Dear Avast,
I’m an IT specialist who, as any IT specialist likely, at times gets consulted when non-IT people’s / family / friends PCs get clogged by virusses or trojans. I’m used to removing their current or inexisting AV bundles and setting up an AV free account. A lot of times, these people decide to buy a premium account a week or so later.
What has been happening the last few weeks though, is that I get calls about so-called offers that Avast gives them bottom right of their screen (the popups), for which these people think they have to pay in order for their Antivirus (which I commended them) to keep working. In one instance, someone bought GrimeFighter, thinking it was a message to renew his antivirus solution, and then had no clue what was happening when he was presented a boot screen that lasted over two hours (the standard Grimefighter scan it seems). When I then visited that person I told him he hadn’t paid for his antivirus, but for a different product, and that he would still need to pay for his Avast antivirus when that subscription ran out. Obviously this wasn’t his intention.
Long story short: for a lot of elderly people the messages that are being sent out w.r.t. protect your network / protect your PC now, is misleading them into thinking their AV subscription needs to be renewed. I’m starting to personally dread pointing people to Avast / installing Avast on people’s PCs.
Best regards,
Bruno