How to remove BetBlocker

Question

I've installed BetBlocker but have noticed that, although it works as intended, it works a little too much for a lot of sites I use throughout the day. Namely Youtube, Facebook and anything else that BetBlocker thinks might try to show me any kind of gambling advertisement (really annoying).

I'm trying to remove this software so I can replace it with another that won't do this. However this software is now claiming to be locked in place for 5 years.

I can't find any package relating to "BetBlocker", nor can I see it on the startup applications.

It seems that the 'history' on the Ubuntu Software Centre isn't present for the installation of BetBlocker either.

Not really sure where I should be looking and I need a wizard.

I installed the software by downloading the .deb file provided and installed via the Ubuntu Software Centre.

Ubuntu 16.04 LTS

Answer 1

According to betblocker.org:

Please remember that once the tool is activated you cannot remove the restrictions until your selected restriction length has expired.

Only they can tell you what that means.

Instead of circumventing the software, have you considered if there is an option to make your Facebook or YouTube interactions less impeded? Maybe you can provide feedback by contacting betblocker and see if they can work on helping you, and others, in similar situations.

In the meantime, you can investigate which packages you do have installed (sudo apt list --installed or sudo dpkg -l). You can use grep to filter the output. grep is CaSe SeNsItIvE by default.

Examples:

1. sudo dpkg -l | grep bet
2. sudo dpkg -l | grep Bet

Once you find the name of the package, it can be removed with apt, or dpkg:

• sudo apt remove NAME
• sudo dpkg -r NAME

If you cannot find any packages, you can look through the list, without using grep, and see if you find any suspicious packages. Don't go removing random packages, but you may see something glaring. Double-check before you remove anything, and if you do, back everything up.

---

If you have the original package (.deb), you can use dpkg-deb to inspect the package file, which contains data such as the name, and files that it installs. I downloaded the latest, so it could be different:

$ dpkg-deb -f /tmp/bet-blocker_1.0.0_amd64.deb 
Package: bet-blocker
Version: 1.0.0
License: SEE LICENSE IN LICENSE.md
Vendor: Komshita <komshita@gmail.com>
Architecture: amd64
Maintainer: Komshita <komshita@gmail.com>
Installed-Size: 269983
Depends: gconf2, gconf-service, libnotify4, libappindicator1, libxtst6, libnss3, libxss1
Section: default
Priority: extra
Homepage: http://bet-blocker.com
Description: BetBlocker
  Bet Blocker, blocks unwanted websites

$ sudo dpkg -r bet-blocker

As noted, you'll need to make adjustments to your /etc/hosts in addition to removing the package.

Answer 2

Going to answer my own question. I think I've fixed it doing the following:

Using the Synapsis package manager, I was able to find the package and mark it for removal. I then updated my packages and saw the package was removed. (Note that the package / software wasn't showing up in the Ubuntu Software Centre, nor was it listed as a package under the expected name of sudo apt-get remove betblocker, the actual name for this package was bet-blocker, I had assumed betblocker as that was the name of the software on the software launcher). Synapsis was the only manager I was able to see this package under.

With the package removed, the websites were still blocked. This is due to the software editing the /etc/hosts/ file, annoyingly they removed all of my existing hosts while doing this (so I now have to set up all of my host configuration again). You'll want to remove the mass of clutter they've placed into your /etc/hosts and re-add your own hosts.

More annoyingly, they also removed the localhost configuration from the hosts file which meant I was unable to sudo (which is required to edit the hosts file), if this is the case there are other question / answers on this forum as to how to do that.

Once the /etc/hosts file has been restored you'll need to restart your PC for those settings to take effect.

Answer 3

all I had to do was go into recovery on my laptop and and refresh PC settings and or restore origonal settings , it was actually to eay to remover being honest, if you get my drift,,if someone actually does come up with a gambling blocker that cant be removed they will be billionaires lol