Q: Adwaremedic is it safe ?
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Apr 25, 2015 10:30 AMby Linc Davis,It should be noted that many of Apple's techs are currently recommending AdwareMedic to people having problems with adware.
Let's assume that this is true. If it's corporate policy that "adwaremedic" is a valid remedy for adware infection, then that information should be on the support page dealing with adware (which it isn't.) If it's not corporate policy, then Apple representatives should not be improvising just to get rid of people quickly. Have they read the source code of adwaremedic? Have they done their own research to assess its safety and efficacy? If not, who has done that research?
Regardless, there's a big difference between doing something on the advice of an Apple representative, and doing it because your followers on this site advised it. On the one hand, Apple is responsible for the consequences; on the other, nobody is.
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Apr 25, 2015 1:18 PMby thomas_r.,Linc Davis wrote:
Have they read the source code of adwaremedic? Have they done their own research to assess its safety and efficacy? If not, who has done that research?
Regardless, there's a big difference between doing something on the advice of an Apple representative, and doing it because your followers on this site advised it. On the one hand, Apple is responsible for the consequences; on the other, nobody is.
Who has done research to assess the safety and efficacy of your own 19,000+ character shell script that you frequently post? Nobody. Who is responsible for consequences if something goes wrong? Nobody, other than an anonymous stranger who may or may not be named "Linc Davis."
You frequently respond to such questions by saying that anyone can read your script (not really true) and that if there were something wrong with it, someone would have spotted it and reported it. Here's the problem with that last bit, though... you have posted your script here thousands of times. It has been revised quite a few times as well (nobody knows how many, since you don't publish release notes), so there are many different versions of it floating around out there. Further, each time you post it is an individual instance, not in any way related to any of the others. From a security standpoint, each one must be considered to be a separate variant of the script, with unknown differences from all others. (You could have avoided such problems if you had put your script in a User Tip on this site, to refer to when advising someone to run it, as I suggested to you a long time ago. There would be only one master script for people to examine, the changes to which could be monitored.)
Do you really expect anyone to believe that someone has done a security audit of each and every one of those thousands of different scripts? What assurance do we have that some of them don't include malicious code, targeting specific individuals and brilliantly hidden amongst countless other harmless variants of the script?
Why should the people here trust your script over my app?
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Apr 25, 2015 1:42 PMby Linc Davis,OK, Thomas, let's pretend that your comment is both relevant and correct—neither of which it is. So my script is unsafe because you can't understand it, and nobody should run it. How does that make any difference to whether people should run "adwaremedic," or whether Apple reps should recommend it when it hasn't been tested by them, or by Apple? Or are you going to say that my script really is safe, so it's fine for people to run either it or adwaremedic, just because someone they don't know told them to? Or is it that my script is unsafe, but adwaremedic is safe, just because you say so?
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Apr 25, 2015 3:40 PMby thomas_r.,Linc Davis wrote:
So my script is unsafe because you can't understand it
No, that's not what I said. Just as you have never tested AdwareMedic, I have never expended the necessary time and energy to decipher your script.
How does that make any difference to whether people should run "adwaremedic," or whether Apple reps should recommend it when it hasn't been tested by them, or by Apple?
It doesn't, but you're the one who brought up the question of whether anyone had reviewed the source code, or had done research to determine its safety. I'm merely pointing out that you're constantly running around posting a script that is similarly unreviewed, yet somehow, because that is yours, it's okay. Your arguments are consistently inconsistent.
Or are you going to say that my script really is safe, so it's fine for people to run either it or adwaremedic, just because someone they don't know told them to?
That wouldn't make any sense, now would it? I'm saying that people should exercise exactly the same caution with regard to your script as they should with running something like AdwareMedic. Caution is good. There's a big difference between telling people to exercise caution as general rule, however, and saying that people should not use a particular app for which there is absolutely no evidence of problems, or calling people who recommend such an app "ignoramuses."
Or is it that my script is unsafe, but adwaremedic is safe, just because you say so?
Again, what sense does that make?
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Apr 26, 2015 3:53 AMby EveryUserName HasBeenTaken,It depends on the pop ups. If you have MacKeeper, then its telling you to use it because you have issues with your Mac, and need to do a system's sweep.
If you want to block pop ups other then that the solution is in the setting for your Safari program, you musta accidentally switched on the ability to get pop ups. Just go through preferences in Safari.
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Apr 26, 2015 3:57 AMby petermac87,Escuse the last poster. You will see their maturity level here from when they joined today before deciding to troll every thread they could with misinformation.
iPhoto to Photo > The journey ...
Pete
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by thomas_r.,Apr 26, 2015 4:14 AM
thomas_r.
Apr 26, 2015 4:14 AM
in response to EveryUserName HasBeenTaken
Level 7
(30,944 points)
Mac OS XEveryUserName HasBeenTaken wrote:
If you have MacKeeper, then its telling you to use it because you have issues with your Mac, and need to do a system's sweep.
If you have MacKeeper, then you need to remove it ASAP, since it's junk software by an unethical developer, and is a borderline scam.
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Apr 30, 2015 3:49 AMby Jtodd419,Just to alleviate any doubts (hopefully) about the program for anyone who is considering downloading... AdwareMedic has been rigorously tested and is an approved tool used by all Advanced Repair Agents in Geek Squad. As an employee there, I can confidently say AdwareMedic does its job well and is one of the tools we run on every mac that gets checked in.
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Apr 30, 2015 8:24 AMby pbodde,Have been a Mac user for a long time and experienced my first problem with adware yesterday evening. Researched similar problems and solutions, isolated solutions that were repeatedly reported effective across several forums, used Adwaremedic, and my issue was resolved. Every user has to decide his/her own comfort level with risk and with solution implementation. Research can assist with both. If you see the same solution across 10 forums, for example, with a 90%+ success rate, that's a good indication of low risk. If the owner of the solution is engaged, visible, and has a prompt response time to issues, that's another positive indicator. Thanks, Thomas, for this tool and for your engagement in the Mac community.
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May 17, 2015 10:57 AMby thomas_r.,Lenny 118 wrote:
will AdwareMedic remove the "www.gstatic.com" pop up window?
That depends on what's causing that window to pop up.
If you've got a pop-up that you cannot dismiss, and it's telling you something like that you have a virus or that your computer has been locked by a government agency or something similar, that's not adware. That's a scam website, which can be dismissed by following the instructions here:
(Fair disclosure: I may receive compensation from links to my sites, TheSafeMac.com and AdwareMedic.com.)
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May 17, 2015 11:10 AMby ChitlinsCC,Lenny has a screenshot in www.gstatic.com pop up - ammended from the backchannel... gstatic = GoggleMaps?
