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I wouldn't trust this company anymore. Bye Lenovo.

by vivivi 12y ago

wvenable 12y ago
Nearly every laptop is preloaded with crapware. Lenovo might have (briefly even) picked one of worst examples of it but I'm sure there are (or will be) examples of this from other manufacturers that has yet to be discovered. It might now be the case going forward that Lenovo will be a better choice. They've been burned.
- SwellJoe 12y ago
  There's crapware, and then there's spyware/adware. The shovelware that most vendors ship on their boxes is offensive, yes. It's annoying. It steals a little of my life each time I buy a new machine, because I have to take time to re-image the system or clean off the crap (my current HP Envy was particularly egregious in this waste of my time, in that the restore image didn't work, so I had to wait ten days to get a restore DVD from them, and had to pay them $15 for the privilege of being able to restore my system). But, none of this is comparable to installing spyware on your customers systems. They keep making claims that it isn't spyware, but in a previous HN thread, someone was trivially able to find the tracking and re-targeting codes in the injected code. It is the definition of spyware, and even worse, it is broken in such a way that it enabled MITM attacks. "It might now be the case going forward that Lenovo will be a better choice. They've been burned." Have you read their statements about it? Every single one of them denies any wrongdoing. They believe it's just a "customers don't like this software" issue. They don't believe it is a "We have likely committed crimes against our customers", which is what it actually is, at least in jurisdictions that take citizen privacy at all seriously. (In the US the TOS click through probably protects them, because the US doesn't give a shit about privacy, but in some other countries it probably wouldn't.)
  - wvenable 12y ago
    > Every single one of them denies any wrongdoing. Of course. You make out like that's a significant detail. "Large company denies liability" is not a headline. Do you honestly think Dell, HP, or even Apple would say anything differently in a similar situation? Based on the quantity and quality of the software pre-installed on every laptop I've ever owned, I'm not quite as convinced as you are that this is exclusively an issue that could only ever happen to Lenovo customers.
    - SwellJoe 12y ago
      Sony shipped spyware, too. As has Samsung on their TVs. But, that doesn't mean it's OK, or that anyone should trust Lenovo because "they've been burned". Lenovo isn't the wronged party, their customers are. I'm saying I would need to see a "mea culpa" from Lenovo before I would even begin to think about trusting them.
      - wvenable 12y ago
        I never intended to imply that anyone should implicitly trust Lenovo now because this happened; such a point is so ridiculous I'm surprised you believe I was making it. I also never made that point that Lenovo is somehow the wronged party -- which is again is ridiculous. Instead, given the general attitude of most PC manufacturers with regard to what is pre-installed, I don't think boycotting Lenovo would necessarily save you from this sort of issue in the future. You're just as likely to be burned by almost any one of them. This product wasn't even made specifically for Lenovo. Perhaps this attention will make Lenovo more careful in the future. It equally might not. It might make other manufactures more careful. Or it might make no difference at all.

I wouldn't trust this company anymore. Bye Lenovo.

by vivivi 12y ago

I wouldn't trust this company anymore. Bye Lenovo.

Nearly every laptop is preloaded with crapware. Lenovo might have (briefly even) picked one of worst examples of it but I'm sure there are (or will be) examples of this from other manufacturers that has yet to be discovered. It might now be the case going forward that Lenovo will be a better choice. They've been burned.

SwellJoe 12y ago
There's crapware, and then there's spyware/adware. The shovelware that most vendors ship on their boxes is offensive, yes. It's annoying. It steals a little of my life each time I buy a new machine, because I have to take time to re-image the system or clean off the crap (my current HP Envy was particularly egregious in this waste of my time, in that the restore image didn't work, so I had to wait ten days to get a restore DVD from them, and had to pay them $15 for the privilege of being able to restore my system). But, none of this is comparable to installing spyware on your customers systems. They keep making claims that it isn't spyware, but in a previous HN thread, someone was trivially able to find the tracking and re-targeting codes in the injected code. It is the definition of spyware, and even worse, it is broken in such a way that it enabled MITM attacks. "It might now be the case going forward that Lenovo will be a better choice. They've been burned." Have you read their statements about it? Every single one of them denies any wrongdoing. They believe it's just a "customers don't like this software" issue. They don't believe it is a "We have likely committed crimes against our customers", which is what it actually is, at least in jurisdictions that take citizen privacy at all seriously. (In the US the TOS click through probably protects them, because the US doesn't give a shit about privacy, but in some other countries it probably wouldn't.)
- wvenable 12y ago
  > Every single one of them denies any wrongdoing. Of course. You make out like that's a significant detail. "Large company denies liability" is not a headline. Do you honestly think Dell, HP, or even Apple would say anything differently in a similar situation? Based on the quantity and quality of the software pre-installed on every laptop I've ever owned, I'm not quite as convinced as you are that this is exclusively an issue that could only ever happen to Lenovo customers.
  - SwellJoe 12y ago
    Sony shipped spyware, too. As has Samsung on their TVs. But, that doesn't mean it's OK, or that anyone should trust Lenovo because "they've been burned". Lenovo isn't the wronged party, their customers are. I'm saying I would need to see a "mea culpa" from Lenovo before I would even begin to think about trusting them.
    - wvenable 12y ago
      I never intended to imply that anyone should implicitly trust Lenovo now because this happened; such a point is so ridiculous I'm surprised you believe I was making it. I also never made that point that Lenovo is somehow the wronged party -- which is again is ridiculous. Instead, given the general attitude of most PC manufacturers with regard to what is pre-installed, I don't think boycotting Lenovo would necessarily save you from this sort of issue in the future. You're just as likely to be burned by almost any one of them. This product wasn't even made specifically for Lenovo. Perhaps this attention will make Lenovo more careful in the future. It equally might not. It might make other manufactures more careful. Or it might make no difference at all.