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Google Parasite Software Fix

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Alpha Doug

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A little heads up for Mac users. I noticed today that something was running and causing my computer to be constantly sending and receiving data over the net, thus causing my fans to run constantly. (MBP). (BTW, I run "menu meters" which gives me a visual rundown of various system functions in real time in my menu bar). I used Activity Monitor to look at running processes, and found a utility function called KSFETCH that was causing the constant searching. I Googled ( irony anyone?) that word and found that it is a parasitic little piece of code from Google that constantly looks for updates for Google software. Moreover, it has been booby trapped to prevent things like "Little Snitch" from shutting it down. There are several potential fixes for it, but I used a Terminal command: (defaults write com.google.Keystone.Agent checkInterval 0) and that seems to have permanently killed the little bugger. I hope. This is an unclever, totally ham handed approach by Google. Do No Evil my _____!
 
I have Little Snitch and it seems to prevent the Google updaters as it operates at a much lower level in the network stack and I can see LS rejecting those attempts but certainly there are other methods.
 
It's just annoying to have to deal with a parasitic software that re-spawns itself when you try to get rid of it. The command line I posted seems to kill it forever. I then dumped Chrome (don't need another browser), and I dumped Google Earth (on my computer, Google Earth dramatically crashes every time I ask it for directions or point it to a specific site., so not really useful anyway). Everything seems to be working fine now that I've "de-Googled" my computer. Actually, I should get better battery life without Google keeping my fans running.
 
Alpha Doug said:
A little heads up for Mac users. I noticed today that something was running and causing my computer to be constantly sending and receiving data over the net, thus causing my fans to run constantly. (MBP). (BTW, I run "menu meters" which gives me a visual rundown of various system functions in real time in my menu bar). I used Activity Monitor to look at running processes, and found a utility function called KSFETCH that was causing the constant searching. I Googled ( irony anyone?) that word and found that it is a parasitic little piece of code from Google that constantly looks for updates for Google software. Moreover, it has been booby trapped to prevent things like "Little Snitch" from shutting it down. There are several potential fixes for it, but I used a Terminal command: (defaults write com.google.Keystone.Agent checkInterval 0) and that seems to have permanently killed the little bugger. I hope. This is an unclever, totally ham handed approach by Google. Do No Evil my _____!
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rerun the 'defaults .............' command but change the 0 at the end to something non-zero, like 36800 (every day (in seconds)). Once it's downloaded, you can run it again w/ 0 parameter.

Or perhaps just redownload the trial and that will include it.
 
Thank You!
 
Alpha Doug said:
A little heads up for Mac users. I noticed today that something was running and causing my computer to be constantly sending and receiving data over the net, thus causing my fans to run constantly. (MBP). (BTW, I run "menu meters" which gives me a visual rundown of various system functions in real time in my menu bar). I used Activity Monitor to look at running processes, and found a utility function called KSFETCH that was causing the constant searching. I Googled ( irony anyone?) that word and found that it is a parasitic little piece of code from Google that constantly looks for updates for Google software. Moreover, it has been booby trapped to prevent things like "Little Snitch" from shutting it down. There are several potential fixes for it, but I used a Terminal command: (defaults write com.google.Keystone.Agent checkInterval 0) and that seems to have permanently killed the little bugger. I hope. This is an unclever, totally ham handed approach by Google. Do No Evil my _____!

--
Only my opinion. It's worth what you paid for it. Your mileage may vary! ;-}
www.dougwigton.com/
Click to expand...
This is why I don't use Google's services and products, and that includes all Android phones. People forget that Google is at heart an ad company. That's where they make most of their money. It's in their interest to gather your personal information and computing habits and to be intrusive on your computers. That wouldn't be a big deal if they were by default opt in and totally transparent, but they are not. This post is a perfect example of that. The average person would never know what was going on. Because of that I think they are a nasty and dishonest company that should be avoided.
 
Last edited:
Paniko said:
Alpha Doug said:
A little heads up for Mac users. I noticed today that something was running and causing my computer to be constantly sending and receiving data over the net, thus causing my fans to run constantly. (MBP). (BTW, I run "menu meters" which gives me a visual rundown of various system functions in real time in my menu bar). I used Activity Monitor to look at running processes, and found a utility function called KSFETCH that was causing the constant searching. I Googled ( irony anyone?) that word and found that it is a parasitic little piece of code from Google that constantly looks for updates for Google software. Moreover, it has been booby trapped to prevent things like "Little Snitch" from shutting it down. There are several potential fixes for it, but I used a Terminal command: (defaults write com.google.Keystone.Agent checkInterval 0) and that seems to have permanently killed the little bugger. I hope. This is an unclever, totally ham handed approach by Google. Do No Evil my _____!
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
I agree with you 100%, however, they bought one of my favorite plugin makers, nik. So I can't dump "all" of their software completely. But I can turn off their stupid update monitor, and just do the updates manually. I think they need to re-think this strategy. Now I'm wondering if Apple is also eating up bandwidth with their automatic app updating.
 
Alpha Doug said:
I agree with you 100%, however, they bought one of my favorite plugin makers, nik. So I can't dump "all" of their software completely. But I can turn off their stupid update monitor, and just do the updates manually. I think they need to re-think this strategy. Now I'm wondering if Apple is also eating up bandwidth with their automatic app updating.
Click to expand...
The thing is Apple makes it simple for you to turn off any auto anything. The new auto updates for apps in iOS, for example, is simple to turn off. Besides, something that occasionally checks for updates shouldn't be eating up any kind of bandwidth one should be worrying about. It could be that there is something inherently wrong with that nasty piece of Google software causing it to put a strain on your system.
Alpha Doug said:
--
Only my opinion. It's worth what you paid for it. Your mileage may vary! ;-}
www.dougwigton.com/
Click to expand...
 
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