Monday, April 22, 2013

Removing the CNet Download virus

Recently while working on a website, I noticed that some words were being underlined.  I did not make them links so I scrolled over the words and this popped up:

I immediately realized that I had a virus in my computer.  What on earth does "Sermons" have to do with eating bananas?  What total nonsense?  I tried scanning my computer with MSE and MBAM to no avail.  So I went to add/remove programs and there it was "GetSavin".  It easily removed itself that way. 

I did some research and this virus comes from going to download.com (download.cnet.com) and they install it on your computer. There was the day when I trusted download.com, I have long since learned to steer clear of them.  They install things on your computer without your permission and then activate it whenever they want.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

So Bob,
If this thing is showing up all over different news articles and the like, how does one keep it out? Or get rid of it?
I'm not on Windows, and no search on my system shows any such thing as "GetSavin".

Curious,
Jack

Everett Lazell said...

I use to trust CNET for downloading good free apps, but no longer. I used their installer and I did not opt-in for any software to be installed except the one I wanted and malware was installed anyway. I had to remove it with malwarebytes.