uTorrent is flagged as malicious by several antivirus engines currently

[itman 1,746]

Eset is far from alone in flagging uTorrent and BitTorrent as a PUA:

Quote

If you check the latest uTorrent setup file on Virustotal or other virus checking services, or run local checks using security solutions, you may notice that it is being flagged.

Both uTorrent Classic -- the local version of uTorrent -- and uTorrent Web -- the new web-based solution -- and BitTorrent are flagged by multiple antivirus solutions at the time of writing. The main release, uTorrent Classic, is detected by ten antivirus engines including Microsoft Defender, Sophos, Eset Nod32, GData, and Dr.Web.

Being flagged does not necessarily mean that a program is malicious or problematic; false positives happen but the likelihood is reduced when mainstream security solutions flag a program.

What is being detected? Most engines list "PUA or potentially unwanted application" as the reason and that indicates some sort of software bundling or file dropping on user systems. ESET lists Web Companion as a reference and that leads to Ad-Aware's Web Companion application. Whether that program has been offered as part of uTorrent's installation is unclear at this point.

https://www.ghacks.net/2019/12/09/utorrent-is-flagged-as-malicious-by-several-antivirus-engines-currently/

Edited December 12, 2019 by itman

[Nightowl 206]

It's better to move to one of these clients , Deluge or qBittorrent

[peteyt 396]

11 hours ago, peter133 said:

uTorrent getting flagged by several antivirus engines does not surprise me at all. The other day I was reading on "https://www.facebook.com/" how downloading content from uTorrent is illegal in some countries. If people still want to download something from uTorrent & something goes wrong they'll have no one to blame but themselves.

Downloading any copyrighted material for free is illegal. So downloading any copyrighted torrent is also illegal. Torrent programs in themselves are legal because they do not supply and content.