Showing posts with label adware. Show all posts
Showing posts with label adware. Show all posts
Monday, March 20, 2017
Installer Adware Infestations MPlayerX
Installer Adware Infestations MPlayerX
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I want to bring attention to Thomas Reeds The Safe Mac new article about an adware infection in the MPlayerX installer:
MPlayerX adware behaving like malware!
Marketing moron crooks are making it tougher to stop them from shoving adware onto victims Macs or to identify when the infecting installers are dangerous. This is the same bad attitude as the spamrats. Therefore, my new term for these vermin is adwarerats.
As Ive covered previously, its important to avoid software download websites that deliberately infect installers with malware. At this point, these are the three safe download sources I use every day:
MacUpdate
MajorGeeks Mac
Apples Mac App Store
Evil Download Mirror Sites
Recently, Ive seen mirror sites for innocuous application downloading infesting those downloads with installers that hide the actual application you wanted to install behind an adware installer. I personally experienced this when attempting to download the FrostWire application from its source website. For the download, my browser was passed along to a mirror site that then dumped on me a fraudulent installer. (FrostWire does not actually have an installer! Its installation is simply a drag and drop into your Applications folder). Knowing something was wrong, I dug into the Installer and found it was simply a script that triggered the further downloading of:
A) ZipCloud adware.
B) FrostWire AFTER the adware had been installed.
Installing the ZipCloud garbage was required before I could actually get at the FrostWire installation.
IOW: Were now in a state of Man-In-The-Middle meddling with the installation of Mac software.
If youve been the victim of CNETs AWFUL Downloads.com (formerly dear old VersionTracker), you know this story already. This intervention between you and what you want to download and install is now standard at that horror of a website.
CONCLUSION:
If you download an application from any website (as opposed to Apples Mac App Store), and youre confronted with an Installer, BE WARY.
If that installer attempts to download and dump on you ANYTHING other than what you intended to install, STOP THE INSTALLATION and complain to the source download website.
Adware is NEVER acceptable, unless you specifically ASK for it to be installed. Never let an installer shove that crap on you, with or without asking you.
Yes, marketing morons ARE out to get us. Its called Customer Abuse. Please join in the effort to wipe this crap out of the Mac community.
One concept: If you run into one of these evil mirror sites for download, post their URL here as a comment. Ill happily test them out, share my results, and raise a loud noise to have that site firebombed, metaphorically speaking.
And as usual, the best way to find and remove adware from your Mac is to use Thomas Reeds Adware Medic. Its donationware. Its excellent.
:-Derek
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Available link for download
Monday, September 26, 2016
Java Installs Adware With Plugin Part Of Growing Mac Adware Attacks
Java Installs Adware With Plugin Part Of Growing Mac Adware Attacks
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Sadly, like a lot of customer adverse companies, Oracle is now packing adware with its Java plugin installer. Beware!
My colleague Thomas Reed caught up with the situation and has done some testing to see whats going on. I recommend reading his The Safe Mac article found here:
Java now installing adware
Despite the fragility of the adware install process, this is still going to be a problem for many people installing Java. Oracle should be ashamed of themselves! Since Java has repeatedly posed security problems in the past, and Oracle has now shown a willingness to infect their own users with adware, I strongly recommend avoiding Java if at all possible. For those who must have Java, Trouton has posted information in his Der Flounder article on how to run the Java installer only, found inside the adware-riddled Java 8 Update 40 application, which should install Java without the toolbar.
For those affected by this Ask Toolbar, I have added detection of the Ask browser extensions and support files to my AdwareMedic app and my Adware Removal Guide. And thanks to Rich Trouton for bringing attention to this issue!Rich Troutons article on the Java adware problem can be found here:
Oracle’s Java 8 Update 40 – The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
You will be prompted to set Ask.com as your browser homepage, with the choice to do so checked off by default. If left checked, Safari’s homepage will be set with a search.ask.com URL and a Safari extension will be used to install an Ask.com toolbar.
Thomas Reed found that the Java installer will install a corresponding plugin depending upon which web browser you have set as your default. With regards to Safari, he found that it also had to be running at the time for the adware installer to work, if it worked at all.
Needless to say, DONT fall for the adware installation! You dont want that crap on your Mac. If you do get skewered, grab a copy of Thomas free/donationware Adware Medic and get rid of it.
ATTACK OF THE ADWARE!
The Windows community has been getting hammered with adware for many years. Now the adware rats have caught up with the Mac community and are infesting the stuff into everything possible. I wrote an article last year, over at MacSmarticles, about the ruination of VersionTracker after CNET/CBS made it just as bad as the rest of their Downloads.CNET.com website. It is now nearly impossible to download anything from the CNET site without having adware foisted at you by its installers. The same thing is going on at just about every other downloads website. I gladly point out that MacUpdate.com is an exception as well as MajorGeeks.com. These are the only two download websites I trust at this point in time.
Recently, the computer manufacturer Lenovo has been slammed by the computer community for infesting their computers with crapware that included a diabolical adware program called Superfish. The adware was built on a code foundation provided by the company Komodia. Their awful software features:
- Faked security certificates used to allow the software to spy on your SSL/TLS, HTTPS connections over the Internet.
- A private encryption key that is protected by the password "komodia". That password doesnt just work in Superfish, but in ALL Komodia software that makes use of spying on HTTPS web streams. The number of affected applications is expected to be near 100.
It has also been discovered that other programs pull the same security trickery:
EFF unearths evidence of possible Superfish-style attacks in the wild
Crypto-busting apps may have been exploited against visitors of Google and dozens more.
by Dan Goodin
One such program is PrivDog, provided by Internet security certificate provider Comodo Group, who have already suffered scandal by releasing nine fraudulent certificates faking themselves to be the likes of Google, Yahoo, Skype and Windows Live. This gives Comodo two black eyes.
Then add to this situation the fact that at least two anti-malware applications have been found to perform the same faked security certificate trick as a method for catching malware being downloaded to your computer. They are provided as deep inspection features of their software, which I obviously suggest you TURN OFF. Those two anti-malware programs are Malwarebytes and Avast. I found out about Malwarebytes via word-of-mouth and am waiting for solid verification.
No doubt, other such questionable software, crapware and adware will be uncovered in the coming months and some of it will run on Macs.
The message:
Be Careful What You Install.
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Available link for download
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