Whatsabyte Adware?

[Statik]

Hey guys, I recently started getting random popups from "whatabyte" and I can't get rid of them. I can't find anything on my computer relating to it, and malwarebytes nor avast can find it. Below is a screenshot of the popups. I have no idea what could have caused it, I'm VERY cautious in my downloading, and haven't downloaded in forever.

 

Photo of popups

[redteam4ever]

Those are most likely browser desktop notifications - you need to disable them through your browser. If you tell me what browser you're using, I can walk you through how exactly to do that...

[redteam4ever]

Oh, it's Google Chrome, it's written in the notification... *facepalm* Go to your Chrome settings, choose Advanced > Privacy and security > Site settings > Notifications. Scroll through the allow list and delete any sites that you don't recognize.

 

This usually happens when you click Allow on a dialog box without reading it... Watch out for the notification requests, ads served through notifications are becoming more common!

Edited August 6, 2019 by redteam4ever
Improved clarity

[Statik]

9 minutes ago, redteam4ever said:

Oh, it's Google Chrome, it's written in the notification... *facepalm* Go to your Chrome settings, choose Advanced > Privacy and security > Site settings > Notifications. Scroll through the allow list and delete any sites that you don't recognize.

 

 This usually happens when you click Allow on a dialog box without reading it... Watch out for the notification requests, ads served through notifications are becoming more common!

Well now I feel like an idiot haha. I was so confused since I haven't had any virus or adware in years.

 

Thanks a bunch, appreciated. 

[redteam4ever]

Just now, Statik said:

I was so confused since I haven't had any virus or adware in years.

I wouldn't classify it as malware, it is just a misuse of a legitimate feature of modern web browsers because technically you had to click to allow the notifications. Happens to everyone once in a while

 

And don't feel like an idiot, I was at the same place you were like 2 months ago when I first saw this on a friend's PC and did all the same steps as you - adwCleaner, AV scan... Then it hit me that these are Windows notifications from Google Chrome - my friend was streaming movies from some shady websites that were requiring to allow desktop notifications to watch the movies. You would've found out on your own too...

 

Fun fact: Yesterday, I saw a webpage claiming that you need to allow notifications to verify that you're not a robot In the age of Adblock, websites finally found a way how to reliably circumvent it...