check the latest virus and spyware definition date

1. In the Norton 360 main window, do one of the following:
* Click PC Security.
* Hover your mouse pointer over PC Security, and then click View Details.
2. Scroll down the Items list to view the Virus Definitions entry.
The Status column shows the date on which you last downloaded and installed the latest virus and spyware definitions.

Solving connection problems

Norton 360 uses an Internet connection to support several of its protection features. If you cannot connect to the Internet after you install Norton 360, you can use the Support features to help you troubleshoot your connection problem.

Responding to emergencies

Norton 360 automatically downloads protection updates regularly and secures you from latest viruses and unknown threats. In addition, Norton 360 monitors your Internet activities to protect your computer from Internet-based threats that exploit software vulnerabilities.

However, there may be situations where you need to decide what action to take on security issues.

If you think that your computer is infected with virus or destructive software, you can do the following actions:

Quick Scan - Quick Scan helps you to scan the possible virus-infected areas of a computer that are often targeted by viruses and other security risks. Because this scan does not scan your entire computer, it takes lesser time to run than a Comprehensive Scan.

Comprehensive Scan - A Comprehensive Scan checks all boot records, files, and programs that are running to which the user has access. Consequently, a Comprehensive Scan that is run by an Administrator will scan more files than a scan that is run by a user who does not have Administrator privileges. This scan might take more time than the other scans.

Let Me Choose - Checks for vulnerabilities and risks, and protects your computer by running the following checks:
* LiveUpdate
* Virus and Spyware Scan
* Browser Settings Check
* Network Address Check
* Internet Explorer Temporary Files Cleanup
* Windows Temporary Files Cleanup
* Internet Explorer History Cleanup
* Disk Optimization
* Registry Cleanup
* Backup

You can also scan a file or folder in the following way:
* Right-click the file or folder you want to scan, and then click Norton 360 > Scan Now
The right-click scan option is not available in the 64-bit version of Windows Vista.