Deep Freeze

Deep Freeze, from Faronics, is system recovery software that protects Windows and Mac workstations against pre-existing vulnerabilities and threats by restoring the machine to a defined state on every reboot. Its approach is fundamentally different from that of antivirus software and is best understood by what it does not attempt: Deep Freeze makes no effort to detect anything. Instead it freezes a workstation's configuration, and any change made during a session — software installed, settings altered, files dropped on the desktop, malware executed, registry modified — is discarded the moment the machine restarts, returning it to the exact frozen baseline. Because the mechanism is reversal rather than detection, it is equally effective against threats that are brand new, unrecognised by any scanner, or not malicious at all but simply the result of a user breaking something.

The consequence for the organisations that use it is a dramatic reduction in support workload. Public access computers in libraries, university and school laboratories, training rooms, internet cafés, hotel business centres, kiosks and shared clinical or industrial workstations are subject to constant unplanned change, and without Deep Freeze each machine gradually degrades until someone re-images it. With it, every session starts clean and re-imaging becomes largely unnecessary. Configuration allows designated drives or partitions to remain thawed so genuine user data and logs persist where required, and scheduled maintenance windows automatically thaw machines to permit patching, antivirus updates and software deployment before re-freezing them, which resolves the obvious objection that a frozen machine cannot be updated. Central management through an enterprise console handles thaw and freeze states, scheduling and reporting across large estates, with remote workstation control and power management available. Deployment is straightforward and the product is long established in education and public sector environments in particular. Pricing starts from around USD 48 per licence with a free trial; there is no free version.