Ysbweb and the crack extractor - part 2

I said this wasn't the end of it, didn't I! Senior Research Analyst AluriaJames (as he is known on the Interweb) contacted me yesterday about another Ysbweb "Crack Extractor", and this one seems to step up the campaign a little. Let's see what we can find...

Here is AluriaJames' original report - for a moment, the scales of justice tip downwards slightly, as ysbweb have at least removed 180 Solutions from the payload. Imagine the commotion if they hadn't! However, those scales rapidly hurtle towards ground-level at the speed of light..check this out...

Last time, it was a standalone executable - nothing was bundled with it. But figuring people wouldn't fall for this forever, we now have a slightly different spin on things. Download it from a website now, and you get all kinds of useless crapola in the bundle - presumably to make the end-user thing they're getting all kinds of red-hot goodies. Word to your mother - these most definitely aren't red, they certainly aren't hot and you've got more chance of hitting some "goodies" by listening to that god awful song with the high pitched whiney noise thing in the background. You know the one. Where that girl does the dance.

First thing you see in this bundle of "joy" is this thing. Apologies for the rather lame screenshot - they do get better. So, Mr I-want-my-cracked-software eagerly clicks away, and...

Oh noes!! For some mysterious reason my crack extractor ain't extracting no crack! You lied to me, interweb! You lied!!!!

So, burned and somewhat annoyed by this turn of events, what do you think our master cracker will do now? Any guesses?

That's right, he heads over to the other folder in this bundle in a fit of rage and sees this little lot. And, of course, it doesn't take a genius to work out that he will click each file to "see what it does". Hmm, might fix this damn crack extractor yet...

Nope, sorry! Little Jimmy Crack-pants is about to get pwned. When he hits the .EXE, you then get the familiar licence agreement popup box from the last install. However, Little Jimmy Crack-Pants has done some evolving of his own, and (in the back of his mind) is thinking....hmmm....something stinks here. My pal Bobby Crack-Pants got whacked by something a while back. I know - I'll read the EULA!!!

Unfortunately for Jimmy, it won't help a bit. Clicking on the link on an installer splash screen would usually pop open a browser window with full terms and conditions in, yes?

Well, not in the wacky world of Ysbweb! They try and contain a licence agreement page inside a tiny framed box in the software, which they know full well is far too small for anyone to read with any ease.

Now, is any kid that this software is clearly aimed at going to bother reading any of that jibber-jabber when it's presented in such a stupid fashion? Of course not, they're going to click install faster than you can blink.

And you know what? Just like last time, there is no crack extractor - just a poor ruse to convince lots of should-know-better kids to install a pile of advertising software they don't want. Woohoo, 15% off viagra and all the crappy holiday popups I can eat!!

I wonder what form our elusive crack extractor will take next? Who knows, but maybe next time actually including one would be a good idea. Seeing as this install is already mired in sleaze, if someone is going to infer something is involved in illegal acts to get people to run it, why stop there? You might as well go the whole hog and bloody well include what you're promising.

But then you're just swapping one pile of sleaze for another...

Wait - I'm not finished! The final twist in the tail awaits you. Shop at home Select, one of the regular features of a Ysbweb install, have just had one gigantic boot planted firmly in the tailpipe by the mighty Commission Junction - this comes hot on the heels of 180 Solutions getting the same treatment not so long ago. Now, both 180 and Shop at home select have been involved in Ysbweb bundles - is it just me or is the software in these things starting to resemble a hit list, being gunned down one by one? Looks that way. And at this rate I think we can expect more to come...