{"id":21854,"date":"2024-05-01T21:22:56","date_gmt":"2024-05-01T21:22:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gridinsoft.com\/blogs\/?p=21854"},"modified":"2024-09-20T17:38:00","modified_gmt":"2024-09-20T17:38:00","slug":"adaware-web-companion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gridinsoft.com\/blogs\/adaware-web-companion\/","title":{"rendered":"Adaware Web Companion"},"content":{"rendered":"

Web Companion is an unwanted program<\/strong> works as a web protection tool. It appears unexpectedly, after the installation of a different program, and tries to make the user pay for a \u201cpremium\u201d version. Questionable effectiveness and bloated results are what makes it not recommended to use.<\/p>\n

Pseudo-effective applications are not severely dangerous, but they can still make your user experience worse. In their operations, such apps can block some of the genuine files and sites. Moreover, they sometimes collect extensive information about user activities, which is a privacy risk.<\/p>\n

What is a Web Companion?<\/h2>\n

Web Companion is a program advertised as a network security tool, a makeshift firewall<\/a>, which scans network traffic to protect the user from questionable websites. Its efficiency, however, starts looking less convincing when you try to use the program in its intended way. An inflated number of reviewed connections, absent information about the scanning \u2013 that is only the tip of the iceberg<\/strong>. Below, you will find a detailed runtime analysis of this app.<\/p>\n

\"Web
Main website of Web Companion – looks quite good.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

First suspicions appear when you review the spreading ways of this program. It has an official website, but I doubt a lot of people have gotten Web Companion from here. A much more common way, by user reports, is installing in a bundle with various freeware. Particular programs of that kind are BitTorrent Classic, BitTorrent Web, and FormatFactory. Some of them offer to choose whether you want to install these, but some do it right away, ignoring the user’s choice.<\/p>\n

\"Bundled
An offer to install Web Companion in BitTorrent Classic installer. Others do not have even this. Source: AppEsteem<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The cybersecurity community considers software bundling an unwanted spreading method, and I totally agree with this conclusion. This makes Web Companion look as an unwanted program<\/a>. And this is also accompanied by the user experience \u2013 let\u2019s get into it step by step.<\/p>\n

Web Companion Runtime Analysis<\/h2>\n

To have a proper user experience<\/strong>, I\u2019ve decided to get this application from the bundle. It did not take long to get one, so out of the blue, the installation window appeared.<\/p>\n

\"Installer<\/p>\n

From the first glance, Web Companion is an OK program. A few paid, though not essential functions, and the rest of the functionality, although sparse, is available right away. However, its main screen raises the first concern \u2013 stat counters look artificially bloated, without any ability to see the list of web requests it has detected. Magically, after rebooting the machine, the number of URLs related to Chrome browser almost quadrupled \u2013 from 24 to 91.<\/p>\n