OpenCandy was an adware module and a potentially unwanted program classified as malware by many anti-virus vendors. They flagged OpenCandy due to its undesirable side-effects. It was designed to run during installation of other desired software. Produced by SweetLabs, it consisted of a Microsoft Windows library incorporated in a Windows Installer. When a user installed an application that had bundled the OpenCandy library, an option appeared to install software it recommended based on a scan of the user's system and geolocation. Both the option and offers it generated were selected by default and would be installed unless the user unchecked them before continuing with the installation. OpenCandy's various undesirable side-effects included, changing the user's homepage, desktop background or search provider, inserting unwanted toolbars, plug-ins and extension add-ons in the browser. It also collected and transmitted various information about the user and their Web usage without notification or consent. After massive criticism of the software occurred, it was eventually discontinued in August of 2016.

Development

The software was originally developed for the DivX installation, by CEO Darrius Thompson. When installing DivX, the user was prompted to optionally install the Yahoo! Toolbar. DivX received $15.7 million during the first nine months of 2007 from Yahoo and other software developers, after 250 million downloads. Chester Ng, the former DivX business development director, is chief business officer and Mark Chweh, former DivX engineering director, is chief technology officer.

Windows components

Components that the program used may have differed but here are some similar names based on versions of the software.

Files dropped

Processes

DNS and HTTP queries

Software known to have included OpenCandy

Workarounds

There were workarounds to bypass OpenCandy by running some installers with a parameter on the command line, which was up to the installer to support or not.