It had been a thorn in the side of many computer users for some time, and now manufacturer Lenovo finally sees the problem. Superfish, a program included with many Lenovo computers, was found to have a significant security flaw.
Lenovo has now also brought this out, and comes with an official removal tool to remove the software. Superfish is a program for 'visual search'. What it did even more, however, was to provoke a so-called man-in-the-middle attack. Superfish placed its own ads on pages that users visited, but did so without the required security. Also read: Lenovo introduces Windows 8 start button through Pokki collaboration.
Faults
In a response, Lenovo's CTO Peter Hortensius said that something clearly went wrong. "Looking back, we're pretty sure we made a big mistake here, or overlooked something," he said. "We have followed the correct procedures, but it is clear that we have not been strict enough."
Do you have it?
The serial numbers below may have Superfish pre-installed:
G Series: G410, G510, G710, G40-70, G50-70, G40-30, G50-30, G40-45, G50-45
U Series: U330P, U430P, U330Touch, U430Touch, U530Touch
Y Series: Y430P, Y40-70, Y50-70
Z Series: Z40-75, Z50-75, Z40-70, Z50-70
S Series: S310, S410, S40-70, S415, S415Touch, S20-30, S20-30Touch
Flex Series: Flex2 14D, Flex2 15D, Flex2 14, Flex2 15, Flex2 14(BTM), Flex2 15(BTM), Flex 10
MIIX Series: MIIX2-8, MIIX2-10, MIIX2-11
YOGA Series: YOGA2Pro-13, YOGA2-13, YOGA2-11BTM, YOGA2-11HSW
E Series: E10-30
remove
The released removal tool can be downloaded from Lenovo's website. Simply download the file under the heading Automatic Removal Tool, install the file and click Analyze and Remove SuperFish Now.
Lenovo's removal tool removes all information from Superfish from your system.
Prefer to do it manually yourself? Then go to it Control Panel, click on Programs and Features and find the program named Superfish Inc. VisualDiscovery. Select the file and click Delete. Go through the uninstall wizard and the program will be removed from your computer.
Delete certificates
Although this last manual method removes the program, it does not remove the certificates that the program has used. To do that, open the Run function with the Windows key + R. Then type certmgr.msc in the text box and press OK. click on Trusted Root Certification Authorities and double click Certificates. If Superfish is in that list, select the certificate and click the red Delete-cross at the top of your screen.
You can manually delete the Superfish certificates from your computer. Please remove the program itself first.
Finally, a little extra for Mozilla users, because Superfish wants to dive pretty deep into the roots of Firefox. Go to Options > Advanced > Certificates > View Certificates. If you come across Superfish, you can remove or disable it here. All the above actions are done automatically with the removal tool that Lenovo has made available.
