Installation

Sandboxie is compatible with lots of 32-bit Windows operating systems including Windows 7, Windows Vista and Windows XP. A 64-bit edition is not planned but 64-bit Windows 7 operating systems can run Sandboxie in Windows XP mode.

Installation itself takes less than a minute and ends with the display of the Sandboxie Control interface which is used to run and configure Sandboxie.

Sandboxie review

The Sandboxie interface consists of a menu bar on top and a larger area that lists the configured sandboxes. These sandboxes can either display the programs that have been started in a sandbox or the files and folders that are currently accessible in those sandboxes.

New programs can be launched in sandboxes in numerous ways including the Sandbox menu at the top of Sandboxie control or a right-click on the program icon in the Windows system tray (there are automated ways but more about that later). Another handy option is that programs can be launched in a sandbox with a right-click in Windows Explorer which is for example handy when installing new software.

The default web browser and email program can be started from the shortcuts offered in the Sandboxie menu. Other programs can be launched by browsing for them using the file browser or the start menu which is displayed in a minimalistic menu if the option is selected by the user.

Every sandboxed program window will displays a # at the beginning of the window which indicates to the user that the program is running in a sandboxed environment. The Is Window Sandboxed option in the File menu can also be used to check if a specific window is running sandboxed.

Data that is created in a sandbox stays in the sandbox. This can be temporary files, cookies, documents that are created or saved files from the Internet. It would not be very practical if there was not a way to exchange files between the sandbox and the rest of the computer system.

Sandboxie provides two options on how to deal with those files.

• Explore Contents: It is possible to launch a Windows Explorer window that gets access to the sandboxed files. This can be done by right-clicking a sandbox and selecting Explorer Contents. The same option is also available in the top menu under each sandbox entry.
• Quick Recovery: Quick Recovery, when executed by the user, automatically scans specific folders (My Documents, Desktop and Favorites) for files that have been created. These files can be recovered by the user to the same folder (of the normal system) or to any folder. There is also an option to add another folder to the list so that its contents are scanned as well.
• Immediate Recovery: An automated version of Quick Recovery which will automatically display a dialog if a new file has been discovered in one of the monitored folders.

Programs in a sandbox can be terminated by closing their program window, right-clicking them in the sandboxie control window. There is another option to close all programs at once that are running in the sandbox.

Each sandbox comes with its own custom set of options. All start with the same options at the beginning and can be customized by the user of the computer system.

This ranges from appearance changes (display a border around sandboxed windows instead of the # indicator), recovery options to add or remove monitored folders, force programs to start in the sandbox which will automatically launch selected programs in a sandboxed environment whenever they are started, restrictions (Internet access, hardware access..) and Resource access (files, registry, IPC, COM..)

And then there are application specific options that make it a little bit easier to work with Sandboxie. Observant users might have noticed that it can be difficulty to run specific programs that require write access like a desktop email client that wants to add the new emails to the mailbox. Sandboxie by default would prevent those write operations. That’s where the application specific settings come into play. Sandboxie provides those settings for web browsers, email readers, pdf and printing, security and privacy, download managers and many more. A lot of programs are listed in that menu from Internet browsers like Internet Explorer or Firefox to security programs like Kaspersky Internet Security or Norton Internet Security to Adobe Acrobat, Evernote and 7-zip.

An option to configure additional custom program rights is provided as well.

Verdict

Sandboxie is an indispensable program that protects a computer system effectively from harm. It is ideal for users who test new applications regularly, download files, spend lots of time on the Internet or simply want to protect their privacy by preventing write operations of temporary data to the computer system.

Christmas Giveaway

We have ten licenses of Sandboxie to give away. Please leave a comment and explain why you would like to win a license.

Raju is handing out licenses of JV16 Powertools 2009 today.

The software developer is providing access to a free version of Sandboxie on his website which has a few limitations compared to the commercial version.

As the name suggests Sandboxie makes use of the concept of so called sandboxes (also called virtual environments by some). The main advantage of running applications in a sandbox is that everything that happens in there stays in there. If you land on a website that uses a 0-day browser exploit to download and launch malicious code on your computer you can rest assured that the rest of the system – that is the part outside of the sandbox – will not be affected by the virus. And the sandbox itself can simply be cleared so that the malicious software has no means of affecting the computer system.

To make it even more visual: Sandboxie acts as a border that is impenetrable for applications that get started inside. Many of these applications usually interact with other system components, say a web browser that is storing cache on the hard drive or storing new bookmarks on the computer. Every attempt to interact with the computer system will be intercepted by Sandboxie and emulated so that the application “thinks” that everything is ok.

These changes on the other hand are not permanently and once the application or the sandbox have been terminated they are gone. But don’t worry: Sandboxie is still providing the means to save data that has been created or downloaded into the sandbox. Think of a document that you are downloading from a website, you might want to keep it even after the browser session closes.

It is possible to configure resource access rights for files running in the sandbox. These are left blank on purpose by default but it would be possible to allow the web browser Firefox to access its bookmarks file directly so that bookmarks get stored permanently. (There is an option in Sandboxie’s settings that allows direct access to the bookmarks of Opera, Firefox and Internet Explorer and another setting for email clients.

The installation runs through without problems or user interaction. The system is ready to run applications in the sandbox right after installation. Sandboxie integrates itself in the right-click context menu (Run Sandboxed) and it is also possible to drag and drop applications into the program interface to run them sandboxed.

The control interface is listing the programs that are running in the sandbox. This is helpful because there is virtually no way of telling if it is running in a Sandbox by looking at the program window.

The commercial version of Sandboxie introduces several interesting and helpful features. It makes it possible to run multiple sandboxes on a computer system. This can be useful to launch set of tools in different sandboxes which is great to isolate programs further.

The Forced Folders and Forced Programs options become available after registration.

Forced Folders:

This options allows you to select folders (this can also be a drive letter) and force all applications starting from there to run in sandboxed mode. Some useful applications for this are CD / DVD drives or a downloads folder for Internet downloads.

Forced Programs:

Allows the user to select files that should always be run in sandboxed mode. This is very useful to make sure that an application is always running in the sandbox without having to launch it that way at every program start.

The developer of Sandboxie was nice enough to give us six licenses of his security software program. You should know the drill by know. Just leave a comment letting us know what you think / like about the program and you are eligible to win a copy of it.