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Best Buy 'Geek Squad' Accused of Pirating Software
Alien54 writes "Texas software company Winternals Software LP has sued Best Buy Co. Inc. in federal court, alleging that the nation's largest consumer electronics retailer was using unlicensed versions of its diagnostic equipment. Best Buy's Geek Squad, is alleged to be using pirated versions of the software since talks on a commercial licensing agreement broke off. A restraining order has been granted."
A slightly related comment - I used to work at a PC repair shop next to Best Buy. We would get a constant stream of customers that would be sent from Best Buy to our store after *they* broke the machine! Sometimes they would even walk right out after getting a machine from the customer and bring it to us. I laughed out loud when I started to see these geek squad commercials. I can just imagine now the peeps at geek squad that use format and reload as their way tp fix any problem the computer has.
...for about two weeks. Most disorganized bunch of fu*k-ups I've ever seen.
Yes, the unlicensed software usage is true, and widespread.
The keylogger thing mentioned above happened once, and the tech was summarily fired. I'm pretty sure the customer got a completely new machine, too, because of it.
Our supervisor was a douche, complete and total jerk. When I confronted him about the issue of pirated hardware, he held sort of the 'BestBuy is like Wal*Mart' attitude, with the assumption that the corporation could just strong-arm the publisher into submission.
I guess he was wrong.
Informatus Technologicus
Having worked computer service in the past, my 2 cents..
Piracy was absolutely rampant behind the counter. The policy was: so long as the customer doesn't see it, it's all good. Some stuff was frowned on, like copying a customer's key to XP and the like, and we were strict on the MS licensing rules (w/customers) except for the boss's friends, who got whatever they wanted.
We used 3 different diagnostic programs, and the rumour was that we'd paid for one copy of one of them a long time ago. We were encouraged to warez (does anybody still say that?) new apps to make our job go smoother, and we must have had a dozen different pirated data recovery suites lying around. So this is not really surprising, if the enviroment at BB is anything like what I knew.
The biggest problem with the service side of things is that anyone who is any good at the job is qualified for much much better things. Servicing PC's is an entry level job that requires an enourmous working knowledge to do well. Any monkey can run a ram diagnostic and format/reinstall, but anything more complex, like virus/spyware removal, intermittant h/w failure, dealing with customers, even just data backup: These all require a skill set that pays better elsewhere. As a jumping off point for geeks, its a great education, but it don't pay what its worth. Hardly a shock that this leads to less-than-professional conduct...
This is entirely true. We were often told to "solve the problem however you can" by managers. Why? Because there pretty much =wasn't= a "geek squad" budget. It is treated as an extension of the PC/Home Office department and basically is used to placate customers who have had their machines screwed up at the service centers. We weren't technicians, we were negotiators. We HAD no budget. In fact, Store 323, North Avenue in Chicago uses pirated software for its diagnostics, on every machine that comes in. It is copied and distributed to the technicians, the other employees, their friends, ANYBODY. The passcode to get it to work, is, ironically "323". The "Geek Squad" agents have shitty jobs, utterly shitty. It wasn't "we're provding you with pirated software to do your job because we're cheap" it was "find your own pirated software to do your job because we're too cheap to buy any AND too lazy to even do the pirating"
Why am I not posting anonymous coward when Im giving them such obvious information as to who I am?
Because I'm not afraid of telling the truth.
Fuck you, best buy
Happiness does not come from having much, but from being attached to little.
I can testify to that large collection. Not a day went by in the three months I did support for one of the big oems, that I didn't talk to at least three people who were told by Best Buy to call us for their recovery discs. When we told the customer that all of our machines shipped with these discs, they'd start on about how Best Buy tacked on a $20 "optimization" onto their new pc...
From what I could gather, this "optimization" consisted solely of installing several incompatible versions of security software, cd burning software, and crap like weatherbug. Oh, and snagging the recovery cd's. My first day on the phones, I thought it was coincidence, until I mentioned it to a more senior tech.
"Oh, yeah, they take 'em. It's their policy or somethin'"
It still took a couple weeks before I believed it, but soon my script was,
"Do you have the CD's that came with your PC?"
"No, it didn't come with any..."
"So you got it at Best Buy then?"
"OMG, How'd you know?"
And since the item was now an "open box" refunds went right out (unless you were willing to make a big enough scene, I heard a few going on over the phone that made me cringe).
Long rant short, after talking with several people I worked with, my experiance was not unique. Basically, BB was trying it's damndest to make sure the customer came back for an expensive service call. Whether or not this is still common practice, I don't know as it's been a few years. I also stopped shopping there for anything about the time I had 20 different associates tell me how much they loved not working on commision in one visit.
Shift happens. Fire it up.
I doubt that, but I'll tell you this now - I work at a Geek Squad in-store precinct (not saying which, since if I say anything, I will get my ass fired, then sued for "divulging confidential company information) - and any customer whose data is backed up gets their data dumped onto the precinct PC, then burned to disc.
That data, though, _DOESN'T GET DELETED_ from the GS machines after they're done.
I have, on multiple occasions, seen managers (especially the PCAM at my store) rifle through customer backups and take what they want, or ogle at the porn and whatnot in there - especially if the customer's female, and there's pictures of her in the My Pictures folder.
Geek Squad used to be good - then BBY bought 'em and made everything go straight to hell.
- CIA02** (last two numbers omitted in order to preserve anonymity)
However, the security sucks. It is too easy to change things that shouldn't be changed. It is too easy to hide and bury things where they don't belong.
Is there any reason for a user-level app to not get a 'chrooted' version of the registry that only allows write access under a certain tree node?
I mean, assuming Microsoft cared about security.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)