Feds Asked to Take Action Against Adware Creator 240
An anonymous reader writes "CNet is reporting that a consumer watchdog group has asked the Federal Trade Commission to take action against 180solutions and CJB.net for unfair and deceptive business practices. The Center for Democracy and Technology submitted over 150 pages of examples of 180s bad practices." From the article: "180Solutions deliberately and repeatedly duped Internet users into downloading intrusive advertising software, according to a Center for Democracy and Technology complaint (download PDF). The company continued these practices even after it pledged to better itself and after receiving warnings from spyware experts and privacy advocates, the group said."
and it won't matter... (Score:5, Insightful)
Only one? (Score:2, Insightful)
Stupid adware. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:and it won't matter... (Score:3, Insightful)
They had it coming (Score:5, Insightful)
And round and round we go.
If they spent 1/10 as much time actually controlling their affiliates as they do writing up press releases, maybe something might have been done.
pdf? (Score:1, Insightful)
180 will always be right on the edge (Score:5, Insightful)
Then they did the arms-length thing: blame the affiliates, but encourage them to break the law.
I don't see how their behavior is any different from companies that mislead people as to what they are buying or signing (e.g. I'll give you a check for a dollar -- but it is also a contract that switches your long distance service to may carrier).
Some people are stupid. Our laws assume that people are responsible and that if they sign a contract, that is them willingly singing a contract.
I suspect the problem is that some people are so stupid that they aren't really responsible, and that is especially the case when it comes to computers running spyware.
Re:and it won't matter... (Score:4, Insightful)
No more spyware! (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:180 will always be right on the edge (Score:3, Insightful)
Not true. You can't sign away your rights. You can't for example sign yourself into slavery. Unfortunately.
Re:Throw them in jail... (Score:2, Insightful)
Your spyware stories? Here's mine (Score:5, Insightful)
and SpyBot Search and Destroy [download.com] every now and again...
But just recently I've had to clean my father-in-law's pc, and a friends one too.
Now the father-in-law's one was pretty bad, popups would launch with IE, and there was a lot of CPU activity etc. that was not accounted for... nasty stuff... but a clean with Adaware, Spybot, using Add/Remove to kill anything that looked suspect, putting firefox on etc. and we have a clean computer.
The other computer though... my GOD! On startup it would immediately go to 100% CPU usage... and once you could finally get Task Manager up it was iexplore.exe that was doing the damage... a few minutes later when it'd actually respond to a kill process and the work of cleaning it could finally take place... well... hours later and using all tools I think it's clean now... but it required all of them to get it all... with HiJack This [download.com] being the final saviour to remove the last of the damage...
And what were the biggest damage makers? The damn programs that these people downloaded that claimed they were 'Spyware cleaners'... but really were spyware themselves.
EVIL
FUCKERS
they prey on people who already have pcs loaded up with spyware... and put more on.
Of course the second of the two pcs was infected so damn badly (Spybot found over 3 thousand items) due to porn surfing... almost always the cause of these things.
I don't know how the makers of these programs live with themselves... there's nothing redeeming about what they do... AT ALL.
RIAA (Score:4, Insightful)
Why is it that we can have organizations like the RIAA to protect industry interests, yet there is no one to protect the interests of consumers?
Re:RIAA (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:and it won't matter... (Score:2, Insightful)
People are learning, I'll admit, but even "saavy" users don't really know much about spyware, adware, viruses, hijacking, firewalls, etc. Have they heard of them? Maybe. But they don't really know how to deal with them or even what to look for.
Re:Should take action against these people... (Score:3, Insightful)
"They're a pretty coin, and they're backed by silver. It's a commodity that's going up in value, unlike the U.S. dollar."
Oooo it's PURTY!!!
And going up in value? WTF? Silver is BARELY starting to recover from being at it's LOWEST value in nearly 600 YEARS (under $4 in 2002)!!
As of today, 1 oz of silver is worth $9.02. And these SCHMUCKS pay $20 for one coin. Yeah.. that's a really good investment there, buddy.
Re:Should take action against these people... (Score:2, Insightful)
Not only that, but his digital dollars are like Enron stock. If all hell breaks loose and we suffer a depression, where do you think you'll find Mr. NotHaus? With all those reserves in the Bahamas, I betcha. Yet, people still continue to believe they can get something for nothing.
Re:And not always duped... (Score:5, Insightful)
1. They can only find known virii. Maybe being 'protected' from tens of thousands of viruses comforts you, but I'm worried about the few no one knows about yet, and AV software provides no protection against those.
2. They are only partially sucsessfull in removing virii. How many times have you seen "Delete Failed! click here for more info"? I've seen it a few times too many. I SHOULD NEVER EVER SEE THIS MESSAGE! This is a design failure.
3. AV software is not effective as a means of prevention. Virii come in two flavors-- trojans and worms. Trojan==idiot user clicked on BrittneySpearsNaked.jpg.exe; AV cannot prevent this. Worm==windows security issue; AV cannot prevent this. This is an over-simplification, and may not be 100% technically accurate, but you get the picture.
4. (sum of points 2 and 3) If AV software can't prevent infection, and if it sometimes can't even remove the infection, what good is it again? Its good for Symantec, its good for Macafee, and its good for IT professionals who get to say "its not my fault, I did everything i could to prevent it" next time a code red happens.
Re:RIAA (Score:2, Insightful)
Why is it that we can have organizations like the RIAA to protect industry interests, yet there is no one to protect the interests of consumers?
Because consumers aren't the ones who have all the money.
Well, that's not entirely true. After all, corporations only get rich because consumers buy their shit. As a group, consumers actually have all the money.
The problem is that consumers are a bottom-up bunch, so trying to convince them all to support a single agenda and allocate money toward it is nearly impossible. Even if you can get a bunch of consumers to agree on the same agenda, you can't easily and effeciently pool all their funds together toward pushing that agenda. Consumers are armed with frustration, consumer rights groups (such as the EFF) are starved for funding, and even if someone at the top sets an agenda, they don't have the resources to make it happen.
Corporations, on the other hand, are a top-down bunch, so a single CEO (or small group, aka the board) sets an agenda, and they can immediately throw the tons of money they've previously collected toward making it happen. They are armed with money, they make a decision, they make it happen.
You can bet that if consumers adequately funded an organization like the EFF, such that the EFF was financially armed better than the RIAA or MPAA, you'd start seeing things change in real ways. But you can also bet that will never happen as long as corporations offer mass-desirable tangible goods for sale while consumer-rights groups only offer intangible services or mass-undesirable tangibles such as T-shirts with their logos on them.
Re:Your spyware stories? Here's mine (Score:3, Insightful)
i think the sentance you were looking for is "Of course the second of the two pcs was infected so damn badly (Spybot found over 3 thousand items) due to porn surfing with IE"
Re:And not always duped... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:and it won't matter... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:And not always duped... (Score:2, Insightful)