Did Corel install adware on my computer?

[MammonLord]

Today my computer popped up an ad for the new version of PSP completely out of the blue.

Image showing the popup: http://imgur.com/a/QEANB

I have PaintShopPro X8 and X9 installed. However, notice that Google Chrome is the only running application; there are no Corel products running and none have been started since the computer booted this morning. Within PaintShopPro I have messages turned off. I've disabled their tray icons. Yet, still, I get popup ads for the latest products. I paid for and legally own this software but it constantly bombards me with ads. Shame on you Corel.

Does anyone know how to completely remove the adware component? This popup is especially egregious, but I'd additionally like to stop the ad that appears every so often when I close PSP. Ideally I'd like to keep using PaintShopPro, but this is silly.

[LeviFiction]

Yes it did....kind of. It fits the technical definition of ad-ware but not the same intent as adware. You can turn it off if you still want to keep using PaintShop Pro. Open PSP and go to the Help menu, message preferences. A dialog will pop up there will be a drop down for showing advertisements in the system tray. You can turn this to "Do not show me messages"

If you don't see it, make sure to run PSP as administrator. Keep in mind Windows runs all programs with regular user permissions even if you are the admin on your computer. Right-click on the icon and use "Run as administrator" That should help.

[ellevsen]

The proposed solution (ie unchecking notifications in the preferences) does not work on PSP X7.

I have unchecked the message preferences yet I still get this ad popping up once per day.

Congrats Corel. Instead of making me want to upgrade, I'm actually going to uninstall Paintshop Pro for the first time in 10 years if you don't stop spamming me with these unwanted and unavoidable ads.

[flagpole]

The proposed solution (ie unchecking notifications in the preferences) does not work on PSP X7.

I have unchecked the message preferences yet I still get this ad popping up once per day.

Congrats Corel. Instead of making me want to upgrade, I'm actually going to uninstall Paintshop Pro for the first time in 10 years if you don't stop spamming me with these unwanted and unavoidable ads.

you can cancel the task in task scheduler. Called CorelUpdateHelperTask
or delete/rename the triggered app which is called CUH.exe (C:\Program Files (x86)\Corel\CUH\v2\CUH.exe)

[ellevsen]

you can cancel the task in task scheduler. Called CorelUpdateHelperTask
or delete/rename the triggered app which is called CUH.exe (C:\Program Files (x86)\Corel\CUH\v2\CUH.exe)

Thanks for this advice.

I found and deleted CUH.exe but I still get the popup. Maybe it is set to reinstall on program open.

I'll look for the task in the scheduler and see if I can kill it there.

[flagpole]

Good lord. It's insidious.

It's likely another version of cuh.exe from somewhere else.

[Ken Berry]

You might also want to keep an eye on this thread, which we have made a sticky at the top of the forum, since so many people complain about the ads: http://forum.corel.com/EN/viewtopic.php ... 64#p346264

[funkyjive]

I recently bought professional versions of Corel software, and already I'm regretting it.

If there's one thing I hate, it's interruptions or annoyances because software vendors believe that nag marketing is going to yield sales. That may be so, though I'm prepared to bet that far more get wholly disenchanted with the experience.

The thing I despise even more than the foregoing is to NOT honour user responses to disable sneakily-installed ads, and further obfuscate the whereabouts of ad software such that users need forum support to get rid of the stuff - if they can.

Until I see clear and concise instructions (with positive confirmations from otherwise Corel advocates) suggesting that removal is successfully permanent, I for one will absolutely never be purchasing another Corel product again. It's unfortunate as to-date I've enjoyed and trusted Corel software, but it's MY computer and I choose not to afford personal frustrations or an inch of desktop to Corel's insufferable marketing merchants.

[hartpaul]

From Previous posts and reading, Corel downloads its messages into a messages folder here:
C:\ProgramData\Corel\Messages

That can build up to quite a few messages especially if you have multiple versions of PSP. My folder has 18 messages .
Now you can click the boxes to say you don't want to see or download any future messages, but that does not clear the messages. So do all the previous steps and then delete all the messages in your messages folder and see if that stops the messages.
I have left mine open to all as I usually get two versions of the program and want to get the second version a cheap as possible. It was through those messages that I got PSPX9 for $25.00 and it is only one or two clicks per session to close those messages and I can stand that to save $50.