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Webroot Filtering Extension/Browser Add-On

  • 10 December 2013
  • 75 replies
  • 575 views

Userlevel 3
Badge +13
I am an old PrevX customer that was suddently changed over to WSA without any warning. I was not happy about that, but I decided to forget it, and give WSA a chance. A few weeks ago WSA installed a browser add-on without any warning, without notifying me, without asking me, and without explaining what the add-on is or what it does. I have paid numerous security companies over the years to protect my pcs, but I will say this about WSA, they sure have some balls. They do whatever they want without asking, and if you don't like it, they could not care less. Either you accept it, or go elsewhere. No apologies, no explanation, and no contact. I've never seen another company that handled business in this manner, and for years PrevX protected my pcs and never once did anything out of hte ordinary like this. PrevX never left me feeling like I didn't know what was going on with my own pcs security.
 
 Now, onto the problem brought about by this new add-on. Every browser, and every PC in my possession slowed to a mere crawl, whether online, or simply using an installed program, it would take me as much as 10x longer to get a single task done because of how bad this add-on slowed my machines down. Upgrading from PrevX to WSA slowed my machines months ago, so I have already sacrificed much speed to run WSA on my 4 pcs, but this add-on was the nail in the coffin, and running my small online business has become next to impossible with WSA's filtering extension.
  I've been a loyal PrevX customer since 2008, and I've always been happy with PrevX, but I have HAD IT with WSA. I'm so sick of unninstalling, reinstalling, deactivating, enabling, and so on & so forth, just to do simple task on my pcs. It is not normal to need to unninstall programs like this constantly just to maintain a somewhat acceptable speed, and I will not continue paying webroot when I waste so much of my valuable time working around their product. PrevX & Webroot are NOT the same thing, and it's obvious that they never will be the same. I've given WSA a chance for months, and they blew it. When my subscription runs out next month, I will gladly move on to greener grass.
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Best answer by RetiredTripleHelix 23 December 2013, 21:11

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75 replies

Userlevel 7
Sometimes the log tool can get frozen, if it does kill it using task manager or if your not comfortable doing that just reboot your PC and run the tool again. In regard to the support system is purposefully designed to be one big conversation. It really helps as sometimes we can see patterns emerging.
 
For instance if a customer comes in and we see that they are having HDD issues we can put a note in saying that the HDD is throwing up lots of errors and that we advised the customer to do a backup . So in 3 months time if the customer calls in saying that a virus has killed there HDD we can look at previous notes for help etc etc.
Userlevel 5
I suspect this could be related to whitelisting or some other condition that our support team should be able to resolve. I suggest writing into our support inbox so that they can collect logs to investigate closer as there definitely shouldn't be a delay when opening/using browsers.
Userlevel 7
Hi Quick!
 
I believe @  has stepped out for a short bit, but I can help you a little bit on this.
 
I do not think that log file should still be running, 4 hours is incredibly and unusually long.  I have not used that tool myself much, but the last time I ran it, it only took a few minutes.  If there is a way to cancel it, you might want to do that, but I am not at all sure on that and I would hate to do anything that would damage the ability to get those logs intact.  TH should be back a bit later and I have tagged him to get his attention to this.
 
As for the Trouble Ticket: that is entirely normal 🙂  Dont worry, Webroot Support will see it as a new ticket.  Our responses and replies are logged that way in our view as it simply gives us users an easy way to find the entire record of our Support communications in the event we need to look back on previous items.
Userlevel 7
Hi quick
 
I have to admit that I vacillated between Internet Security Plus & Complete, but finally decided on Complete.  My vote, for what it is worth would be...go Complete.
 
Regards
 
 
Baldrick
Userlevel 3
Badge +13
Will do. Thanks to you and everyone else for your time & trouble, Quick
Userlevel 7
@ wrote:
Will do. Thanks to you and everyone else for your time & trouble, Quick
Quick, while we always try our best to provide quick help advice that we hope will help resolve problems, sometimes complicated issues do take quite a bit of time, a lot of questions, replies, etc etc etc.  But no matter how much time and how many replies, it is NEVER a trouble  :)
 
Good luck!
Userlevel 7
Badge +56
I agree with David 100% and you being a Prevx user snice 2008 I would like to see you happy with WSA. ;)
 
Daniel
Userlevel 7
Badge +56
@ wrote:
Well, my ISP came out and replaced all my equipment on Monday morning, and I've watched for several days to see if my pc performance would improve with WSA Filter Extension enabled. So far, the results have been exactly the same.
 After a new equipment install I also tried the same speed tests again, with the same exact results. I phoned tech support and this time they tell me my ping results are higher than most ISP's because of the distance between earth and the satellite orbitting earth, (Over 18k miles).
 So, I've disabled the filter extension again and my speed is slowly improving. It seems to be taking it longer than before though. I open task manager to see why things were taking so long, and WRSA.exe*32 is dominating my CPU usage. I have a dual processor on this pc and percantage getting used averages at around 50%. After the PC was powered on for 10 minutes or so, the usage went down considerably, to little to no usage, and my speeds are back to normal. It had been finished scanning for several minutes before the CPU usage went down.
 I'll contact customer support now and check into the whitelisting to see if they can help fix this. Will keep everyone updated.
 Thanks again, Quick
Hi quick,
 
That's doesn't sound like WSA to do that with the CPU and yes I have seen IE messages that the Web Filter slows down IE I just set to 2 seconds and I know you contacted support and tried reinstalls but can you contact the support inbox so they can gather logs again and tell them about the Performance issues as a seen a few others have issues also and I'm sure Joe and team are working on it also we have a new Beta Build out v8.0.4.46 and there are many of us testing it right now but we have no change log with beta's but I do see the filtering extension is up to 1.0.0.22 I don't know the version of your Web Filtering Extension but hopefully it will help but again I suggest that you Submit a Support Ticket for they can get the logs from you and hopefully an answer. Please keep us updated as usual.
 
Thanks,
 
Daniel 😉
Userlevel 3
Badge +13
Update:
I had to try the tool one more time before logging off. This time I selected "run as administrator" and it worked. Within 2 minutes it had completed.
Userlevel 3
Badge +13
Thanks. I'm just glad you mentioned there being a difference, otherwise I'd never know my security was lacking.
It shall be "complete" soon.

Kind Regards, Quick
Userlevel 7
Hi tazmantiny
 
Welcome to the Community Forums.
 
Personally I would never advise deleting the extension.  But if you really do not want to use it then you can just disbale it by going into the addons/extensions manager for each of the browsers that you use, and simply disabling the relevant extension.
 
If you do not know where to go in the browser(s) then please let us know which one(s) you use and one of us can provide the approrpiate instructions.
 
Regards, Baldrick
Userlevel 3
Badge +13
HAPPY? Happy about my pcs all slowing to a mere snails pace? Or happy that webroot takes it upon themselves to do whatever they like, whenever they like, without notifying it's customers that there will be a change?
 I had no choice but to unnistall this 'wonderful' new add-on as I couldn't do simple task while it was enabled. I've tried for days to get this thing to work right, but it slows down every browser on all 4 pcs. I cannot upload small pictures when it is enabled, I cannot switch between tabs without needing to wait as much as 45 seconds for the pcs to catch up with the commands I've given, I cannot access my photos through a photo editing program because this add-on has slowed my computers to the point that they cannot keep up with the photo editing software. It's ridiculous! I disable this add-on, and everything is back to being super fast. Now when I click a button on my mouse, things happen, whereas before disabling the add-on, I would click the button, then go have a smoke while waiting on the computer to figure out what it was supposed to be doing. The entire screen would simply lock up until that command was complete. I've experienced 2 minute hangups witht his add-on enabled, so NO, I am not happy about this add-on being pushed on me without my consent, and I'm certainly not happy with it's performance.
 If it's this bad, I can see why webroot is releasing the add-on so slowly, as there would otherwise be an overwhelming amount of pissed off customers finding their way to this community board to expres their 'happiness', just as I have.
Userlevel 3
Badge +13
Your response only proves my point. It is painfully obvious that as long as I am a webroot customer, I will need to repeat this uninstall/reinstall process continually.
For now, with this add-on disabled, I am more than happy with my pcs' performance. So I will keep this add-on disabled. When it is enabled, even a basic search at google's search engine would take forever for the page to load....then 5 minutes later the add-on's ratings would suddenly appear out of thin air next to links in search results.
So, I don't want this add-on enabled....ever. I don't like what it does, nor do I like how it makes my pcs perform. I will not punish myself yet again by uninstalling/reinstalling WSA, as I have already repeated this process more times than I care to count, and the results are usually the same: normal for a while, then back to being super slow. I have grown to hate WSA over the past few months!
Userlevel 7
Badge +56
Yes it's strange as it's the same Developer of Prevx and he is now the V.P. of Development JoeJ of Webroot.
 
Daniel
Userlevel 7
Those internet speeds arent great (sorry to say it) but it shouldnt realistically effect WSA`s performance. As you said a while ago you dont have many U`s in your logs so the client wont even have much to communicate about. Still the ping times while bad shouldnt effect the client (it just means it will take a little longer)
 
I have never seen WSA impact any of my PC`s (both at home work or at home) network speeds but I havent test Dial-up or sat connections (but I have talked to customers who said Sat connections worked). To be honest if your internet connection is struggling with WSA then you are going to have serious problems running a classic style AV as you will have to download a large number of defs every day. 
 
As for how WSA works compared to Prevx they are very similar and the older Prevx clients didnt do the determiations locally (i,e it didnt do the anaylsis on your PC) it still required to communicate with the cloud in order to get determinations (excluding heurtistic determinations of course). Has anything else changed since the update from Prevx to wsa?
Userlevel 3
Badge +13
Thanks. Before we take that route, I have one other thing I want to wait on ~ I just spoke to my ISP Tech support about my system going out for 30min to 2 hours every single night during early morning hours. The tech says this is a malfunction in my equipment and he is constantly replacing the indoor modem and outdoor satellite radio to fix this problem. He says it will likely get worse & worse until it completely goes out, so best to fix it now. I asked if this would cause a delay in my ping times and he says that this WILL almost always cause a delay in ping times. He will come next Tuesday to replace my equipment. I'm hoping this may fix the entire problem I'm having with WSA. I've been with this ISP for around 6 years, and have had many tech visits over the years, and much equipment replaced, but I would've never guessed that faulty equipment was the cause of the daily outage. Int he past when my HughesNet equipment has gone out, it didn't partially stop working, it stopped working permanently!
Anyway, my fingers are crossed that this fixes everything. If not, we'll move onto the WSA support team.
Thanks again, Quick
Userlevel 7
Badge +56
Sounds good please let us know the outcome!
 
Cheers,
 
Daniel
Userlevel 7
Badge +56
Ok here it is and just download and run and follow the instructions and no need for the advance setting and allow it to upload and make sure you put the email address that you used to contact support after your done go back to the ticket and say TripleHelix at the Webroot Community gave me the wsalogs diagnostic tool and it has been uploaded!
 
http://download.webroot.com/wsalogs.exe Note: This tool is for the support inbox only and in most times is supplied by them to find more detailed logs to look futher into an issue only please don't suggest to other members unless your an Expert Advisor or above thanks.
 
Thanks,
 
Daniel 😉
Userlevel 3
Badge +13
Will do . Many thanks.
Userlevel 7
Badge +56
Exellent lets hope they can see and issue also did you reply to your ticket and tell them wsalogs have been uploaded?
 
Thanks David & Roy for helping him while I was out Kudo's for the team work! :D
 
Cheers,
 
Daniel 😃
Userlevel 3
Badge +13
Spoke with tech support today, and here is a copy of their response:
 
" I see that some of the Heuristics and setting on your Webroot SecureAnywhere are turned up too high. This will stop valid processes from running properly.

Can you please try resetting all settings back to default to see if this will allow the site.
To do this locally open Webroot, click on Advanced Settings, Reset to Defaults and then Save.
Finally scan your machine once before retesting the application/site.

The Webroot browser extension is there to vet search results for you andd help you identify dangerous sites before you click on them as you had mentioned."
 
 I have followed all their instructions on 2 pcs, and hope to see an improvement in performance. In my reply I asked if the add on does any other important task other than vet search results. If it turns out that this add-on does not do anything else then I believe I'll just leave it disabled. It doesn't seem to work properly for me at all, as it may take as long as 5 minutes for the extension's color coded ratings to appear on the screen in search results. I have not enabled it again...yet. I think I'll just wait on support to confirm this add-on doesn't do anything else before I make a final decision.
 There are no [u] files in my scan logs from today. There was 1 from a program provided free from my ISP, zonealarm, but it was only active on my pc for about 10 minutes a year ago, then I removed it. Other than that, no unknowns that I can see.
 
Userlevel 2
why does anyone want the av version of this program when they could have the plus or complete version of this. (complete ftw)
"why does anyone want the av version of this program when they could have the plus or complete version of this. (complete ftw)"
 
I use the AV version because my online bank proivdes a free annual subscription. 
 
I was already quite satisfied with my long used firewall / HIPS and sandboxing apps.so there was no need to invest in a suite.
Userlevel 7
Hi blues
 
You are most welcome, and glad to see you over here too (hopefully between here and the Prevx page at Wilders you are covered as many of us, as you do, frequent both).
 
Your comment "... I don't have much experience with WSA as many others I tend to read more and post less. (Usually a good policy...LOL!)", did actually make me chuckle. :D 
 
For the future...don't hold back over here...questions and views are actively encouraged (as long as they are helpful/usful, which BTW is a comment not directed at you ;)).  We are all here to learn...it is just that some of us know a bit more than others...but there is still much to learn from everyone (or almost every member).
 
Regards
 
 
 
Baldrick
Userlevel 3
Badge +13
Update:
 Tech support replied to my last question regarind what the extension does, and here is their reply:
 
"The Webroot Filtering Extension is just for the search results and reputation.

It does not serve another purpose and you can disable it if you do not wish to use it"
 
 
 With that said, I'm leaving mine turned off.
 As of now, my pc seems slow, but not nearly as slow as it was with the add-on enabled. I can live with it like this. I still believe WR software is the cause of me losing some of my speed, but I can live with that loss of speed so long as my pcs are protected.

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