Avast collected data on location, health concerns, and more.

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.

  • dangblingus@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
    844·
    8 months ago

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

      • GreatDong3000@lemm.eeEnglish
        8·
        8 months ago

        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@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          3·
          8 months ago

          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@lemmy.worldEnglish
      30·
      8 months ago

      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@lemmy.worldEnglish
      255·
      8 months ago

      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.

      • Dudewitbow@lemmy.zipEnglish
        241·
        8 months ago

        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.

      • Contend6248@feddit.deEnglish
        12·
        8 months ago

        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@lemmy.worldEnglish
          3·
          8 months ago

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

    • lemmyingly@lemm.eeEnglish
      1·
      8 months ago

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

  • ilinamorato@lemmy.worldEnglish
    72·
    8 months ago

    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.

  • Kinglink@lemmy.worldEnglish
    621·
    8 months ago

    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.

    • redcalcium@lemmy.instituteEnglish
      461·
      8 months ago

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

      • The Octonaut@mander.xyzEnglish
        1218·
        8 months ago

        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.

    • Imgonnatrythis@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      51·
      8 months ago

      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.

    • MiDaBa@lemmy.mlEnglish
      43·
      8 months ago

      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@lemmy.worldEnglish
    581·
    8 months ago

    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.

    • kworpy@lemm.eeEnglish
      21·
      8 months ago

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

      • taanegl@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        8 months ago

        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.

    • lemmyingly@lemm.eeEnglish
      24·
      8 months ago

      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.

        • lemmyingly@lemm.eeEnglish
          2·
          8 months ago

          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@lemmy.worldEnglish
                1·
                7 months ago

                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.

  • Chocrates@lemmy.worldEnglish
    53·
    8 months ago

    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@pawb.socialEnglish
    43·
    8 months ago

    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. :(

  • MaggiWuerze@feddit.deEnglish
    40·
    8 months ago

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

  • Swordgeek@lemmy.caEnglish
    31·
    8 months ago

    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.

  • EmperorHenry@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
    20·
    8 months ago

    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@lemm.eeEnglish
    181·
    8 months ago

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