Home Malware Programs Adware BitGuard

BitGuard

Posted: October 2, 2013

Threat Metric

Ranking: 9,990
Threat Level: 2/10
Infected PCs: 3,471
First Seen: October 2, 2013
Last Seen: September 19, 2023
OS(es) Affected: Windows

BitGuard (which should be distinguished from BT Guard, a similarly-named, but unrelated program that includes proxy features popular among torrent network users) is a browser hijacker that claims to protect your browser from compromised sites or unwanted changes while also implementing a few unwanted changes of its own. By hijacking your browser's homepage, hijacking your browser's default search engine and then preventing you from reversing any of these changes, BitGuard reveals its real purpose as a browser hijacker.

BitGuard: the Guard with Its Own Interests at Heart

With no obvious marketing campaign or company behind its distribution, BitGuard shows all the obvious signs of being a PUP that may claim to protect your browser, but is unlikely to offer any real security advantages. Even ignoring these factors, BitGuard has shown numerous negative traits in malware researchers' analyses, including:

  • Preventing itself from being uninstalled through the Windows Control Panel. This function, it should be stressed, is a deliberate blocking of your ability to remove BitGuard, rather than a failure to remove all of its components during the uninstall process.
  • Resetting various Web browsers' homepages and default search engines to unwanted websites, such as search sites with poor reputations.
  • Blocking any further changes to the above settings, regardless of whether they're implemented by other programs or the PC's user.

When combined, these traits turn BitGuard into nothing more than a browser hijacker that pretends to help your browser's security – when BitGuard's real functions merely are to take you to sites that can't acquire traffic through consensual methods. Accordingly, malware researchers have classified BitGuard as a low-level PC threat that should be removed from your computer since there's no reason why a reliable browser add-on ever would need to block you from removing BitGuard.

Stopping Your Web Browser from Being Bitten by BitGuard

In the extremely unlikely case that BitGuard does provide some security benefits to your browser, malware researchers still must urge you to delete BitGuard ASAP, due to the inherent security problems in its search engine and homepage-hijacking functions. While you will not be able to remove BitGuard through your Control Panel, which would suffice for a benign application, anti-malware software can be entrusted with the job of deleting BitGuard without many expected difficulties. Extra steps like booting into Safe Mode or restarting through peripheral devices are optional, but can be useful for disabling BitGuard while you uninstall BitGuard.

BitGuard uses non-consensual methods of installing itself, such as concealed software bundles and installer files that are mislabeled intentionally. Although you can't trust BitGuard to announce its installation during the process, making good use of anti-malware tools and browsing the Web with all relevant safety habits in the forefront of your mind may keep your PC far from the most likely sources of a BitGuard infection. In the worst cases, anti-malware products with active defensive features should be able to block BitGuard during the actual installation process, which malware experts can suggest as a last ditch defense.

Technical Details

Additional Information

The following URL's were detected:
breaking-news.me
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