It’s been 18 months since Check Point released ZoneAlarm Extreme Security 2010. And as it didn’t make much impact, and there was no 2011 release, you might have thought the company had given up on security suites altogether.

But you’d be wrong, though. It turns out the company was simply working on a much more interesting Extreme Security 2012 edition, released today, which comes packed with essential functionality.

ZoneAlarm’s PRO firewall does a great job of monitoring your application’s online activities, for instance, intelligently making most of the key decisions itself – no annoying pop-ups here.

An antivirus engine based on highly-rated Kaspersky technology detects and blocks malware before it can do any damage.

And a lengthy list of features – antiphishing, download monitoring, keylogger jamming and more – work to keep you safe online.

Some modules, which were, well, a little basic before, have been improved through partnerships with other companies.  So forget the limited parental controls of the previous edition; Extreme Security 2012 now comes with a version of Net Nanny. An IDrive-based online backup tool gives you 2GB of server space for free.  And the Identity Theft feature comes with a free year’s subscription to Identity Guard (for US users, anyway), which provides daily credit record checks, email alerts of activity, and free phone help if you spot something dubious.

You also get a spam filter, private browsing, a capable Registry cleaner, and many other extras. And a brand new, cleaner, simpler interface ensures you can navigate all this functionality with the minimum of hassle.

Normally priced at $79.95, ZoneAlarm Extreme Security is currently available for a very reasonable $39.95. And if you don’t need quite as much functionality, then there are other editions available at even lower prices: check the ZoneAlarm site to find out more.