General ZoneAlarm Settings

How to check your settings in ZoneAlarm.

Open ZoneAlarm by going to the Windows START menu, Programs, ZoneAlarm and choose "ZoneAlarm Security". Click Firewall on the left and ensure that the Internet Zone Security is on High and the Trusted Zone Security is on Medium. Now select Zones below and make sure the Loopback Adapter, 127.0.0.1, (if available) is listed as "Trusted" and "New Network" is set as "Internet" in the Zones column.


However, if you are on a private network with other trusted computers and wish to share files, printers or other resources, you may wish to choose the "Trusted Zone" for "New Network".

PLEASE NOTE: More information regarding networking is available in the ZoneAlarm Help file.

Now go to Program Control on the left and make sure that Program Control is on the Auto Level (if available), Smart Defense Advisor is on Auto and Automatic Lock is OFF. Select Programs below and make sure that Generic Host Process for Win32 Processes (if available) has three green bars for Trust Level and a tick for both Trusted and Internet in both the Access and Server columns. Check that Internet Explorer has three green bars for Trust Level and a tick for both Trusted and Internet in the Access column and Outlook Express/Outlook/Mail (whichever proram you use for emails) has three green bars for Trust Level, a tick for all the options in the Access, Server and Send Mail columns.

If your internet connection uses a program installed on your computer to manage the internet connection, you will need to ensure that this program also has the appropriate access to the internet.

Next, select Privacy on the left (only available in some older versions of ZoneAlarm) and ensure that Cookie Control Ad Blocking and Mobile Code Control are all set to Off. We recommended that users generally turn off the Privacy Control because these settings affect the way WebPages load in Internet Explorer. If these settings are left on some WebPages will not work correctly, especially on banking websites.

IF users still wish to have the Privacy settings on then they are welcome to do so, but they need to be aware that they will more than likely need to return to the Privacy settings at times and make adjustments.

If you changed any settings, please restart your computer.


If you are experiencing problems with ZoneAlarm or have misconfigured some of the program settings, you may wish to reset ZoneAlarm. Please follow the steps below to do so, but be aware that this will remove any custom program permission settings (if any):

1.) Hold down the Ctrl and Shift keys together

2.) Right click on the Z icon near your clock

3.) Choose 'Reset' from the box that comes up

4.) Choose Yes on the Reset Settings dialog box

5.) When prompted, choose OK to restart your system

6.) Follow the on screen configuration prompts after your computer restarts