Free Burger from TGI Fridays
As many users on facebook have seen there is an offer from TGI Fridays to get a free burger. I signed up. Why not? It’s a free burger and you don’t have to do more than give out your e-mail. Well time came to get the free burger. I went to their website and notices a few things wrong. For starters, you have to be running windows. That’s a problem for me. I run Linux, but I do have my windows inside a virtual machine. Anyways, I load up my windows and try to get my coupon, but what do I see, but I download for a program called couponprinter.exe from coupons.com. That seems a bit strange to me. So before downloading it I did some checking. I found it has been reported at a malicious program and according to many users it installs spyware.
The next day I was at my parents house and while waiting for other family members to arrive I went to check my e-mail using my Mother’s computer that I keep clean… very clean. I found that exact couponprinter.exe program on her computer. I didn’t think much of it at the time. I did my thing including backups and cleaning as I do when ever I see my family. It turns out that the very next week I was back. I checked on my mom’s computer. She said the only time it was used was to check on her e-mail. I found more spyware. I thought that was pretty interesting.
To test I removed all the spyware and rebooted. It was back. I then decided to remove the couponprinter.exe program she installed just as a test. I rebooted and nothing. The computer was clean. Now why I didn’t write down what I found I will never know. Just a lapse in judgment. Just to double check when I got back home I downloaded the installer on my Linux machine and uploaded the file to jotti’s virus scanner. Only one program reported it bad. Dr Web reported it as Adware.Coupons.34. Check it out Here. I’m pretty sure I saw more than just the one when I ran Spybot: Search & Destroy.
So, as much as I hate to say it (for possible legal issues), I would recommend NOT installing this program. Screw the free burger. I don’t want it anymore.
If you installed the program I highly recommend removing it and use free programs like Adaware and Spybot: Search & Destroy to remove any traces the coupon printer program installed. These programs are available for windows users. If your on a mac I’m not sure. I don’t have a mac nor did I test the mac version (if any) of the program to see if there was anything bad.
