Expert: Carolyn Meinel - 1/21/2010

Question
is it safe to use super anti-spyware and spybot search and destroy on one computer to complement each other or not?

also, my windows firewall came on for something it blocked on the web when it was turned off because norton I imagine was running its own...can I turn it back off and let norton do its thing? ( I know other people say norton this and norton that in terms of not being any good but its fine for me ).

Answer
In general, you can use two different firewalls together with no problem. In particular, you can leave Windows firewall on while adding the Norton firewall.

Your safest solution to the spyware problem is to use just one Internet security program that combines antivirus with antispyware protection, for example Norton's product.

Anti-spyware programs can conflict with each other. I haven't tested yours to see if they are compatible. However, I have tested others and here is how two security programs can crash a computer. One security program loads a file into memory to test if for whether it contains a harmful infection. The other security program, if it is set up to test everything as it is loaded into memory, will automatically also try to evaluate this file. What ends up happening is the two programs fight over this file and use up all the processing power of your computer.