How do I fix mydownloader.app crashing whenever I try to download something?

In this excerpt from
Answercast #25, I look at a computer that is having problems downloading
and suggest ways to check that system for malware.

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Download and update problems

I believe that what you are looking at is malware.

Mydownloader.app sounds like malware of some sort: something that has basically taken over the downloading portion of what your applications are attempting to do.

It could be a download accelerator, which in general I tend not to like anyway because they do interfere and they don’t necessarily give you a lot of bang for the buck.

Clean your system

In a case like this, be it malicious or otherwise, clearly something has inserted itself into the downloading process and is causing trouble. I would start by running what Microsoft used to call the System Standalone Sweeper, now called Windows Defender Offline.

What that is, is a downloadable disk image that you can burn to a CD and boot from. It will run Microsoft Security Essentials, or the equivalent, from the CD without your system having to have been booted from the hard disk. That allows it to potentially clean up portions of the system that are infected but are otherwise inaccessible while the system is running. That’s where I’d start.

I’d also run Malwarebytes on that system.

Virus and malware scan

Normally, I would say you should be running an up-to-date anti-malware scan, but clearly this tool is interfering with your ability to download updates to Ad-Aware. That’s part of what makes me think that this is malware of some sort.

• I would approach it as malware.

Try running the Windows Defender Offline, then Malwarebytes. Once you have your system fixed up enough that it will successfully do a download, then update your anti-malware tools and run up-to-date scans.