Why you should stop using CCleaner!

Overview:

CCleaner, (originally Crap Cleaner), developed by Piriform Software, is a utility used to clean potentially unwanted files and invalid Windows Registry entries from a computer. It's one of the longest-established system cleaners, first launched in 2004. It was originally developed for Microsoft Windows only, but in 2012, a macOS version was released. An Android version was released in 2014.

The program has garnered around 2.5 billion downloads total with 5 million active downloads per week. This was perfect for the time being, until in 2017, Avast an anti-virus company known for its shady marketing practices, acquired CCleaner and made changes that would ultimately change the perspective of CCleaner as a whole.

Issues CCleaner faced:

1. CCleaner tends to ignore user preference in their settings, because of that, the program has made silent updates without the knowledge of the user. This privacy issue was exposed in Piriform's forums, then a quote by a member of the company, "Since the release of v5.46 we have updated some users to this version to meet legal requirements and give users more autonomy and transparency over their privacy settings." Pretty shameful if you asked me.

2. A feature in CCleaner called "Active Monitoring" was introduced in version 5.45. This feature is available in the options tab and is a standard feature that collects anonymous data about your system. Although, you can easily just disable this feature, except that really doesn't matter though. If you close CCleaner and reopen the app again, the feature has been automatically re-enabled. This issue was short-lived because Piriform removed the feature after the next update due to upset users leaving the app for good.

3. A few years ago, a 32-bit version of CCleaner was hacked and distributed malware (Trojan). The malware was used to collect information about the systems it was installed on and it also can run malicious code on those affected systems. This was later resolved and confirmed by the company, however, this has made users question the security of the program itself. It's also ironic that they were bought by an anti-virus company that's known for a lot of shady practices and spawning tons of fake virus pop-ups, forcing users to purchase its software. Good work Avast!

4. In the old days of CCleaner, most features were available for everyone, free or not, anyone could use them to improve their systems, that is until the acquisition from Avast when most elements were put behind a paywall. Let's remember that CCleaner claims to be lightweight and doesn't contain any ads in their program, all of that has changed and CCleaner has been filled with ads and useless features that are considered bloatware.

Off-topic but important for you to know:

5. Let's not forget the fact that the program was acquired by Avast anti-virus. Avast has had several glaring problems throughout its life. Problems such as; gathering millions of users' data and selling it to a company named Jumpshot (which was later exposed by an AD blocker for its devious practices), acquiring another anti-virus company named AVG which pretty much converted the entire thing into Avast, its support firm Yogi has been harassing many users to pay for their services and so many others that would make this entire paragraph too long!

Alternatives:

There are alternatives to CCleaner that can do a very good job at what they're selling you. But first, let's talk about one program that can do something similar to CCleaner but has come pre-installed with your operating system and has been around the decades, I'm talking about Microsoft Disk Cleanup.

I know that Disk Cleanup can't do much compared to CCleaner, but at least their service is decent and is 100% free and safe. They can remove temporary files, fix broken registries, delete old updates, etc. This can be good at deleting any existing CCleaner registry that you obviously don't need.

Glarysoft (Glary Utilities), is a free system utility to clean and repair registries, defrag disks, remove junk files, fix PC errors, protect privacy, and provide more solutions to other PC problems. I have personally tested this program out and all I can say is that it this a very good one. They can do many things that CCleaner can't do, There's some paywall stuff, but most features are still technically free. No trials, no forced payments, no issues that can bring this app down! I will send you the link to this app for you to try.

Download Here: Glary Utilities | Glarysoft

(We are not affiliated with this product)

Thank you for reading this blog post! Share this with your friends who might still be using CCleaner so they can uninstall it and use the alternatives that I have mentioned. With that said, I hope you learned something today.

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