What your antivirus company knows about you

I clicked on it to read it, but you have to download it. How do I know it is not a virus? lol
 
I like how ESET's response to practically everything is "NOT DISCLOSED"
 
Skripka said:
I like how ESET's response to practically everything is "NOT DISCLOSED"
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For me the biggest and obvious problem is that there is no regulation from anyone of what happens in this software sector. Some of the stuff they collect has absolutely no reason to be collected (like the username you use in Windows or your machine's name or local IP, i.e, the IP you use behind your router). They only serve to uniquely ID not just the computer, but even the user. They seem to take many liberties without asking your permission, all in the name of "security".

Another worrysome conclusion, is that, some of them don't even use encryption. So a 3rd party, that's sniffing the traffic from your computer, can obtain the same data they do, just by intercepting the antivirus phoning home.

Still another thing, is that most, seem to have the possibility to install "user specific" patches. But most of them are shy to admit, so they prefer "not disclosed". Why being so shy? And why would a user require special treatment and not give the same protection to everyone? Well, my guess is, that this timid approach has to do with other stuff, beyond malware definitions. For instance, if local police authorities asked the antivirus company, they could effectively deliver a payload that can act as trojan horse without the antivirus reacting to it. It is also noteworthy that the big majority of US-based antivirus seem to "sweep" anything they can find.

It is also interesting that many seem to send samples of suspicious files, which logically, include documents, photos, etc.

For software that theoretically should be your only shield towards the outside world, one would expect that asking first, would be nice. Instead, they are more or less doing whatever it pleases them.

P.S.: I remember not so very long ago (i think it was about AVG 7 age), when antivirus would even ask during installation if you were to allow a unique product ID to be generated. I vaguely remember both Avira and AVG doing that. Now, nobody bothers. They gather everything. For your own safety and for having "cloud services"...
 
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I would tend to take "Not Disclosed" as yes, but we can't say so.
 
waxbytes said:
I would tend to take "Not Disclosed" as yes, but we can't say so.
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Yes, that's why the preferred not to say. They think it will make them look better compared to those who openly said yes. :D

And mind you, they may collect even more things. This was simply a pre-made questionnaire compiled by the test company. Nobody stops them from getting more... Of course they wouldn't say "wait, you forgot to ask us about this! We do that too!"
 
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Not surprised in the least. One of the two major reasons I don't use one. Other one being the performance hit. Both are equally important.
 
dgz said:
Not surprised in the least. One of the two major reasons I don't use one. Other one being the performance hit. Both are equally important.
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Me too. I actually hated antiviruses ever since they got web scanners (slowing down browsing) and cloud components.

I just use MBAM free as on demand and on occasion standalone free scanners, always on demand. For everyday use, i prefer virtualization and a small proggie that informs if new executables have been written on the disk.
 
I would not be surprised if these AV vendors haven't provided this information to our intelligence agencies on a regular basis.

Imagine if some sort of top-secret documents were leaked. All they would have to do is call up the major AV vendors and force them to search across all client machines for a particular file MD5. Scary stuff.
 
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