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What is WinPcap4.1.2 and can I remove it?

Anonymous
2012-01-14T00:11:55+00:00

Program WinPcap4.1.2

Hi

I have just gone through Programs installed and have noticed that the following program is instaled;

WinPcap4.1.2

Is this part of Windows and if not, is there any extra information I need as I intend to uninstall it

using the Windows uninstall method.

Could this program be installed through the following installed programs;

Skype, Freemake Downloader/Installer or Malware bytes.

I have Vista SP2.

Is there a way to instruct Microsoft Secruty Essentials (MSE) and/or Malwarebytes

that in future this is an unwanted program and not to accept/remove it.

Thanks

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  1. Anonymous
    2012-01-14T01:02:58+00:00

    It's not part of Windows. This is its website: http://www.winpcap.org/

    It is used to monitor network traffic by programs such as Wireshark.

    I know it's not installed as part of Malwarebytes (free version) and I doubt Skype uses it.

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  1. Anonymous
    2012-01-27T00:05:26+00:00

    Hi

    Found that this was part of Freemake Video Downloader. Sorry for the delay in answering.

    From Freemake, their response was:

    "WinPcap is a service which serves to grab videos from your web browser. You will be able to download videos from much smaller number of web sites when you remove

    the service."

    As I am concerned with the security of this program, I uninstalled it. Also in Freemake

    I uncheckecked the Sniffer check box. For the moment I will use it in this format until

    further services are needed and I feel more comfortable in using this program.

    Thanks to dax1792 for answer.

    Regards

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  2. Anonymous
    2015-06-28T08:30:13+00:00

    Hello all, there is some info from winpcap main web http://www.winpcap.org/

    WinPcap is the industry-standard tool for link-layer network access in Windows environments: it allows applications to capture and transmit network packets bypassing the protocol stack, and has additional useful features, including kernel-level packet filtering, a network statistics engine and support for remote packet capture.

    WinPcap consists of a driver, that extends the operating system to provide low-level network access, and a library that is used to easily access the low-level network layers. This library also contains the Windows version of the well known libpcap Unix API.

    Thanks to itsset of features, WinPcap is the packet capture and filtering engine of many open source and commercial network tools, including protocol analyzers, network monitors, network intrusion detection systems, sniffers, traffic generators and network testers. Some of these networking tools, like Wireshark, Nmap, Snort, ntop are known and used throughout the networking community.

    Winpcap.org is also the home of WinDump, the Windows version of the popular tcpdump tool. WinDump can be used to watch, diagnose and save to disk network traffic according to various complex rules.

    Hope i help a bit and have fun ;)

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  3. Anonymous
    2016-01-22T18:05:04+00:00

    this was part of Freemake Video Downloader.

    4 people found this answer helpful.
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  4. Anonymous
    2012-03-09T13:56:02+00:00

    I do not run any of the programs listed above, nor have I ever used any of the programs above (Wireshark, Skype, Freemake, Malwarebytes) but Winpcap 4.1.2 and NMap 5.0 mysteriously installed on my computer, too.  I have Vista, use Internet Explorer 8 or Firefox 10.0.  Have tried to do a manual uninstall only to have the two programs reinstall with every restart.  Contacted Dell Computers only to have them try to uninstall and they can't either.  they said neither program is a threat, but only a nuisance (whatever that was supposed to mean).  I run McAfee and AVG.  Computer runs fine...no lags, no slow down, etc.  But I would like to know where these programs came from and how to permanently remove.  Any suggestions?  PS: I'm not tech savvy.

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