Panda Dome is a combined VPN and antivirus program that aims to provide basic protection for your Windows PC for those that either can’t afford or are unwilling to pay for full protection.
Panda Security provides a free antivirus program already but this version also includes a VPN as well, and it is still free. Which security suite you choose depends on whether you already have a VPN (see Use a VPN when travelling to improve internet access). If you do, just get the Free Antivirus, but if don’t then get Panda Dome.
The page on the site shouts VPN PROTECTION FOR FREE and there is a FREE DOWNLOAD button, but if you don’t read everything on the page carefully you might be surprised when Panda Free Antivirus installs as well as the VPN. This is not just a VPN, but a VPN plus antivirus bundle.
Panda free VPN
Let’s look at the VPN first. Clicking the VPN button on the home screen takes you to the status screen which shows whether the VPN is connected or disconnected. There is a daily usage limit of 150 MB a day and it is quite easy to exceed this without thinking, so you have to be careful what you do online and not watch streaming video, listen to streaming music, or let Windows Update run.
You must keep your internet usage to a minimum when it is turned on, but it is still quite useful if you travel with a laptop and have to use public Wi-Fi hotspots to check your email and other tasks. The VPN makes the internet more secure and more private. If you need to use more than the 150 MB data daily allowance there is an option to upgrade to a Premium account and this is UK £65.24 for the first year and UK £86.99 a year after that.
There is a selection of over 20 different countries for the VPN to connect to and there is an automatic option which selects one for you. Down in the bottom right corner is a message “Powered by Hotspot Shield” so anything that applies to Hotspot Shield should apply to this free VPN.
Apart from that, there isn’t much to say about it. There are no configuration options, apart from setting a default country, and it just works, making your internet connection more private and secure.
Panda Free Antivirus
This free VPN comes with Panda Free Antivirus, which aims to provide basic protection against malware threats on the computer and on the internet. On the home screen is a Scan button which then gives you a choice of scanning critical areas (a quick scan), a full scan (a thorough scan of the whole disk) or a custom scan (choose any drive or folder).
There are a number of configuration settings for the antivirus and you can choose to scan or ignore compressed archives (I have lots of zips, so I skip them), it can analyse and block malware based on its behaviour, and it can detects PUPs, potentially unwanted programs which aren’t necessarily malicious, but are irritating.
It protects against USB drives and flash drives inserted into the computer and it offers to vaccinate them. A process monitor checks that the URLs accessed by programs and processes are OK and it should pick up malware and spyware that tries to access the internet. I haven’t had any warnings so far but my PC is pretty clean anyway.
Panda Rescue Kit
The Rescue Kit button on the home screen enables you to do two things. One is to create a rescue USB drive using a flash memory stick. This can be used to boot a PC and run Panda Cloud Cleaner to remove malware that cannot be removed when Windows is running.
This is a great idea and it is one of the first tasks you should do after installing the software. Don’t wait until you get a nasty infection before you think about it.
The second item in the Rescue Kit is to detect advanced viruses with Panda Cloud Cleaner. This is an alternative malware clean-up tool and it can be used as a stand-alone utility from the Panda website but here it can be started from Panda Dome.
Conclusion
Free VPNs are always limited in some way and this one is no exception. Data usage is counted daily rather than monthly, so even if you reach the limit, it resets tomorrow and can be used once more. However, the limit is quite low and it rules out streaming media, big downloads and other heavy uses. It is fine for light occasional use and, of course, you can always upgrade if you need more data.
Panda Antivirus is good and in a recent real-world virus test by AV-Comparatives Panda performed better than most rivals, blocking 100% of threats. This inspires confidence that the security software is doing its job.
Overall, this is a good VPN and antivirus bundle for protecting your PC. It works well in free mode and there are upgrade routes for more powerful versions.
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