Q: Is MacKeeper a legitimate program?

A fiver!   That's 3.3 litres of petrol, for heaven's sake.   But we are starting to digress again.

Preditor wrote:

 

I will bet money that until i said "Little Snitch" you had never heard of it.

How about taking a look at the dates on every article I've ever written that contained the text "Little Snitch":

http://www.thesafemac.com/?s=Little+snitch&submit=Search

Your statements have become laughably ridiculous at this point, so I'm done trying to have a rational discussion with you.

seventy one wrote:

 

A fiver!   That's 3.3 litres of petrol, for heaven's sake.   But we are starting to digress again.

indeed, stay well.

Preditor wrote:

 

MacKeeper was on the 500gb drive for years before that.

OK, but it couldn't have been much more than one year since unless you were a beta tester.

You attempted to quote Wiki as if it was fact but that screen shot shows you that the wiki was wrong.

I never quoted Wiki, that was Andy.

I have no idea who was the 1st developer but It was on my G5 which is still being used by my son.

ZeoBIT spent the first couple of years of their existance developing PCKeeper and did not begin any real work on MacKeeper until the following year, according to what their CEO told me. Their Anti-Virus code at that time was exactly the same as they were using with PCKeeper, using Unix wine to port it to OS X. As I mentioned, I still have version 1.0 here and it was released on 25 Oct 2010. I suppose there could have been beta tests before that, but in all probability I would have heard something about it before then.

Here's the "About MacKeeper..." from version 1.0

Note the Copyright dates. I suspect if you check your current version, you will find the same start date.

I first downloaded it on 18 Jan 2011 to check out what first appeared to be a conflict with ClamXav, which is when I visited their tech support people. I later evaluated it for myself and decided I didn't need it. I think it was when version 2.0 came out as Intel only, that I uninstalled it completely.

On 8 Mar 2011 users were asked to help the developer of ClamXav resolve a problem regarding what reportedly was a ZeoBIT pardner who was using clamxav.org domain to trick users into downloading MacKeeper (reference). They did the same thing to CleanMyMac around the same time.

Here is the announcement in April that Kromtech Alliance Corp Acquires MacKeeper. Note that it also establishes the ZeoBIT, LLC establish date as 2009.

With that I'm planning on ending any further discussion on the matter by me.

As a certified Mac support professional for 5 years (not as long as many, but long enough) that has seen too many innocent/unknowing users tricked into installing and even paying for MacKeeper, I would strongly discourage anyone from installing MacKeeper or most anything that purports to accomplish what they claim. It's a pain, but can be uninstalled (after diligently searching online for good step by step instructions because I don't trust the maker's uninstaller).

Perhaps there are some that feel they benefit from having it installed, but it's not well written (can cause crashes, freezes, perhaps corruption of data), uses unethical advertising (poses as something recommended by Apple Inc., persistent/annoying pushiness, charges a lot of money for benefits that can be accomplished with much less or no money).

I work in the Apple Mac support industry. So I see a lot of problems. I don't believe Mac's don't have issues, because... well... people typically only come to me when they're having a problem with their Mac, whether just perceived or an actual issue. But I can say that I've seen this software too many times and it's only been trouble.

If you want real help to speed up, protect, clean, etc. your Mac, try these first:

1) Make a list (mental, on paper, or some typed out smartphone/computer file) of any anti-virus, anti-malware, anti-spyware, cleaning, etc. software you may have installed.

2) If you're close enough to an official (not just a 3rd party Apple Authorized Service Provider) Apple Store, make an appointment at their Genius Bar (maybe make 2 or 3 appointments back to back if you think you'll need more than 15 minutes), back up your computer (if you know how), and take the computer in and ask your questions and present them your list. If you haven't backed up your data or don't know how, then ask them to help you with that too. These appointments are free. They don't know everything, but they're free and they can (often) be helpful. If they don't help you to your satisfaction, then you can ask them to recommend nearby 3rd party Apple Authorized Service Providers that could spend more time helping you (which may not be free). At least the Apple Store Genius Bar appointments are free and they have no problem referring you elsewhere if it may help you more. Genius Bar support and 3rd party service provider "scopes of support" overlap, but they each have their purposes and advantages.

3) Find a 3rd party Apple Authorized Service from the previous Genius Bar appointment recommendations or from http://locate.apple.com/ (and click on the upper right "Service" section, choose "Mac", and enter your location).

4) Call them and ask (or just take your list there) and express your concern that your Mac seems to be running slowly and if they can help clean it up. If you haven't backed up your data or don't know how, then ask them to help you with that too.

Many recommendations as to how to best maintain or clean up your Mac will be personal preference, but I can confidently say to everyone: don't bother with MacKeeper. Even if you're not one of the many that pays MacKeeper money to cause more headache, don't take the risk. There are safer and better solutions.

~ Ben

Well said!

Well, to answe the OP's question technically, yes, MacKeeper is a legitimate program. They even have a page on the Apple app store but there are hardly any downloads from there and the few ratings are all either mediocre or just plain bad.

As stated in this review of MacKeeper review here, http://lureofmac.com/mackeeper-review-should-you-install-this-mac-utility-softwa re/, MacKeeper seems to do a lot of things. But then, most of the things it does are things that people will probably not really go out and search for.

I guess MacKeeper is like one of those crazy Swiss army knives that you buy. It can do a 100 different things but you will probably end up doing just 1 or 2 things!

Honestly, I don't think MacKeeper needs to be installed on a Mac.

"…they even have a page on the Apple app store…" Really? Where? I can't find it. Certainly not on the desktop App Store. There is also nothing for ZeoBit. It's also not on the iTunes App Store. It may have been on the App Store at some point, but it is not there now.

orbor wrote:

 

"…they even have a page on the Apple app store…" Really? Where? I can't find it.

Yes, it was called 911-Bundle and has been removed for whatever reason (here's the link that no longer works). ZeoBIT is transitioning development of MacKeeper along with two other software products to Kromtech and apparently going into the cloud business with ZeoNet.

MadMacs0 wrote:

 

orbor wrote:

 

"…they even have a page on the Apple app store…" Really? Where? I can't find it.

Yes, it was called 911-Bundle and has been removed for whatever reason

So it would not be correct to say that 'they have a page'

But they had a page.

I paid an installed it, and it slowed down my Mac to a practical halt. It definitely was a pain to remove.

A successful product does not need a name change.

DO NOT, DO NOT, DO NOT click on anything to do with MacKeeper.

THOMAS A REED, you are right on.  The MacKeeper pop up ads I keep getting on line are a scam.  Do not click on the link or in anyway acknowledge them.  It took an hour with the help of Applecare to find all the junk they downloaded to my computer.  There could still be more damage but not aware of it yet.  There was no menton of a fee or request to download.  No mention of a program.  I got pop up ads that covered the whole desk top, some were ****.    Everytime I went back to the page I had been viewing when I clicked on the MacKeeper ad I got the same flood of new pages with ads.

Not only that the email I sent to a friend with a link to the page I was viewing corrupted her computer as well.  Her son is still trying to fix the problem.  The corrumption resets dates to 2007, leaves scrambled pages when first going on line and erased her Kaspersky software.  I am a Mac user.  She is not and they still managed mess up her computer.

Satan is just one click away.

All Previous Arguments aside.

Here is my point (T.Reed) and do not go wining to moderators cause you dont like it or help cause however my last post was removed. You may have not

Tell me this. If i decided to make some malware that looks like an Apple authorized download and people started downloading it and having problems... Does that mean that apple product illegitimate? NO.

It makes me a malware-wolf but apple maintains its legitimacy. On another forum i remember people being skeptical of Apple updates and their new os releases because they thought it would throw their systems off. But Apple is still legit and other than versioning their system os is nearly flawless to me.

I have not seen any definitive testing that proves MK is bad. It didn't bother my computers ever. It seems more like a hunch than a semi-definitively tested estimation.

If a person got a bunch of stuff on their computer that they either didn't know was there or seemingly started when they downloaded an app. That doesn't prove that it came from MacKeeper anymore than it came from time machine. There are no points of entry data notes / Timeline that can show that these suddenly discovered files are from what mackeeper is doing or not doing.

All there are on the web is opinions. Who has tested this to give some true way of quantifying it. The extra sexy new macpro cylinder has definitive analysis on its performance. It has comparisons to the current macpros. Thats definitive enough for anyone.

Is it possible that you Thomas Reed could do such a test that shows exactly what your test system looked like before install of MK and what it looks like after running MK for a given period?

Is there a way of proving that these changes in your system performance were caused by MK?

Disagree.

I did install it and it brought my Mac to a practical halt. I disinstalled it (quite a procedure) and the Mac was fine again.

This is a test, not an opinion.

MK is junk, use it if you want to.