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In an announcement, Piriform, the company that produces CCleaner, played down the seriousness of the issue, saying that only a small percentage of its users would have downloaded the malicious version (the product did not install automatic updates). But it is not beyond the realms of possibility that the attackers had specific targets in mind when they spread the malware this would explain why it exfiltrated information about the infected machine. It is unclear whether this has happened, and there is no evidence to suggest that it did. However, should the attackers have used the backdoor as a foothold to install more persistent malware on an infected machine, this malware would likely still be active. The takedown of the C&C servers and the takeover of the relevant domains means that the original malware itself has now been neutralized.
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In a blog post, the Cisco researchers provide a good overview of the malware and its C&C communication to a hard-coded IP address, with a Domain Generation Algorithm (DGA) as a backup communication channel. Researchers from Cisco Talos found a version of the product that came with a malicious payload added to it, which installed a backdoor on targeted systems.
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You can use Windows cleaning options and other third-party tools that do a better job at tasks like finding duplicate files.For the security community, 2017 might well be called the year of the update: two of the biggest security stories – the WannaCry outbreak and the Equifax breach – involved organizations being hit badly as a consequence of not having installed (security) updates, while another major story, that of (Not)Petya, concerned a threat that spread through a compromised update system used by the Ukrainian tax software MEDoc.Ī new story can now be added to the latter category: that of CCleaner, a legitimate tool widely used for cleaning up Windows and OS X computers. If you rarely run low on disk space, only use one browser, and don't mind updating software manually, then there's really no need for you to use it. So whether you should use CCleaner depends on your needs. And some CCleaner tools, like Uninstall and Startup, just duplicate Windows functionality and are thus of little use.
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TreeSize is a much better disk analyzer and Patch My PC is better at updating software.
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Many of these are free and often do a better job than CCleaner.įor example, Windows's Disk Cleanup handles a lot of what CCleaner's cleaning tools do. However, you can access a lot of CCleaner's features in other utilities and software. And the Drive Wiper and Software Updater (if you pay for Pro) are useful. For instance, if you use multiple browsers, it's convenient to remove temporary files from all of them at once.
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To be fair, there is some use to CCleaner. The only all-new feature, Health Check, is just a more convenient way to clean up data you can select manually in Custom Clean. Microsoft's official statement on Registry cleaners recommends staying away from them don't even bother with this feature of CCleaner.Īside from the privacy and security issues, most of what we said about CCleaner in 2018 (in the article mentioned earlier) still stands. While most people regard CCleaner's Registry cleaner as better than other random ones online, you still don't need to use it. In fact, if a Registry cleaner is too zealous, it can actually cause more problems than it solves.
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While orphaned entries and other minor problems do occur in the Registry over time, there is no good evidence that cleaning the Registry will speed up your computer. This section is simple: you don't need to use Registry cleaners. On Applications, you can clear temporary data for other browsers as well as apps like Steam, VLC, and TeamViewer.Ĭheck everything you're interested in cleaning and hit Analyze to see how much space your action will save. The Windows section has Edge and internet Explorer browser data, as well as Windows files like log data, thumbnail caches, and emptying the Recycle Bin.
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