Our List of Despised "Alien Chestburster" Software
OK, so you install some new software. Maybe it's freeware from CNet, certified free of viruses and spyware.
Maybe it's software on a CD that came with your new $500 video card. You click, click, click on buttons marked "OK" until the final click on a button marked "finish".
The next day, you open your web browser and see... what's this? Where'd it come from?
Your start page is changed; there's an extra "toolbar" at the top of the page.
Your default search engine isn't Google any more: it's some search engine you never heard of before. It's not quite as harmful as a Trojan virus, but it's junk... often malware... that you'd never willingly install on your PC.
Where did this junk come from? Whassup widdat?!?!?
What happened? Well, as you were absentmindedly, trustingly clicking through the "install" for that other program-- the one you wanted-- that other program also installed some slimy, unwanted junk software.
That kind of evil stowaway reminds us of the movie "Alien", starring Sigourney Weaver and directed by Ridley Scott.
In the movie, a spaceship's crew lets a crewmember come back into the ship. They don't know it yet, but he has a destructive alien hidden in his chest.
A few hours later, during lunch, he goes into convulsions.
The malignant alien bursts out of his chest
and attacks the crew. The crew spends the rest of the movie trying to get rid of-- or get away from-- the alien.
The alien chestburster scene portrayed in Lego™.
Click on the picture to see more Lego™ fun at PlanetOddity.com
That kind of alien slimy destructive stowaway is what we're calling "alien chestbursters".
It's our hope that by educating the Public and embarrassing the purveyors of these "alien chestbursters"
we can compel them to abandon this slimy, offensive, underhanded trick.
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Alien Chestburster Software: Avoid these programs, or exercise great caution while installing them. THEY INSTALL UNWANTED BAD SOFTWARE. |
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Avira (free version): Antivirus software. Some versions ask you to sign up for spam;
all versions show a big "BUY ME!" daily, when the program downloads an update.
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CCleaner: Cleans your Windows registry, removes unneeded files.
Wants to change your home page and search engine, installs a toolbar.
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Comodo Firewall & Antivirus (free edition): Wants to "phone home" (send data from your PC to their headquarters). Some versions
want to change your home page & search engine; some versions try to change your DNS (domain name server)-- a privacy risk-- and install their woefully bad antivirus program and some weird software called "geekbuddy" *koff-koff*. (SHAME on Comodo! Comodo's software is supposed to be a SECURITY package that
PREVENTS this kind of abuse! "Who will watch the watchmen?"
- CPU-Z (and HWmonitor) from CPU-ID company. This program tells you what make and model your cpu, motherboard, RAM, chipset, and graphics card are. It also by default tries to scam you into installing Ask toolbar, making Ask your default search engine, and changing your homepage to theirs. Why are these jerks selfless enough to write free software, but selfish and twisted enough to foist this malware on us?
- FileHippo:
Update Checker. Roger says, "some of the stuff that the FileHippo Updater links download is
not the same as the versions on the author's home page, even when the version number is the same.
FileHippo have added a "Ask toolbar" or something else to the installer.
- Foxit Reader:
PDF Reader (replaces Adobe Acrobat PDF Reader). Tries to add a very unwanted toolbar to your web browser. Additional warning: July 2011:
The most recent version also rearranged your Windows desktop icons. Why's it even messing around with that area of Windows????!
- ImgBurn:
a lightweight CD / DVD / HD DVD / Blu-ray burning application. Tries to add a very unwanted "ask.com" toolbar to your web browser,
despite the announcement on the website that "First and foremost, ImgBurn is a freeware tool. You cannot bundle it with
your own commercial application and you cannot sell it in any way, shape or form."
I guess slimy near-malware toolbars somehow don't count in this warped (*#@$-wit's definition of
"commercial applications". What rock do these guys live under? Let me send a pest control guy to "handle" them.
- PDFcreator: tries to install the
"Yahoo!" toolbar / take over your default search engine. As if we'd volunteer to lose our privacy to a spyware toolbar,
and substitute Yahoo for Google...! Shame on PDFcreator's authors & distributors.
See the screenshot evidence here.
- Speccy from Piriform:
tries to install Google's "Chrome" browser, which is basically Google spyware with a thin coating of browser.
Read their EULA for a real shocker, an example of just how arrogant a big company can be while stripping you of your privacy.
It also tries to make Google your default web browser. These are the default install settings for Speccy, so
if you don't read carefully, you get zapped with this crap.
The main software, "Speccy", gives you a lengthy list of your pc hardware's manufacturers, types, and models.
- uTorrent and BitTorrent: Torrent downloaders from the same company (BitTorrent owns uTorrent). Tries to change your homepage and search engine, &
add a toolbar with big privacy concerns. See a screenshot of the problem here.
- Super from eRightSoft: adware-required video / audio file converter. Version 38 was adware-free; from version 46 onward, the software won't install the main program (the file converter) if you block its access to the Internet (via your firewall..andI don't mean the entirely insufficient "firewall" koff-koff that is free from Microsoft and built into in Windows) and block the adware malware "Win32/OpenCandy".
- Vuze: Torrent downloader. Like uTorrent,
it tries to change your homepage and search engine, &
add a toolbar with big privacy concerns. See a screenshot of the problem here.
Additionally, it tries to install totally irrelevant online GAMES from a company called "Raptr".
See a screenshot of that problem here.
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