No to Cisco Web Security

[tobyaw]

A while ago I installed Cisco AnyConnect on my Mac, in order to VPN in to work. Recently I noticed that a process acwebsecagent was logging multiple failures every minute to my system log; with a bit of investigation it appears that the AnyConnect installer defaults also installs Cisco Web Security, unless one chooses to uncheck it.

As far as I can tell Web Security appears not to be related to AnyConnect’s VPN functionality; it is a separately licensed Cisco service, and if it isn’t configured it appears to have a performance impact on one’s Mac.

If it is installed, you can remove it with:
sudo /opt/cisco/anyconnect/bin/websecurity_uninstall.sh

More info at:
http://www.thebitguru.com/blog/view/394-Random%20Slowdown%20of%20Browsers%20in%20OS%20X%20Mountain%20Lion

Comments

Indeed, no to Cisco Web security

[felipe alfaro solana (from livejournal.com)]

Thanks, Toby. Indeed I noticed that the Web security module was consuming a considerable amount of network bandwidth. I also believe this service is not needed to use the VPN service, so I decided to uninstall it using your instructions. Thanks a lot for sharing this very nice and useful tip.

Re: Indeed, no to Cisco Web security

[tobyaw]

Glad I was able to help. Re-reading my LJ post, I realise that it doesn’t really capture how annoyed I was with Cisco for installing something that was impacting the performance of my Mac.