I tried to surf with my Chrome and I have hitman pro for scanning, for some reason, whenever I surf either Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox or Internet Explorer, ask.com installs itself and I have to clean it with HitmanPro-what the heck is ask.com? HitmanPro recognizes it as malware. However, whenever I surf all of the mentioned browsers under the supervision of Sandboxie 4.14, ask.com can never install itself in the first place! So, yes, I will definitely keep my Sandboxie4 after a long thinking, I simply trust it because of both security and privacy and because of this bad experience. So what exactly is ask.com, and should I be worried about this?
It's might be just a search engine (at least in Chrome). HitmanPro always finds it after update or Chrome reinstall. In Chrome you can right-click in address bar and select Edit search engines. Delete Ask.com built-in search engine and you won't get detection from HitmanPro any more... IMHO it can be considered as false positive from HitmanPro as no other antimalware flags this built-in search engine as possible malware.
I don't consider it is FP. Though it is not malicious, they're often introduced w/out actual user consent so it is most often PUP. Even Avira once bundled it for free product, but many people complained about it and removed it, and now Avira quit bundling ask. I once used ask, and found it is almost useless as a search engine, sorry for user if any.
I quit using Avira because of that ask.com about 1.5 years ago. Of course avast that I came back resorted also to use some spy tool later. At that time Avira was telling if I remember right that you have to use that ask.com site to have our web searches "safe". Nothing is safe with web searches as we have learned.
I finally figured out what it is! It comes only with Google Chrome, I retested everything again, Mozilla Firefox and Internet Explorer don't have problem with this at all. It is Google Chrome, when you install it, you also get with the package ask.com-now should I stay away from Google Chrome permanently if this is a spytool Also, by the way, I've been using Chrome for several months without any malware installation, so this ask.com is not a malware or even a pup, but it's annoying in every way, so what should I do, guys? Recommend me something, anything. I think this explains why Peter2150 never wanted to use Google Chrome in the first place.
Ask yourself why Google would integrate to it's browser some ask.come? You have got it elsewhere and it has somehow installed a toolbar or something to Chrome. It has nothing to do with Chrome itself. Like I told Avira AV used to install ask.com toolbar to browsers. Your case might be something else. Perhaps even you don't remember and have allowed Chrome be synched, so where ever someone has logged into your account, what he/she has as an extension gets installed to your browser too provided you too are synched.
So, why there is no ask.com anymore on my computer since there is no Google Chrome on my computer? So, I checked exactly what HitmanPro says, it is the following: C:\Documents and Settings\Direktor\Local Settings\Application Data\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Webdata Now this is classified as askbar/ask.com by HitmanPro and yet there is no trace of ask.com on my computer, no malwares installed. or anything else malicious, I checked at least 5 times, and my computer is really fast! Now, Webdata is a part of Google Chrome and its package, and there was no Webdata when I uninstalled Google Chrome and removed all the traces, than re-installed Google Chrome from ground zero. Webdata is a part of Google Chrome, and it has nothing to do with askbar/ask.com, sinc there is no ask.com on Google Chrome, not even as a search engine. So, I will listen to advices from Simplicity and SLE, which first told that this is false positive or/and issue with another software (HitmanPro, in this case).
Chrome was the only one "infected", so what do you expect after uninstalling it? I'll tell you the answer, it wasn't malware but just some browser setting HMP recognizes since it's usually made by adware. Just try to remember what you installed unsandboxed and any checkboxes you may have missed.
I never installed anything at all, that's the whole point of it, I was simply surfing the net, no installations, and like I said, no Google Chrome, no askbar/ask.com/Webdata, my computer has no infections just for the record, it simply started the first day I installed Google Chrome. So, if it comes with installation than it's not any kind of infection at all.
After seeing your edit, were you ever surfing unsandboxed? Did you run HMP sandboxed? Do you use Chrome Sync? If the answers are all no, then this may be a SBIE hole.
As already mentioned twice - this is ask search engine. I have exact same "problem" and only "solution" is to remove ask search engine. Here are instruction on managing search engines in Chrome: https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/95426?hl=en @CoolWebSearch did you check which search engines you have installed? I bet ask.com is one of them. And this engine is installed by default when Chrome is installed (at least in my country). There is no "infection" whatsoever.
