You glance at the taskbar and spot an icon you have never seen before. Or maybe you open your web browser and the homepage is different, or there is a toolbar sitting at the top of the screen that was not there yesterday. As far as you remember you did not install anything, so where did it come from?
This is one of the most common things people notice on their computers and the confusion that comes at the time is completely reasonable.
The most likely explanation: bundled software
The number one cause of the unknown software is the installer you didn’t read all the way through. When you download something free, whether it is a PDF reader, a media player, a browser plugin, or a game, the installer often carries extra passengers. Somewhere in the process there were pre-ticked checkboxes offering a new default search engine, a toolbar or a free trial of something else entirely. Most people click “Next” without reading the agreements and messages properly and the “extras” install quietly alongside whatever they actually wanted.
This is technically aboveboard from a legal standpoint, which is why it does not always trigger your security software: the software was approved, even if nobody noticed the consent happening.
The other ways it can happen
Bundled installers are the most common route, but they are not the only way that unknown software or changes are made. Visiting a compromised website on an outdated browser can sometimes trigger a silent install without any clicks at all, particularly if your system has not been kept up to date. There is also the chance that another staff member downloaded something, clicked through without paying attention, and the result is now sitting on your desktop looking unfamiliar.
Why it is worth taking seriously
What lands this way falls into a few categories:
- bloatware that’s annoying but harmless;
- adware that quietly tracks your browsing habits and feeds you targeted ads;
- occasionally something worse than the above two items.
The problem is that it is genuinely difficult for a non-technical person to tell which category something falls into just by looking at it and making the wrong call. Ignoring something that is logging your keystrokes is a real risk, but so is trying to manually delete system-related files that look suspicious but are not.
Uninstalling from the programs list does no always clear things out properly either. Some of these installations leave behind browser extensions that reinstall themselves, scheduled tasks that run in the background or registry entries that persist after the main program appears to be gone.
Not sure what you are looking at?
If you are a business located in Australia and something has appeared on your computer that you did not deliberately install or if you suspect something is not right, contact us here at DP Computing. We can identify what it is, remove it properly if it is a problem and check whether anything else came in with it. The unsettling feeling of finding something on your machine you did not put there is usually worth a quick chat to see if it is harmful or not.