I have uninstalled McAfee SiteAdvisor

Today Firefox notified an update for SiteAdvisor, which I allowed.

I then found it installing another program without asking, which seemed to be a search bar. I have now removed all traces of McAfee from my computer because I do not trust any company which tries to install something without permission.

I should like to know what other forum members think about this? Am I being unreasonable?

I have found that Web of Trust flags more bad sites anyway, so will just use that from now on.

Guess what? A lot of products try to do that, good and bad. It's a good way for companies to keep apps free. You just have to pay attention during the installation process because they have to notify you if they're going to install something like that and you do what I did while updating CCleaner the other day. Uncheck the box and don't allow the toolbar to install. Saying you're not going to use a product because it tried to install a toolbar is a little radical.

I was only doing a SiteAdvisor update, which is automatic with Firefox, the only reason I knew what was going on was warnings from Comodo Defense+. I did allow it, then found I had this new program installed and so uninstalled with Add & Remove. Definitely no options offered at any time.

I use CCleaner too and never install their Yahoo bar.

I posted this because they installed it without asking.

JamesFrance,

Are you sure that during the upgrade install you were not presented with options that required you to untick a box? I agree with frankp316 - CCleaner has been trying to install the yahoo toolbar by default for some time and it requires unticking the box every time you upgrade CCleaner.

Also, I'm not familiar with Web of Trust - can you elaborate?

tork

Hi tork,

No, with Firefox you are just told when there are updates for add-ons and you click to install them.

A list of terms and conditions appeared but only after it installed an extra program. I declined those but then looked in Add & Restore and the program was there.

Web of Trust works in a similar way and I had them both together, so noticed that WOT marked more sites in searches as bad than SiteAdvisor.

http://www.mywot.com/

I know that McAfee is trustworthy, so I guess they made a mistake because of the way Firefox add-ons are updated.

Yeah, it looks like this has more to do with Firefox than McAfee. I'm not crazy about Site Advisor and similar products. They seem to make a lot of mistakes.

Edited by frankp316, 24 December 2008 - 11:50 AM.

noticed that WOT marked more sites in searches as bad than SiteAdvisor.

Sorry for hijacking this thread, but I'm curious. Is the fact it marked more sites as dangerous the criteria that it's better? Or did you actually do some research and find that SiteAdvisor was missing too many, truly bad sites?

I'm asking because I prefer to do my own homework on sites. Than trust the opinions of a corporate giant's whims on whats good or bad for me, and have zero idea of their 'definition' of bad?

I may be researching malware or a controversial subject and not get crucial information. Because of something that has zero impact to me, but it's a 'bad' site according to their definition.

I think a lot of "exploits" (I'm not sure if I'm using the term correctly) are using fake security add-ons under cover of being added with a legitimate program. I have been trying to clean up my computer over the past week, with some luck, but I got a Google Earth downloaded, together with Spyware Doctor and Norton Security Scan. I was given a "choice" as to what I wanted downloaded, but the choices didn't take. When I went in later to uninstall the Norton Security Scan, it didn't do so in the usual Windows way--it was very active. If you have Windows, I would also disable automatic updates for now and not click on "install updates when shutting down" icon--I think that's been a constant source of re-infection for some people posting at BC. The computer often stays on for hours if you click on that.

Another site of infection, which I'm not happy about--sometimes a firewall will come down when I go to Brian Krebs' Security Tips column at Washingtonpost.com. He gives a lot of excellent advice on patches and programs. But he has become so popular that some of the adware posted on the site has become more virulent, knocking down firewalls. I think other security blogs which accept java script ads may be similarly dangerous for now. And I'm absent-minded--I don't always remember to site verify, although I have the tools.

By the way, Web of Trust allows its subscribers to vote on a site and to rate it as to whether it's bad or good--their ratings are based partly on customer reviews and experiences.

Edited by fuzzywuzzy6, 24 December 2008 - 02:57 PM.

I just think that these are useful to make you think twice before visiting what comes up on a Google search. If it shows red I would not be so quick to visit the site. There are so many infected sites around now that anything which suggests that a site could be a problem is helpful. Sure they will have false results, but I have seen Antivirus 2009 on Google when looking at avs. It does make you put your brain into gear before you click.

But a lot of times, it's not the site itself but the ads on the site. Most times the website isn't aware of any problem until someone contacts them and they tell the ad company to clean up their act.

I have found WOT to be a very useful tool. It does provide a rating for trustworthiness, vendor reliability, privacy and child safety by holding your mouse over the colored ring and lets you know the amount of data used to determine the rating. When doing Google searches I simply select links with a green rating and avoid the red warning ones. If I want to purchase something I do look into the detail. If you really want to check out a site rating you can review comments made by WOT users. The downside is that it takes a new site a while to establish a colored rating. I do a lot of searches for technical information that just doesn't have much traffic and those sites sometimes appear as gray for a long time but at least I understand the risks involved. Low traffic sites tend to less productive for attackers than high traffic sites though but we all know nothing is 100% safe.

I also use CustomizeGoogle with Firefox so adds do not appear at all on my searches. I have never intended to click on an add but it is easy to make a mistake so just stopped them from appearing with my searches.

Edited by Justa, 26 December 2008 - 08:42 AM.

noticed that WOT marked more sites in searches as bad than SiteAdvisor.

Sorry for hijacking this thread, but I'm curious. Is the fact it marked more sites as dangerous the criteria that it's better? Or did you actually do some research and find that SiteAdvisor was missing too many, truly bad sites?

I'm asking because I prefer to do my own homework on sites. Than trust the opinions of a corporate giant's whims on whats good or bad for me, and have zero idea of their 'definition' of bad?

I may be researching malware or a controversial subject and not get crucial information. Because of something that has zero impact to me, but it's a 'bad' site according to their definition.

WOT gets its ratings from other users, not a companies decision. When you are on a site, you can click the WOT icon in the toolbar of firefox and rate it in 4 categories: Trustworthiness, Vendor Reliability, Privacy, and Child Safety. You can also add comments about the site directly through the icon (it opens a new tab to add a comment).

McAfee SiteAdvisor had a new update that came with a completely safe 'McAfee Secure Search' bar. All it does is let you search for things in it and it takes you to Yahoo search, nothing to worry about..

The search bar is extremely annoying in my opinion, I think I am going to uninstall it and just rely on WOT.

Edit: Just found out how to disable the search bar. Click the Siteadvisor icon and click "Disable Secure Search".

Edited by xblindx, 02 January 2009 - 05:22 PM.

McAfee SiteAdvisor had a new update that came with a completely safe 'McAfee Secure Search' bar. All it does is let you search for things in it and it takes you to Yahoo search, nothing to worry about..

The point of the original post was that this search bar was installed without any warning and I did think this was something to worry about. Not a good way of doing things, hiding a new program install in an update.

Mind you I don't approve of the way computer makers load their products with programs from this same type of company, which expire after a few months and then nag you for payments.