RealPlayer Labeled ‘Badware’
Many, many times we are asked to remove viruses from computers. What we find in addition to viruses is typically a conglomeration of Malware, Spyware, and Adware that has slowed the affected computer to a crawl. Now we have another … Ware. Just thought you might want to know. Here is a link that you may find helpful before you install a program. http://www.stopbadware.org/
The following article was written by Brian Krebs on Computer Security. I found it informative and helpful and I hope you do too.
An industry-academia group designed to raise public awareness about software that violates fair information and privacy practices has labeled recent versions of RealPlayer video streaming software as “badware,” charging that the software surreptitiously installs pop-up ad serving software as well as the Rhapsody media player engine.
Stopbadware.org issued an alert about two software titles from RealNetworks - RealPlayer 10.5 and RealPlayer 11, saying each violated the group’s badware guidelines.
RP10.5 fails to alert the user that its “Message Center” feature — which is pitched as a way to keep the user up-to-date on security patches — will pop up ads from the system tray if the user doesn’t register the application.
RealPlayer 11 earned the badware mark because it installs (as an ActiveX control) the Rhapsody Player Engine without notifying the user, the report notes. In addition, when the user uninstalls RealPlayer, the Rhapsody player is left behind.
Stopbadware is a collaboration between Harvard Law School’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society and Oxford University’s Oxford Internet Institute, with support from companies like Google, Lenovo, and Sun Microsystems.
Typically, Google will flag Web sites that serve applications labeled as badware, placing a link below every badware site returned in a Google search that reads: “This site may harm your computer.” But they have not yet done so with RealNetwork, despite the kinds of marketing tactics described in this Stop Badware alert.
John Palfrey, executive director of the Berkman Center and a professor of Internet law at Harvard, said the RealNetworks company has a history of operating at the margins of consumer privacy issues. “What was clear to us was that [RealPlayer] 10.5 and 11 went over what was, to us, a clear line.”
Palfrey said Google was unlikely to list RealMedia’s site as badware, however: that classification, he noted, was generally reserved for sites that try to install unwanted or malicious software when a person merely visits the site.
Ryan Luckin, public relations manager for RealNetworks, took issue with portions of the report, saying while the company still supports 10.5, it no longer distributes it. Further, Luckin said, RP11 disables the Message Center by default. He said that RealMedia would consider changing its uninstaller to remove Rhapsody in future versions of RealPlayer, though he added that RP11 was likely to remain the default player available on its site for “a good chunk of time.”
All of this may come as little surprise to anyone who has installed RealPlayer on account of some video they needed to watch that wouldn’t render in any other media player, only to be pestered with constant pop-up ads that gobble up system resources.
But there are alternatives. If you just need to hear streaming Real audio, the free and excellent VLC Media Player can take care of that for you. For Windows users looking for a free alternative to render Real video content, a package called “Real Alternative” should do the trick. Real Alternative includes the codec needed to play Real video content, as well as the lightweight Media Player Classic. I have relied on this latter package to be my DVD player of choice on my main PC for the past several years now, and it works great.