What is Akamai Netsession Client, netsession_win.exe?

Because this page helped me, I wanted to give my experience. My internet wasn't working correctly and every time I opened something that needed it, it weny blank. I taught my dad how to block it too. So i started to look trough my process and found this. Googled it, found this page, blocked it and now it works again. Thanks

I might have got it when I downloaded Adobe Reader.   I noticed it shortly after that.

I don't like univited installs.

I'll leave in on the computer, but I unchecked it from the start menu.

I got it courtesy of Staples Inc when I bought some software about a month ago

mine was installed by "Need For Speed World"

uninstalled it @ software in my configuration screen.

Vista browsing ok again!

(still don't know what it was)

Wow, so glad that someone else was wondering what the hell this program did! My firewall said  the same thing, and this looked very fishy...

Thanks everyone!!!

S~

Adobe also uses it to download Photoshop & the rest of their collection! I'd leave it alone )

I also downloaded this at NFL.com. When viewing video there is a link that says "Higher Quality Video" and when I clicked on it, the Akamai NetSession Client was installed. I was prompted to install, accepted the EULA, watched it install, and then clicked "Finish" when it was done.

The next video I clicked on to watch was in HD and looked great. I am sure it can be used by the Akamai company for other things but it is a legitimate software and company, is required for the videos I watch on NFL.com, so I have to trust it just like I trust Microsoft all the time.

You don't have anything to worry about, I haven't had any problems or any attacks. So use it for whatever it was intended for on your computer and enjoy.

Thanks. 

Installed an update to HTC Sync for my Verizon phone and was informed to turn off my antivirus program during this process. The update installed two programs. One was the normal HTC update and the other was Adobe Air 3.2.0.2070. Following the installation of both programs it required me to restart the computer and upon reaching the desktop I received the Windows alert message asking to give permission to allow Akamai NetSession Client to be installed on my computer. The check box indicated this would give program access to not only my computer but to my network. I chose "No" and selected "Cancel".

I got this warning as well, looked found this as first on the search. So I decided to post a reply, my friend is an IT guy and says that Akamai is a client server for photo/video file sharing. So if you use VIMEO, YouTube, Facebook, Picasa, or any webgame downloaders, you have probably used & may need this akamai-netsession-client. I have provided the link to their official page, which shows you how to find the client on your computer. (win: start-control panel-Akamai net session control panel (32bit) )for me.

That being said if you can't find any programs using the client or the client control panel, then you should block it.

FYI: My client only said Kuma Games was using it, while I know for a fact that Facebook uses it as well (maybe silently?)

thanks for the great info on akamai! It attached itself to my computer when I updated my garmin gps.

yall Rock!

Any program that circumvents a user's permission to install on their computer is a form of malware and can not be trusted. It may be commonly used, but due to it's exploits doesn't make it safe.  Better to be safe then sorry later remove the program and all of its trash that came along with it.

@a web rocker: You need to chill out a bit.

It's not malware or a virus. It's a legit application accelerator. If you stream videos from a web browser, then you've probably installed it.

I have a brand new computer and I wasn't online when this program installed itself. My sister in-law was uploading photos from her jump disk when this program installed itself without permission and I immediately noticed performance problems with my computer.

My Norton blocked it and it was asking permission to access my files when I wasn't even online. I tried to call Akamai to ask about it and they couldn't give me a straight answer. Several Google searches made me weary so I called a computer tech under my warranty and he advised me to remove it and now if my problems continue, I have to take the computer in for a complete removal.

As for it being illegal to install itself, the tech said that this program is considered malware and not a virus and thus is not illegal to install itself to your computer without permission. My advice to anybody who finds this is to do a complete uninstall and if problems continue, you need to take your computer in to be serviced.

My firewall is blocking this Akamai Netsession Client and now MS Outlook is giving TCP/IP errors and will not send or receive. I am guessing it installed when I received and opened images from someone's IPhone/Boost Mobile. I guess I have to unblock it to get MS Outlook to send and receive email...?

An Adobe trial download is when Akamai was installed. If one actually reads the information when installing software you usually see the notice about Akamai.

If in fact you were NOT notified, the I would be rather reluctant to allow it to turn on.

As with any service, I leave them off until something complains.

Peace,
Myst

FYI, I installed Adobe Photoshop /Premiere Elements 10 and sub it pop upped & began to request permission to access the Internet. So I blocked it for the time being.

Do you play World Of Warcraft? I have this same thing sitting on my screen today. Looks like a WoW update process but let me look into this some more. I'll get back.

I just got the alert from my Win7 Firewall too. And I don’t think it is a coincidence; as it happens that this PC is brand new and it coincides with the Norton 30 days Trial expiring. It may be a cheap scare tactic to get me into renewing, which I will not; besides, it makes me angry. I already have a program installed which I pay also for online monitoring, and it is in all my PC’s. If that service finds it a ‘threat’ it will block it and alert me to delete it.

Akamai netsession was part of my Dropbox install I believe.

Looks like mine got installed with an iTunes update. This from the readme.txt file that is included with the package:

**** Akamai NetSession Interface ****

--------
Overview
--------

This file describes the Akamai NetSession Interface.

The Akamai NetSession Interface is a download manager application. It was
installed on your computer when you downloaded content that uses the service
to provide secure, high integrity downloads of large files.

The NetSession Interface supports downloading from a central source and between
peers. When peer-downloading is enabled, your computer can serve as an upload
source for other computers -- without adverse impacts to your computing.
Peer-to-peer downloading can provide faster, more effective downloads.

The NetSession Interface contains no adware or spyware, is safe and secure,
uses minimal resources, and provides you the ability to manage and control its
actions, including the ability to uninstall it if you do not want it on your
computer.

------------
How It Works
------------

The NetSession Interface does not have a noticeable desktop presence during
downloads, since its work is integrated into the sites or applications that use
the service.

However, there are two interfaces you can use to manage downloads and the
interface itself: admintool and a Control Panel extension.

... and also:
------------
Uninstalling
------------

Before you uninstall, please note: If you uninstall the service, you will
delete files downloaded to the cache folders under the installation folders. If
you don't want to delete those files, copy or move them to a different folder.

If you do not have a serious need to uninstall the service, it may be better
not to, since other downloads may require NetSession later. NetSession may be
installed again when you download software or media that uses this service.

Also, the Akamai NetSession Interface is a shared network library that may be
used by multiple applications. It will uninstall correctly only when other
applications using the interface are uninstalled. Other applications may not
perform correctly if they look for but do not find the NetSession Interface.
For that reason, you should not simply delete the NetSession files.

Seems NetSession is a commercial download manager used by Autodesk, Adobe, Microsoft and other big companies so even if you uninstall it, it may get installed when you download SW from them. It does not seem to be spyware. See akamai.com/client.

I have it on my PC for over a year and does not seem to affect performance or anything

There is an entry in add/remove programs to uninstall it if you like, although I would not loose the time on doing it over and over since seems many companies use it.

The Akamai Netsession Client was required by Adobe when I downloaded a trial version of Acrobat 10; it appears to be used as a download manager. Windows 7 firewall warned and I uninstalled using the W7 Control Panel. If it matters, I typed 'Akamai' in the search bar on the start menu which fired up an interface that allowed me to stop the process which was running.

My guess is it is a backdoor the Chinese cooked up. Once everyone in America has it on their computers they will shut the whole thing down at that point crippling our economy. I say this happens on or about 12/21/2012.... Muhahahahahahhahaa.

I googled it because I have not installed anything on my computer in months. I don't like it. I didn't ask for it, so why does my firewall have to be the one to tell me about it?

I did get this message from Akamai after installing iTunes and restarting my PC.

Mine doesn't say who installed it when I push uninstall.

I just got it also. I had an upgrade to Firefox. I'm not sure if it is related. I did a reboot and got a firewall message so I blocked it. Thanks!

I've also just had the firewall pop up and ask me for permission to allow this. It installed a few days ago, I'm not sure how it got there, I think through an Adobe update. It's interesting that this is happening, I'm in Australia so it seems it's not just North America.

If you are in North America, and the program installed itself with out your permission, it is considered an illegal act. It seems like all of us are having the same problems at the same time, thus meaning it cannot be from a program. My advice would be to block it.

I also had Nero Showtime install it on my computer back in November but didn't get the prompt from Windows to block it until late December. It's probably safe but I don't think I'm going to need it so I got rid of it anyways.

As for finding out how it got there, if you can find a user.dat file in the directory and open it, you can see what program installed it. Some user.dat files will even tell you under "Type" in the files properties.

I just double clicked uninstall on it, and found out that it's Need for Speed World that installed it... but I don't get why it runs all the time.

I'm not sure if the people that complain about it installing "secretly" or calling it sneaky are quite correct. I'm pretty sure that many of them are on the same boat as me that when installing a program and that small window with the terms and conditions come up on installing any program the tendency is to just check the box and hit next.

My guess is that if we bothered to read those we would have seen at some point something saying that whatever program we were installing would also install the Akamai interface. And someone else noted here, many programs use it... in my case I think it was Real Player that installed it.

I have allowed it because my Firewall has told me that I had already allowed it for another program before (probably Adobe). Still if you are having problems with it there is always the option to uninstall or disable it.

It also wants to install with the trial version of Corel Wordperfect, but it is asking first.

The Akamai netsession interface and Akamai netsession interface service installed itself on my computer and was used by Need for Speed World. So it's starting to look like it's used by a lot of programs.

It may be Adobe, because according to my PC this nasty file was installed the same date, six days ago. I did not notice it until I started Microsoft Word and my firewall blocked it. I don't like anything running on my computer without me turning it on myself.

Nero Burning ROM is the program that put it on my machine originally. The interesting thing is that it has been happily dormant since November 3 when I installed it and only December 14 did it suddenly ask about blocking. I installed the two Akamai Netsession programs.

I downloaded it on nfl.com to make my videos stream faster. I have had no problems with it.

Go to the folder where Akamai is located. Click on "uninstall.exe". You will see which company installed the program. From this point you can decide if you want to continue to uninstall the program. I personally like to minimize the program in my computer.

The same for me. Installed without permission and to get my computer to actually open anything up I keep having to restart. Do I have to uninstall?

Personally I don't like things that install themselves on my computer without my knowledge, but it seems that there is a lot of going on behind the scenes nowadays. With more and more complicated technology and transferring tons of data, like video, I guess we can't control it anymore. It's good to be suspicious however. I was blocking this thing since it got here. Here is the explanation of what this thing is and what it supposedly does on the Akamai website.

Seeing as my Windows firewall auto-blocked and THEN asked me if I wanted to unblock, I would say it is evil and therefore a cleansing must occur!

My computer has been randomly turning off as well! As if it suddenly lost power. I don't think it's a coincidence that this has been happening and I've found this Akamai thing on my computer as well! Removed to ****.

This is like letting a thief get into your house, via your window, without asking  permission. This is the wrong policy for a company! Good or not, I have removed it from my system. Akamai should ask before installing software.

It downloaded for me and installed without asking as well. I noticed it the other day when my machine started randomly resetting like it lost power, very slow start ups etc. So i did a registry scan and saw it listed there and said "What the **** is this?" not a disk defrag a registry one so I removed it. Seems the problems I WAS having have stopped. **** stealthy pricks.

Thanks for the help! The "let it through idiot" it is prolly getting pawned by nasty things lol. Thanks for the info tech guy!

I had Akamai NetSession Client appear on my machine yesterday. As I had also put on a new version of Adobe Reader yesterday I assume it came in with that app. I will be removing Akamai from my machine.

I don't like it, it installed without permission and when I checked it's properties it claims it was installed on a day my computer was offline.

Wiki says it also supports peer to peer file sharing and that it can use our PC's to re-share cached Akamai files to offset loads on their own servers. Akamai's page only loosely eludes to that lil' fact.

That's a big deal if you are using a metered internet connection like a tethered cellphone or mobile 3g/4g hotspot device. You could get hit by an outrageous bill for data limit overages or have your connection throttled back over usages that were not even yours. It's an even bigger deal if live in a rural area that is only served by dial up, the bleeding bandwidth would lead to timeouts, lag, or otherwise frozen web browsers.

The more I read, the less I like about. This thing basically installs its self then leeches off our system's resources and internet bandwidth without any user knowledge or permission to re-share the web content or streamed media we have downloaded to our own PCs from Akamai’s customers. Some of Akamai's customers include Apple and the iTunes store, Hulu, Netflicks, Facebook, Twitter, Adobe systems, Yahoo, and Blizzard Entertainment.

Does this sound bad to anyone else? First off, they are secretly using peeps without permission to increase their bottom line with a stealthy program that installs it’s self with no user input. Second, how do you effectively uninstall a program that installs without permission? Third it is P2P web server, poised to be the most distributed p2p app ever created, is there a hacker in cyberspace that isn't working on a way to exploit it?

This just feels bad on so many levels…

I had this thing show up immediately after I used a new 128gig flash drive I got from a company in China. I think it is in the drive to allow for faster file transfer from the C drive to the device but I am not sure. So far I have blocked it, but reports I see from a Google search seem to indicate that the file is safe.

It's only good for you, let it through. It increases net and streaming which supports Akami. It's useful.

Same here, I'm not admitting it, everything works fine without it...

I'm getting a related security message from Online Armor: "C:\Users\MyName\AppData\Akamai\installer_no_upload_silent.exe is blocked."

The "silent" part makes me suspicious...

I just got the same security message.

While the Akamai interface is commonly used for a lot of things, I hear it's often exploited as well. Can't hurt to block it, and if something stops working, go back and let it through.