One icky thing I’m seeing more frequently these days is adware installed on Macs. Let’s say that you’re surfing along and decide you want to use a third-party program, so you Google its name and find a site that offers a download. But when you install it, all of a sudden your browser’s home page has changed, the search engine you were using has been replaced (and may be redirecting you to places you don’t want to go!), and you’re seeing pop-up ads everywhere. Yuck.
Removing all of the pieces that these crappy, invasive programs install on your system is not difficult to do by hand as long as you’re familiar with your Mac’s file system and know where to find, for example, your /Library/LaunchAgents folder, but it’s much easier to use an automated tool to clean stuff up. If that’s the way you want to go, I recommend AdwareMedic by The Safe Mac (donationware). This nifty little utility scans your system very quickly, alerts you if it finds any adware, and offers to clean it out for you. So to get started, go to the page I linked above and click on the giant “Download” button.
(Note that if your system redirects you to a different site when you click that, your adware may be preventing you from installing the program; if that’s the case, check out The Safe Mac’s suggestions for what to do or just paste the disk image’s URL into your browser to download it directly: http://www.adwaremedic.com/AdwareMedic.dmg.)
Once the file has finished downloading, open the disk image from your Downloads folder.
Like most programs, AdwareMedic instructs you to drag its icon to your Applications folder to install it, but you don’t actually have to do that if you don’t wanna. Just double-click on the AdwareMedic icon, and you can run it directly from the disk image.
If you click on “Scan for Adware” on that screen, you can, well, scan your system for adware. Surprise, surprise.
Whew!
One other thing that makes The Safe Mac so useful is that the developer, Thomas Reed, also has a manual removal guide up on the site, which is handy if you’re running an OS X version earlier than 10.7 or if you just don’t want to run AdwareMedic for some reason. But in any case, if you find the program or the site helpful, consider donating to The Safe Mac to help Mr. Reed churn out more great utilities!
Comments
Hi Melissa. Thanks for the information. I’m sure it will be quite useful to some, but, to be honest, I haven’t run into any invasive adware in a long, long time. Maybe I’m just not diving as deeply into the Internet as you are, but I think I’ve poked my nose into even some pretty dark parts of the web where one needs to keep their wits about them. I’m using Safari, and maybe it’s not as ‘open’ as some other browsers. Also, I have OS X set to allow me to install any apps, so it’s not a matter of thirds-party app installs being automatically blocked. I’ve checked my ~/Library/LaunchAgents and /Library/LaunchAgents folders, and there is nothing there that shouldn’t be. I’m really curious about what specific nasties you’ve run into, and where.
Actually, I do see something like adware, but it’s actually just those really annoying ads for MacKeeper, that seem pop up everywhere, then throw up a prompt asking if you want to leave the page, when you try to close them, as if doing so might have some negative result. If there is a way to block specific web ads, I’d be glad to hear about it. I’d turn off Java and Javascript, but I actually need them enabled.
Hey MOSiX Man!
To be honest, I’ve never had adware on my personal computer. In the land of the über-paranoid Mac users, I am the queen.
However, what I am seeing is a much greater frequency of adware on the machines of the folks I support. We’ve had four cases just so far this week, and these people weren’t doing anything nefarious—just trying to download Skype or other legitimate programs (but from incorrect websites).
The most common offender I’ve seen is called Conduit.
As to your second post, are you sure you don’t have MacKeeper installed? (Check your Applications folder.) If so, I would uninstall that puppy as fast as you can. There may be some “debate” as to whether MacKeeper is legitimate software, but in my opinion, it’s…ummm…useless. Yeah, that’s it.
If you don’t have MacKeeper installed, check your browser settings for pop-ups. In Safari, look within Safari> Preferences> Security; there’s a box labeled “Block pop-up windows” that you can select.
Hope that helps!
Melissa
These are apps so that you can view a video or something like that?
Hey Lee,
What I meant by that was anything that you might want to use that Apple doesn’t offer, like Skype, for example. It’s good to be sure that the download link you’re clicking is a legitimate one, but it’s not always easy for folks to figure that out, I find.
—Melissa
Got it. I was thinking of those cases where some website wants you to download an extension or something.
Stick with fruits and vegetables from inside the walled garden
Agreed agreed agreed! Download from the App Store, people.
Wow! I had a dozen items to remove. iPhoto–which I haven’t been able to open for ages–seemed especially infected with the things.
That’s kind of silly advice. There are a score of apps I need, for which there is no equivalent on the App Store. I cannot be the only one, or even in the minority.
Hi iJack!
I was (mostly) kidding around—though I do think it’s good advice for people who aren’t technologically savvy.
—Melissa
THANK YOU for this recommendation, which I got in a response from Dave and John. I got caught
by finally giving in to a relentless push from some crapware posing as a Flash update. I think the one it installed was SearchProtect. Between comments taken from a page on Apple’s Discussions (which John also echoed) and your recommendation for this VERY nice little utility, I think I’ve weeded out at least the worst of it. Definitely worth sending a ten-spot to the developer.
And this comes after many years of having usually been almost paranoid-meticulous in watching out for this kind of aggravation, often even using a mouseover to discover “Aha! A *scam*!” in the URL line. So I VERY much appreciate this. Good work, Melissa!
Aw, I’m happy to have helped in some small way!
And don’t feel bad about ending up with adware—for some reason, a lot of people seem to be getting stuck with it these days. The bad guys are getting sneakier!
—Melissa
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