Social Web Security, Re-invented

Prospective testers will undoubtedly be struck by the utter lack of new browser toolbars, following installation. It's alright, it's all  part of the new approach, says project manager Alexandru Balan: "the  team went all- out and moved everything to the protocol level. TrafficLight is browser- agnostic and will soon be OS-agnostic. That's because everything, from filtering to presenting the  interface, happens to the HTTP traffic. The only task left to the browser is to render the end result – a safe browsing experience."

 The new application adds green – meaning safe, yellow – suspicious or red, i.e. harmful signs next to links in results pages or on social networking sites. Testers that insist on clicking the red ones will be rewarded with bigger stop signs and a choice to proceed to viewing the rogue page with all the known harmful elements removed.

 There may not be much left, of course and it may not be particularly wise to do so, but the option's there. Phishing attempts and virus-infected pages can be blocked in this manner.

 For those using other operating systems (or even just work computers running Windows but with no administration rights), BitDefender is also releasing a string of browser extensions. These have limited functionality, for instance they do not scan downloaded files for viruses, neither do they tag links found in social networking websites, but should work with any OS.

Hop on to  http://trafficlight.bitdefender.com and check out the next-gen technology of TrafficLight.