CCleaner silently compromised, contains backdoor/maleware

[LambertandHam]

Huge news if you use CCleaner like me. The program has been silently compromised for at least a month to add in a backdoor. I deleted the portable version from my computer, am currently scanning and might do a full restart/restore.

Piriform this morning warned customers that the Windows 32-bit edition of version 5.33.6162 of CCleaner, and version 1.07.3191 of CCleaner Cloud, were "illegally modified before it was released to the public". This was used to infect PCs with a backdoor that can run code from the attacker's remote IP address.

The tainted versions of CCleaner and CCleaner Cloud were released on August 15 and August 24, respectively.

link

[Gotmadskillzson]

Re: CCleaner silently compromised, contains backdoor/maleware

I'm not running 32 bit Windows so I'm not worried about it.

[countryboy]

Re: CCleaner silently compromised, contains backdoor/maleware

Never used it.

[LambertandHam]

Re: CCleaner silently compromised, contains backdoor/maleware

I'm not running 32 bit Windows so I'm not worried about it.

Still worth a check and an update just to be sure. Thankfully nothing found on my PC after scans, although I was using the portable version.

[daflyboys]

Re: CCleaner silently compromised, contains backdoor/maleware

Never used it.

It's an excellent registry cleaner. Good for cleaning junk files too. Highly recommend... well, the non-virus version.

[p_rushing]

Re: CCleaner silently compromised, contains backdoor/maleware

Still worth a check and an update just to be sure. Thankfully nothing found on my PC after scans, although I was using the portable version.

The scan wouldn't have found anything, it was so buried it even passed as safe.

From a security aspect, there wasn't any real risk. The rogue installer was only on 1 server and then reached out to 1 server to collect the data. That server was shut down quickly, so there was no where for the data to go. The data also was just hardware, OS, etc info, so it would be hard to do too much with it. It also only affected 1 version, so unless you update immediately, you might not even have installed it.

[DieHardYankee26]

Re: CCleaner silently compromised, contains backdoor/maleware

Windows Defender caught it for me, I'm running 64 bit so i guess it didn't actually run but it was still there.

A registry cleaner gets bought out by an anti virus company and spreads malware to its users. Who watches the watchmen I guess.

[slickdtc]

CCleaner silently compromised, contains backdoor/maleware

A registry cleaner gets bought out by an anti virus company and spreads malware to its users. Who watches the watchmen I guess.

Strange isn't it?

I was going to make a joke here about how I use Avast and it is Russian-based (which I was mistaken about, it's Czech-based), which just seems sketchy. When I went to fact check myself, I found out who the anti-virus company was that bought CCleaner (Piriform) -- Avast. D'Oh!

[SuperBowlNachos]

Re: CCleaner silently compromised, contains backdoor/maleware

They were recently bought out by Avast. Expect it to seriously go downhill and also start giving you a pop up every day.

[AlexWilliams20]

Re: CCleaner silently compromised, contains backdoor/maleware

Is this a problem on a 32 bit Windows? As much as I know it may cause issues on a 64 bit Windows, but I'd better check. As much as I know CCleaner was considered the best registry cleaner and the most used among users all over the world, so I don't think it might be compromised. Maybe this is just a strategy of the competition to discredit it or something like this, but from what I've seen online a lot of people still use this and have no issues. I'll still check this, but these are just my thoughts about this.