Welcome to Incremental Social! Learn more about this project here!
Check out lemmyverse to find more communities to join from here!

Avast fined $16.5 million for ‘privacy’ software that actually sold users’ browsing data

Avast, the cybersecurity software company, is facing a $16.5 million fine after it was caught storing and selling customer information without their consent. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced the fine on Thursday and said that it’s banning Avast from selling user data for advertising purposes.

HootinNHollerin ,

They definitely made more than that selling data what a fucking joke

db2 ,

F*C fines are just protection money payments.

dangblingus ,

If the software is free, but not open source, it's harvesting your data. How else do you think these companies stay in business?

the_post_of_tom_joad ,

If you pay tho they're also harvesting your data. And if you don't use your service they make a ghost profile and harvest that data.

prole ,
@prole@sh.itjust.works avatar

The only way to fully prevent it is to remove the profit-motive altogether.

the_post_of_tom_joad ,

Sounds fun!

GreatDong3000 ,

Yeah I love it when people say "if you don't pay you are the product" as if paying for youtube premium, google one, reddit premium or spotify will stop them from harvesting your data haha that's how naive we were back when we thought data was collected only for ads.

the_post_of_tom_joad ,

how naive we were back when we thought data was collected only for ads.

Yeah their cozy relationship is terrifying considering Edward Snowden's revelations. It's such a simple workaround the constitutional right to privacy. Simply buy data from a willing company. And we wonder why they don't make laws against private companies' data mining...
🤔

Fredselfish ,
@Fredselfish@lemmy.world avatar

Free my ass! Avast charges money for that service. Hell they make you subscribe to use any service outside basic virus scan. So customers paid to have their data stolen and sold.

CustodialTeapot ,

I dislike this sentiment. Just because something is FOSS or open source, doesn't mean it's not harvesting your data or doing something nefarious.

Contend6248 ,

A good example would be Yuzu (the Switch emulator), it was open source and collected so much telemetry that Nintendo might go after their users.

This might be fear tactic but it shows you that you aren't safe

Chocrates ,

I don't know about Yuzu's data collection but they were destroyed because they existed.

Dudewitbow ,

kinda wrong sentiment to get from the statement. statement is only saying if

if free and NOT open source > data harvest

it doesn't necessarily imply that

if free and open source > doesnt data harvest

at all. its just you have the ability to find out via code of they do or not. thats more or less in the boat of logical paradoxes you can make.

lemmyingly ,

So companies like Proton and BitWarden are harvesting your data with their free tiers?

russjr08 ,
@russjr08@bitforged.space avatar

I haven't looked into Proton, but BitWarden is open source both server side and client side.

N2Narkosis ,

Proton is open source as well. Free tiers are supplemented by subscribers. https://proton.me/support/proton-plans#proton-free

TrickDacy ,

$16.5 million is not even a slap on the wrist

Contend6248 ,

A great business model actually

ilinamorato ,

Five years ago, I posted on Reddit about how Avast had installed a browser without my consent and set it as default while I was out of town and away from my computer. That post has had comments added to it several times a year ever since, meaning that they're still trying that nonsense. They stole my data without my consent by importing all of my browser data, and now it's come out that they blatantly sold it without my consent as well.

I said it then, and I say it now: If you install something without my knowledge or consent, you're a virus, plain and simple.

LoremIpsumGenerator ,

Cybersec company ❌

Advertisement/Data mining ✔️

Kinglink ,

Jesus Christ.

Remember when Google's Motto was "Don't be Evil" It was supposed to be a jab at Microsoft, but it feels like every year tech companies find news ways to just be fucking evil.

PS. Google kind of fails to live up to that motto too, I don't even know if it's still an official motto.

MaggiWuerze ,

I don’t even know if it’s still an official motto.

It's not

redcalcium ,

Google execs knew this motto will just get in the way of maximizing profits for shareholders, so they dropped it a few years ago.

Imgonnatrythis ,

Kind of?
They would happily sell your mother heroine and auction off her house. They fail at not being evil like Antarctica fails at being hospitable to palm trees.

roofuskit ,

Corporations have no soul to damn and no body to incarcerate.

the_post_of_tom_joad ,

No they officially (quietly) dropped it like a decade ago

TheOctonaut ,

No, they didn't. Alphabet was created as a parent company in 2015 and uses the similarly vague "Do the right thing" in their code of conduct. Google itself still has "Don't be evil" in their code of conduct, unchanged. Google needed Alphabet to not be Google (or they'd get fined to hell) so having everything identical wouldn't have been a smart idea.

That this easily Google-able myth is so pervasive is a wonderful microcosm about online gullibility and laziness.

the_post_of_tom_joad ,

https://gizmodo.com/google-removes-nearly-all-mentions-of-dont-be-evil-from-1826153393

Wow literally the first thing i searched.

And get fucked for your tone you pedantic little punk.

TheOctonaut , (edited )

Read your own article all the way to the bottom ❤️

(Also thank you for citing a fucking Gizmodo article from 2018 instead of the actual Google Code of Conduct which is the top result for "Google Code of Conduct to prove my point about laziness beautifully. Please note, you'll have to read all the way to the end again, sorry. https://abc.xyz/investor/google-code-of-conduct/)

Promethiel ,
@Promethiel@lemmy.world avatar

Love the vibe and energy against pretense for pretense sakes, but your source makes you seem demented as it literally repeats exactly what they said if you read it.

the_post_of_tom_joad , (edited )

Well fuck me then lol. Swhat i get for linking gizmodo. I'll take the L. Still that guy sucked and i won't unblock him

systemglitch ,

I too love blocking people who make reading this place shittier.

MiDaBa ,

I'm all for crapping on large publicly traded companies but lumping Google in with companies that sell your data isn't honest. Google does not and never has sold user data. They sure as hell use your data for their own ad network but they do not sell that data wholesale. Meta and other data brokers sell your data and this Avast company sells your data through a product they claimed stopped tracking. I'm not pro-Google but to compare their business model (which is very transparent about how it handles your data and how it's never sold) to Avast's business model (which is to completely lie to the end user while literally selling everything that user does) is not an honest comparison.

taanegl ,

This is a careful reminder to be VERY SCEPTICAL about not only "anti-viruses" (like bro, Windows defender is good enough), but also browsers. There is a high probability that the company is either a data broker or fintech... looking at you, Opera.

lemmyingly ,

I tried Windows Defender a couple of years ago for an entire year. I thought it was dog water. The anti-ransomeware feature was the only nice thing about it. I now use BitDefender.

kringkastingssjef , (edited )

What are you clicking on all day?

lemmyingly ,

At least once every 6 months I come across a top Google result trying to download malicious scripts. The web searches are innocent, eg. "Iso standard metric thread" or "bee keeper hive monitor", which are both search terms in the past where a top result had malicious scripts.

JTskulk ,

Sounds like you need the noscript browser extension instead.

lemmyingly ,

Sounds like a horrible internet experience. No thanks.

JTskulk ,

Nah it's pretty good. Just a little rough at first as you whitelist the websites you go to. After that they all load quicker since you're blocking a bunch of tracking and advertising sites.

kworpy ,
@kworpy@lemm.ee avatar

If you use antivirus software you're a dumbass. Just don't download viruses?

taanegl ,

Yes, that's why regular people should stick to Windows defender instead of downloading and installing a third party one, because it does the job just as well.

Also, it's Windows.

Chocrates ,

Do we know how much money they made on it? If it was more than $16.5 then it was still a good step on their balance sheet.

This stuff needs to be fined at the full income they made from the tool plus some penalty. Corporations only care about their balance sheets.

Interstellar_1 ,
@Interstellar_1@pawb.social avatar

That's horrifying. I remember using the avast private browser when I was younger as to not get tracked by Google chrome, but i was just getting tracked by avast instead. :(

r00ty ,
@r00ty@kbin.life avatar

It's capitalism. You get to choose who steals your personal data.

THE_ANTIHERO ,
@THE_ANTIHERO@lemmy.today avatar

Unless you use a trusted firefox fork

the_post_of_tom_joad ,

I kinda feel like capitalism is treating me like a lemon thief these days.

Slovene ,

You lemon stealing whore!

Morefan ,

False choice. Self hosting is an option, and not even that difficult these days.

People are lazy.

MaggiWuerze ,

And I'm sure that fine was as high or higher than the profit they made from the data... what, it wasn't?!

crusty ,

Cost of doing business

EvilEyedPanda ,

Jesus christ right!! I'm curious how much they made off that data.

swordgeek , (edited )

This is fucking garbage.

When a company gets caught with their hand in the cookie jar, it's not a punishment to put one of the cookies back.

Fines should be ten TIMES what the company made from their misbehaviour, not ten percent.

Sibbo ,

Ah, the snake oil turned out to be poisonous.

EmperorHenry ,
@EmperorHenry@discuss.tchncs.de avatar

that is one of two reasons why I stopped using their software.

Too many scare-ware screens and too much bloatware that you have to be mindful about not installing.

kworpy ,
@kworpy@lemm.ee avatar

Can't believe a company with a notorious history of spying on users is at it again for the 234th time!

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • •
  • technology@lemmy.world
  • incremental_games
  • meta
  • All magazines
    •