Illegal sites blocked?

[leo3487]

@exile360 as reply at a thread replied:

Quote

But yes, it is true that Malwarebytes has no political motivations in their detections.  They simply target malware, scams and PUPs (Potentially Unwanted Programs) and only

criminal malicious content is targeted for blocking by the Web Protection component.

Now I want ask, criminal content = illegal content? For who?

I mean, if a political party or an org becomes "illegal" or terrorist organization for USA, MBAM will block it?

[exile360]

No, I meant illegal activity such as malware, exploits (which are both illegal), as well as stuff like CP.  As far as I know Malwarebytes doesn't block anything on any sort of political grounds.  They don't even block cracks/warez sites (even though they violate intellectual property laws) unless they're also hosting actual malicious content such as Trojans and the like.

You can learn more about what Malwarebytes blocks and why by reading this article from the Malwarebytes blog.

[exile360]

By the way, I just checked several popular Torrent sites known for hosting/linking to pirated content and none of them was blocked by Malwarebytes.  Likewise, I visited several ROM sites known for hosting illegal video game ROMs for console and arcade games and none of them were blocked.

I don't believe that piracy is within the criteria used for blocking sites by Malwarebytes, and as far as I know it never has been (I worked for Malwarebytes for close to 8 years up until mid-2017, including when Web Protection was first introduced in Malwarebytes 1.x) and they never blocked any sites/content strictly on the basis of piracy or similar content; only when such a site was hosting actual malware did they add a block for any such sites.

Edited April 2, 2019 by exile360

[leo3487]

I understand your point. Thanks for your clarification

If is that, I can return to trust MBAM

[exile360]

You're welcome

Yes, I recall internal conversations around subjects like this and the team deciding that it is Malwarebytes' job to protect people from threats, not to try and 'police' the internet, so they focus on actual scams, malware and PUPs; basically things that pose an actual risk to users' systems, rather than trying to stop people from pirating software and the like.