Avast still spying on us :-D

Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security
1

It’s been a while, I asked here, why Avast turns ON by default “participate in avast community” and “participate in data sharing”. Not every update, but quite often these would be turned ON by Avast, although I keep them OFF. I was assured by a nice Avast employee that Avast has no need to spy on us, why on Earth would they do it, right? Very nice guy to chat with, realy nice. A few days ago, Avast upgraded on its own, ahem and since it again works strangely on my machine I start checking the options and obviously Avast again turned ON the above mentioned setting against my will. no respect. will never buy.
p

2
Very nice guy to chat with
avast only has a chat for business users.

avast is not spying on you in any way.

3

Can’t confirm your issue.

  • Which Avast…? (Free/Pro/IS/Premier)
  • Which version…?
  • OS…? (32/64 Bit…? - which SP/Build…?)
  • Other security related software installed…?
  • Which AV(s) did you use before Avast…?
4

[quote author=Eddy link=topic=187984.msg1322167#msg1322167 date=1467291761]

Very nice guy to chat with
avast only has a chat for business users.

you have no right to suggest i lied, eddy. it would be very easy to get back at you and be nasty to you, but i still resist that urge.

5

hi, i dont think it matters to go into thiss issue since it’s been looked into by avast already and it really happens like forever, but for you:
latest avast free
win 7 x64
zone alarm free
i§ve been using avast for many, many, many years. almost bought it on at least two occasions, but i cant force myself cosidering some of my experiences.
hope it helps, but dont waste too much time on it, its not a new thing
best of luck though :slight_smile:
p

6

Drop ZA and try again.

7

I simply stated the fact that avast only has a chat for business consumers.

8

Yes,You are partly right about Participate in data sharing.The issue you have is solved in 12.1.2272 Beta version and i also have this issue in 2016.12.1.2271 Beta:https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=187525.msg1319250#msg1319250.[b]Changes:+ Fixed issue with user settings reset to default after program update [/b]in 12.1.2272 Beta.(https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=187642.0) One thing avast! not spying on us. :slight_smile:

9

hi, thanks for replying.
i have 12.1.2272 (b12.1.3076.0) and i believe (but i cant be 100% sure) the switch happened with this update. but theres no way for me to be 100%.
about spying: i am a bit dramatic, of course, but the point is - we need to have trust in a product that claims to protect us and issues such as these undermind the trust. i have no way of knowing if it is just a bug or a happy spying feature. i cant tell so obviously i go with the worst case scenario. i guess its that i am czech, i would love to be proud of avast and i love so many of its features and they they always do something that angers me so much…
best regards
p

10

thanks for suggestion, but too much trouble: find an alternative, learn how it works, install it, set it up… i have barelly time to reply to this thread

11

Best you post/ask here then: https://forum.avast.com/index.php?board=30.0

12

Sorry, but these claims are nonsense. avast! NEVER re-enables those settings by itself. I have data sharing disabled on all systems and they have been like that for several updates.

Settings are always respected unless there is some misconfiguration due to update. Which to this date never happened for data sharing settings.

There is also EULA which describes data collection and you can look for explanation from Vlk somewhere on this forum about data collection. or was it on Wilder, I don’t know exactly. Look it up.

Bottom line, in current time of heavy cloud integrated protection systems, all antiviruses gather data one way or another. Btw, have you used Google today? Yeah, that…

13

But it does,Now it is fixed by avast!. :slight_smile:

14

i could almost envy you the confidence with which you know what happens on someone else’s computer, but then again i dont :smiley:

15

But he knows :wink:
Seriously thanks for mentioning it here. I still have hopes for Avast. I will be on the lookout :slight_smile:
Best regards,
P

16

I’ll just quote myself. If it’s a bug, that’s not intentional behavior and you can’t blame it on them like they are doing it intentionally. The bug which resets ALL settings to default doesn’t reset data sharing specifically. Blaming it as intentional would be just stupid thing to do.

17

I only recently installed avast and hadn’t even realized that it updated because it does this automatically. I just checked my privacy settings and they were changed, and I know for a fact that they were disabled when I installed Avast. It’s annoying and a little disappointing, but whatever. Just wanted to post here to state that this isn’t an isolated incident. Avast does apparently change Privacy settings, and it has happened with the most recent update regardless of what that changelog claims.

18

I am not blaming them at all,just point it out. :slight_smile:

19

No.It is enabled by default you have to manually disable it. :slight_smile:

20

Some of my my settings (like “Enable Avast email signature” and “Antispam”) which I’ve turned off are also always turned on again when AIS updates.