BlockUTubeAde

Posted: March 14, 2014

Threat Metric

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The following fields listed on the Threat Meter containing a specific value, are explained in detail below:

Threat Level: The threat level scale goes from 1 to 10 where 10 is the highest level of severity and 1 is the lowest level of severity. Each specific level is relative to the threat's consistent assessed behaviors collected from SpyHunter's risk assessment model.

Detection Count: The collective number of confirmed and suspected cases of a particular malware threat. The detection count is calculated from infected PCs retrieved from diagnostic and scan log reports generated by SpyHunter.

Volume Count: Similar to the detection count, the Volume Count is specifically based on the number of confirmed and suspected threats infecting systems on a daily basis. High volume counts usually represent a popular threat but may or may not have infected a large number of systems. High detection count threats could lay dormant and have a low volume count. Criteria for Volume Count is relative to a daily detection count.

Trend Path: The Trend Path, utilizing an up arrow, down arrow or equal symbol, represents the level of recent movement of a particular threat. Up arrows represent an increase, down arrows represent a decline and the equal symbol represent no change to a threat's recent movement.

% Impact (Last 7 Days): This demonstrates a 7-day period change in the frequency of a malware threat infecting PCs. The percentage impact correlates directly to the current Trend Path to determine a rise or decline in the percentage.

Ranking:	408
Threat Level:	2/10
Infected PCs:	330,189

First Seen:	March 14, 2014
Last Seen:	October 17, 2023
OS(es) Affected:	Windows

BlockUTubeAde is a Potentially Unwanted Program that claims to provide advertisement-blocking features for YouTube, but, ironically, uses its functions to inject advertisements into other Web pages. As simple adware, BlockUTubeAde doesn't engage in deliberate attacks against your PC, but malware researchers often find that the advertisement networks abused by adware tend to lack common security standards that would weed out misleading tactics and script exploits. These built-in security issues, along with other, equally suspicious elements of BlockUTubeAde's installation, cause its classification as a PUP, and, like all PUPs, you should remove BlockUTubeAde with appropriate security tools unless you have exceptionally clear reasons for not doing so.

A Case Study in a Self-Contradicting Browser Add-On

As long as easy advertising revenues remain within reach of unscrupulous add-on designers, malware researchers expect to see fresh adware for examination, but these advertising add-ons aren't always as honest as they could be in describing their purposes. BlockUTubeAde is one of the most obvious examples of an adware program that claims to have advantages for filtering out unwanted online content, but, in fact, performs the exact opposite duties. Malware researchers haven't found any signs of YouTube advertisement-blocking functions from BlockUTubeAde, which, instead, uses your browser as a medium for displaying pop-ups, thumbnails and sponsored links for its advertising partners.

BlockUTubeAde's advertisements may affect other Web pages loaded by your browser indiscriminately. Other facts that particularly concern malware experts are that BlockUTubeAde, by default, blocks all standard methods of disabling its add-on features or even uninstalling it through your browser or the Windows Control Panel. Even without the latter evidence, you shouldn't consider BlockUTubeAde to be a net benefit to your PC, and its advertisements may expose you to phishing attacks, tech support misleading tactics and other Web-based threats.

Squeezing a BlockUTubeAde out of Your YouTube

Malware researchers usually consider the removal of adware programs to be all but essential for any PC's online security, and this especially applies to adware with additional suspicious attributes, such as BlockUTubeAde. Since neither the Control Panel nor your browser's add-on settings will be capable of uninstalling BlockUTubeAde, the use of appropriate security products with anti-adware features is suggested. BlockUTubeAde hasn't shown any inclinations to resisting the system scan and software removal techniques of competent anti-malware suites, and no extra steps should be necessary, unless other PC threats become involved.

BlockUTubeAde also has a history of installing itself automatically. Most PUPs accomplish this through bundling themselves with separate, free products, such as media players, browser updates, codec packages or unrelated browser add-ons. Malware researchers wouldn't recommend trusting the downloads of any site known to distribute adware such as BlockUTubeAde, but if you must do so, always scan these files for potential bundles before launching them.

Technical Details

Additional Information

The following URL's were detected:

quicklisti.com