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Tamper Protection question


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A question on tamper protection.  I just used the Malwarebytes Support tool to uninstall and re-install Malwarebytes.  It was able to uninstall Malwarebytes without asking for the password even though I have Malwarebytes tamper protection set to require a password for uninstallation.

Should this be possible?  I thought the tamper protection setting should require a password before the uninstall took place.

Bill

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  • Staff

***This is an automated reply***

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If you are having technical issues with our Windows product, please do the following:

Malwarebytes Support Tool - Advanced Options

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I guess I'm missing something then.  What is the tamper protection for?  I thought it was to protect you from someone tampering with the settings or uninstalling the program altogether.  All someone would have to do is to keep a copy of the support tool on hand and they could uninstall any Malwarebytes installation they wanted to.  Seems like a security risk to me.

Bill

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  • Root Admin

No, I'm sorry you're not understanding the use or purpose.

If I have admin rights on your computer there is NOTHING you can stop me from doing period. No tool on the planet can stop me from doing anything I want to do.

The password is designed to keep those without the password from making changes. If they have admin rights and choose to do so even if we block them from doing something. They can boot up from a USB disk and delete anything they want to delete or format the drive.

What if you put a password on Malwarebytes but there was no way to remove that password without formatting your hard drive? Don't you think that would cause you more grief and hardship?

The tool used in the right hands is working and doing what it's intended to do.

Thank you again

 

Edited by AdvancedSetup
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@AdvancedSetup

I see.  Thanks for the reply.  I didn't realize tamper protection was that limited in scope.

I wasn't suggesting a password be added that could only be removed by reformatting the hard drive. 

I was just thinking that maybe the support tool should prompt for the tamper protection password if there was one set since one of the options is uninstalling MB.

Thanks,

Bill

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  • 4 months later...

Bill, I know this is old, but what AdvancedSetup never quite got around to saying is that it is not limited for those who use User Accounts without admin privileges.

 

For example, my handle is ExpertNovice.  An admin account could be named Expert and a user account could be created that does not have administrative privileges with a name of Novice.  After adding Tamper Protection to MalwareBytes someone would have to know the password for account Expert to make changes.

Thus, enhanced security.

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