Antivirus giants fined over automatic renewals

Two major antivirus companies have been fined by New York's attorney general for charging customers without their authorisation or consent. The companies have promised to change the way they renew customer subscriptions. Symantec and McAfee have said that they will provide customers with more information about product renewals …

This topic is closed for new posts.

Posted Tuesday 16th June 2009 14:48 GMT

Rob Beard

Anti-Virus

This is one of the reasons I wouldn't touch Norton Anti-Virus or McAfee. For starters Norton doesn't half slow your system down to a slugs pace, and McAfee... well that won't pick up a couple of Trojans that Clam Anti-Virus (which is free and open source) will pick up.

On Windows I tend to use AVG, sure it's a little slower than some but it works and works well. Also never had any problems with NOD32 either.

I dunno, I remember when Norton was a brand you could trust (Norton Utilities especially) and Peter Norton was well respected, but it seems like his name is being used to sell any old crap these days.

Rob

Posted Tuesday 16th June 2009 14:48 GMT

imposter

Nasty Malware

-Hard to remove

-Disables your security

-Pretends to offer protection while offering little or none

-Slows down your computer

Is what normal fake anti malware does.

Norton and macafee showuing themselves to be class leaders in taking money, not only doing the above but taking regular payments without asking. I have considered them to be about as good as no security when the downsides are considered and would have always reccomended AVG free to anyone over it, despite the fact it's not really great. (It's sufficient if you're a sensible and informed user of the internet, I have no idea why my PC isn't yet compromised).

O think the rest of my thoughts on this don't need to be said, this all speaks for itself.

Posted Tuesday 16th June 2009 14:48 GMT

VoodooTrucker

Explicit consent

Credit cards should not be able to be charged without explicit consent, and a unique transaction identifier. Currently anyone who has or has ever had your CC number can charge you whatever they want, whenever they want, then you have to dispute it.

This is the *stupidest* security model I've ever heard. To (mis)quote a not-so-nice guy, "the current model is like handing your wallet over, asking them to take what they want, then give it back please.

We absolutely need unique, encrypted transaction numbers and NFC. PCI security is an (unfunny) joke. This is fucking sad, and needs to end.

Posted Tuesday 16th June 2009 14:48 GMT

bilston

Pleased its been stopped

Had to renew a Symantic anti virus for a friend.

Having taken the credit card details the b*****ds calmly informed me that this would be an automatic renewal, and that you cant change this now, you need to log back in, and then jump through a lot of hoops to re set it back to non automatic. Not even a box to tick pre set to yes!

Thats assuming Norton does not frig the whole thing up any way.

What a way to treat customers, it almost seems they don't care.

This topic is closed for new posts.