Shazaa was created as a browser add on and search assistant toolbar by www.shazaa.com to be compatible with the peer to peer file sharing community called www.kazaa.com.  It tracks browsing history to deliver targeted advertisements and resets the Browser’s home page to shazaa.com.  It also downloads third party software and updates itself without the user’s involvement.

Shazaa has to be manually downloaded by the computer’s user to initiate the infection.  Its disguise as a search assistant toolbar facilitates this deception.  There is also no visible End User Licensing Agreement for Shazaa before or during the installation process.

While the spyware program called Shazaa was first discovered in January of 2005, it is presumed to have been around much longer.  The ownership of shazaa.com and some of its related sites were awarded to kazaa.com in a court hearing in July of 2004.  As many people know, kazaa.com is well known for providing spyware infections for use of their site.

If you are infected with Shazaa, you should remove it immediately.  Besides compromising your computer’s operating speed and stability, it is a potential threat to your privacy.  Manual removal is discouraged, since important files might be damaged in the process.  You should use a spyware removal tool like SpyZooka to remove Shazaa and its variants.

Associated Files:
May place randomly generated file names in C:Program FilesSystemMiscmatrixversioninfo and C:Program FilesSystemMisc

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREClassesCLSID {EFF80427-F837-4B74-8834-BAF18E0553FD},
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerBrowser Helper Objects {EFF80427-F837-4B74-8834-BAF18E0553FD}