A little history here. We all know about the main add-on named MSNPlus. The one that comes bundled with all kinds of crap. Well, that simply isn’t the only one that comes with crap. There are more.

Add-ons certainly need a second look before installing them along side IM programs. Make up your own mind about what I find and publish, but I will post my opinion towards the end and what I advice.

Messenger Discovery Live:-

You may recognise this add-on and you may not. This add-on has a few questionable areas.

There are several issues’ users have raised about the program and described that their anti-virus programs are detecting the add-on as a trojan or other related terms for malware. But also about the adverts that it serves with it.

The general response what you get from a forum admin or mod is, it isn’t spyware. If you don’t like it, remove it! If you don’t like the adverts, don’t use it.

What is this program serving up? Well the following:

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The famous Starware Advert which leads to the Starware toolbar. It also comes with AzoogleAds, PartyPoker ads and plenty of those annoying smiley ads.

But why would I be posting to you about this just on the basis of those adverts? It’s not only that! I actually asked it’s creator about this. Asked if the program uses a sponsor. And if he tracked any sponsors (if it has one) or tracked the adverts.

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Make your own mind up. Sadly my account no longer exists. I can’t say I’m all that bothered.

Just for the record, the program does get flagged by a few vendors as a BackDoor.Generic8.ECO (AVG), not-a-virus:AdWare.Win32.NewDotNet (Ikarus) and Generic.Malware (Prevx1). We got this from VirusTotal - VirusTotal Results (pdf).

Can these adverts been turned off? Luckily they can, but only after you have installed it, been hit by adverts whilst installing it and changed the setting inside the program which half of the users will probably not know.

The program itself allows several questionable features. One of them is getting alerted when someone has deleted you from their list.

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Look at the arrow. If checked, you get alerted when someone has deleted you. Doesn’t this break some kind of privacy law? Or is that only when someone has blocked you and you get to know via third party software. What about this then:

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Another funny feature whereby you can steal a display picture of whom you have on your contact list. Nice term to use, steal. Very nice in fact. So nice I need to laugh out loud. Because out of 100 users that may use this, how many will have asked they can take a picture from the respective contact? A very low amount depending what the audience is that’s for sure.

So not only are you spying on your contacts trying to determine if you have been deleted, you are also letting others steal your display picture. What if it’s a personal one?

Everything I have highlighted in this post is giving out the wrong signal. This add-on may not have WinFixer like MSNPlus has. But it did or still does have a adware related toolbar. This when no adverts are getting tracked. Clearly new measures need to be brought in.

Want my recommendation? Be careful of any add-on. Research it fully before you install. In the long run they could give you a big headache and if you’re lucky serve you with adverts and other crap. Thus get a system full of crap!

What would be nice is to find an official party that officially approved IM based add-ons. Otherwise I can see this getting out of control.

This is an open debate and anyone can comment within reason. Join us on our forum about this. Let us know your stories. Should there be an official party that approve add-ons so that users get the best quality? Or do you have another opinion?

…On tomorrow’s show I’ll have another IM add-on that will be highlighted. I hope.

Several experts researched what has been mentioned in the article. Credit goes to everyone involved.

Update - Remember my Messenger Add-On rant? & VitalSecurity.Org.