Back in the day (1980's) Peter Norton was a computer programing guru and was held in high esteem industry wide. He published articles and books that were seminal for many up and coming computer geeks and hackers and created a line of software utilities for computers that made them run better and eventually helped people fight the ever growing problem of viruses and other malware.
He made millions and then sold his company in the early 90's to a company called Semantec. At first Semantec continued Peter Norton's excellence and produced some great software, like many companies over the last 20 years the software products became less and less effective (even destructive) while the company became more and more concerned with profit alone. You know the story...death by bean counters.
As a pro computer repair person I have spent hundreds of hours cleaning people's computers of one of the most cumbersome and pernicious pieces of expensive software ever invented: Semantec's Norton's Security Suite.
It's invasive to the point of ridiculousness in how it "hooks" into Windows system files and even after uninstalling leaves all sorts of traces of itself in systems folders and the system registry. It also can cause all sorts of havoc on systems should anything go even slighly wrong with the program itself or when subscriptions run out and need to be renewed.
The worse part is the amount of money people pay to the company to get a service many anti-virus and other security software products make available for free.
Now a lawsuit has been filed against the company for using extortion software that causes customers to think they have an infected system when they do not. This puts them in the same category as the European mob groups that make millions off the same scare techniques.
I have long suspected that anti-malware companies could easily be responsible for producing the very same viruses and trojans that their products were aimed at controlling and fixing. Think about it.
Now something of that order is being raised by a lawsuit against Semantec.
Score one for the little guy.
Lawsuit: Symantec bullies users into buying anti-virus softwareThe anti-virus vendor Symantec has been formally accused of employing devious scareware tactics to trick customers into paying for software they don't need.
On Tuesday (Jan. 10), James Gross filed a class action lawsuit in a California Federal court claiming that Symantec defrauds its customers by running fake anti-virus scans on their machines, Courthouse News reported. The results, Gross alleges, are rigged to convince users their computers are in danger and need to be protected with the paid version of Symantec's products.
In a statement, Symantec said the lawsuit lacks merit.
In the suit, Gross singled out three Symantec products: PC Tools Registry Mechanic, PC Tools Performance Toolkit and Norton Utilities, and said each comes with a free diagnostic scan that warns consumers, "in alarmist fashion," that harmful threats exist on their computers.
"Once the Scareware's scan is complete," Gross claims, "the user is presented with its results in an extremely menacing fashion. For example, the displayed lettering is red and bolded, the screen contains warnings that errors need immediate repair, or that they are slowing down the computer, or exposing the user's privacy."
"Next the Scareware offers to 'fix' some of the detected errors, but requires the user to purchase the full, registered version of the software to fully 'fix' the identified computer problems," Gross said.
This is where Symantec's actions become illegal, Gross contends. He claims the three offensive Symantec's products always report that the computer's "system's health is low," and that "high priority errors exist on the system." In effect, the free diagnostic scan is Symantec's way of scaring consumers into buying a product to fix a problem that, according to Gross, doesn't exist.
"The Scareware does not actually perform any meaningful evaluation of the user's computer system, or of the supposed 'errors' detected by the software," he said. "Moreover, the Scareware does not, and cannot, actually perform the valuable tasks represented by Symantec through its websites, advertising, and in-software display screens."
Symantec countered Gross' claims, and said, "Several independent third parties have tested and reviewed these products very favorably, verifying the effectiveness of their functionality," according to a statement obtained by Computerworld.
Gross, a Washington State resident, seeks punitive damages for unfair competition, breach of warranty, fraud and unjust enrichment.
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