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Microsoft's Windows 8 App Store Is Full of Scamware
Deathspawner writes Windows 8 brought a lot to the table, with one of its most major features being its app store. However, it's not a feature that Microsoft seems too intent on keeping clean. As it is today, the store is completely littered with misleading apps and outright scamware. The unfortunate thing is that to find any of it, all you have to do is simply open the store and peruse the main sections. Not so surprisingly, no Microsoft software seems to be affected by this, but many open-source apps can be found at the store from unofficial sources that have a cost, or will lead the user to download a third-party installer. It's only a matter of time before malware sneaks its way in, if it's not there already.
Who actually uses this shit? I'm not surprised it's filled with malware.
Sadly now the table is cluttered with crap nobody needs. Could someone bus the table, please? I got work to do.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
This is a pretty bad example of clickbait. The linked bog basically says "There is junkware. Microsoft's Trademarks are protected but others, like iTunes and Firefox, get scammed by repackagers, same as any search engine.
Lacking evidence to the contrary, it seems Microsoft actively approves this state of things. They have a human performing certification and content compliance, which involves actually installing and verifying these applications:
"Content compliance: Our certification testers install and review your app to test it for content compliance. The amount of time this takes varies depending on how complex your app is, how much visual content it has, and how many apps have been submitted recently."
With that statement, they must be 100% complicit in these scams, because it makes them money when someone bites, and because it keeps the number of apps in the app store up.
As we realize the OPERATING SYSTEM is phoning home already, aren't we splitting hairs really?
The same thing however, killed a videogame company or two. It's not the maker that suffers, it's the market.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Did you really expect anything less from a store that only has 16-color single-tasking Crapps®?
Sometimes I have the feeling they just don't care.
but many open-source apps can be found at the store from unofficial sources that have a cost
FSF says it's perfectly fine to distribute free software for a fee, so long as the license is followed.
But platforms relying on a single app store have in the past made copyleft license compliance difficult or impossible. The GNU General Public License, for example, defines "source code" to include what GPLv3 calls "Installation Information" and GPLv2 calls "scripts used to control compilation and installation". When a platform requires all code to be digitally signed, a signing key is part of this "Information" or these "scripts". And the terms for obtaining a code signing certificate tend to forbid developers from sharing the private key with the public. This is why GPL software like VLC can't be on Apple's App Store, nor can ScummVM be on the Wii console.
I don't know about other users but I've had an ASUS Windows 8.1 desktop for almost a year now and have never downloaded or installed ANY apps from the Microsoft "store" and have only once clicked on the App Store tile itself once by mistake. I avoid their "store" like the plague on a desktop environment. I don't have the need or want to Skype or play Angry Birds on the desktop I guess...who uses the Microsoft App Store and for what purposes? I'm genuinely curious...
They are just true to themselves with the most crappy thing they can offer. As there are by far enough stupid MS fanbois and people that think there is no alternative, they do not have to do anything well in order to continue to make huge and entirely undeserved, profits.
That said, the only legitimization for an OS-vendor App-Store is a high quality level and security level. Otherwise you can just download and buy anywhere.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Not quite, Mr. Summary. There's nothing legally wrong with selling open-source apps if the license is followed. And ethically? Consider this:
Why would anybody find this useful? If there's a particularly obscure but useful open-source app that updates irregularly, or it's difficult or cumbersome to install, or maybe Grandma just doesn't want to mess around with MSI and EXE installers, then the new publisher would be adding value and providing a service in providing the open-source across the Store interface; reducing the fuss needed to get the software working, updated and safe.
There's nothing stopping the original developer / copyright holder / copyright assignment entity, or indeed any other legally allowed entity, from putting up the software on the Store for gratis (assuming the Store allows that) alongside New Publisher's paid for version, but if they haven't or don't want to that is their own problem. If the New Publisher has monitised the service they provide in packaging the OSS app, then bully for them.
This is all in a fantasy land where said 'good' publishers existed and actually worked to keep the software updated regularly, I know.
All this means is that companies like Apple and Mozilla happen not to have notified Microsoft of the infringement yet. So if you're worried about it, go tell Apple's legal department and Mozilla's.
Microsoft gets paid, who cares... (nobody at Microsoft that's who!)
Apparently Microsoft is putting major service packs for Windows on the Windows Store now. For example, the upgrade from Windows 8 to Windows 8.1 is offered without charge through the Windows Store application. But if you waited until Windows 8.1 to buy your laptop, this upgrade was already done for you.
Windows has been phoning home since the introduction of Windows XP in the fourth quarter of 2001. Yet most people don't care, as the ability to run Windows-exclusive applications and drivers for Windows-exclusive peripherals outweighs the pain of product activation and Windows Genuine Advantage checks.
This just in: Windows users targets for software meant to DUPE them into doing something stupid! This and other startling revelations at 10PM on "News that isn't New!"
"If you love someone, set them free. If they come home, set them on fire." - George Carlin
But you don't see the Android marketshare suffering do you?
Vonal Declosion
The monopoly app store of an operating system with the market share of Windows cannot be curated as tightly without raising red flags to regulators that Microsoft is abusing its monopoly. True, the US gave Microsoft a slap on the wrist after George W. Bush took office, but at least Europe's competition regulators still have some testicular fortitude. Apple and the major video game console makers get away with it because their market share is not necessarily large enough to produce what economists call "market power".
Google have their stupid "store", Apple have their stupid "store", Microsoft have their stupid "store". These companies try to force you to go through their stupid "store" for everything. Even free things. You just want to download something and they force you to create a store account and verify with some kind of tracking like a phone number because god forbid that you can upgrade Notepad these days without the FBI receiving a notification.
In my opinion, these companies have completely lost the plot. They have started to change things for the sake of change, probably because they employ too many people and those people have to create things for themselves to do. Their latest thing is "store". Using computers was easier, less frustrating and more fun when we did not have the "store".
As a long time Windows user, I didn't want a crApp Store. At the outset of this whole Win8 fiasco I said, "If I wanted an iPad, I'd already have one". So. I got a lot of down mods for that, IIRC. I think events since then have confirmed my PoV. If the customers don't want/don't care, then morale at MS has to be pretty low. Maybe they're just happy that anybody, Anybody, ANYBODY will show up at their party. That's not a recipe for a good relationship. Ugly person at the party, reeking of desperation... get's taken advantage of. Utterly and completely unsurprising. They shouldn't try to be cool. They should just go home and play on their computers. If they do, the coolness will come to them. Remember when it wasn't cool to be a geek? Where were we? Not at the party. At home. With the computer. Get it, MS? Go back to the drawing board, not the tablet.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
This was my first realization after picking up a Surface Pro 3. I went to the app store and tried to find google chrome. Found something for $2.99 or something. Went looking for Opera. Same thing. Every piece of software I looked for within the store that was not legitimately in the store, was faked by someone.
I think we have plenty of evidence to the contrary. Microsoft has, and does, willfully provide false information. They do this deliberately and indiscriminately, even to judges while under oath. Maybe you forgot about the claims to a judge that "If you remove Internet Explorer the Operating system stops functioning.". Even though a judge was smart enough to remove IE and show they were lying, nobody went to jail. So the trend continued.
Now what possible motivation would MS have for lying about approving apps? Easy, it's a numbers game. If Apple has half a billion applications how can MS fudge numbers to look relevant and not appear to be deliberate liars? Easy! Let people dump all kinds of crap into their app store so they can claim "look how many applications we have!' and "Look at our growth rate, thousands of new apps every day!". Both are technically true, though based on a lie about monitoring.
MS further can easily blow off the lie about approving content. Expect something along the lines of "Our people were not trained properly" with some bogus "we were hacked" charges sprinkled in for FUD and sympathy.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
I imagine that Microsoft didn't offer Windows 8.1 to Windows 8 users through the normal Windows Update mechanism because Windows 8.1 introduced additional hardware requirements. For example, unlike Windows 8, Windows 8.1 requires NX and SSE2 support in the CPU.
I miss the days when only seasoned, professional programmers working for actual companies and releasing under that company released software. What we have now is a major charlie foxtrot. I agree with Andrew Keen. The notion of professionalism has been eroded.
Isn't this a trend with all app stores now? There's little incentive for any developer to create something only to have it cloned the next day, and have your original app downvoted by the army of the "competition", e.g., http://www.reddit.com/r/gamede.... I'm starting to think there are more "rogue" apps than legit ones.
Many apps use Adware anyway, which is just a backdoor waiting to happen. Do you trust the developer not to sell you to the highest bidder? The information you hold might be more valuable than you think.
Personally, I forgot about the "Smart" in "Smartphone" for a while now. It's not worth the trouble I'll be in, if I get attacked successfully. I know someone who used an online bank app, and had her account hacked into, because she installed an app from an untrusted source. I'm sure you guys know many cases like this. In my view, any app store is an untrusted source nowadays :)
Google, unlike Apple, doesn't actually force you to go through its "stupid "store"". And Microsoft doesn't force you either, at least on its non-RT, non-phone versions of its Windows OS.
Android OS has supported two ways to "sideload" software outside Google Play Store from day one. One is through "Unknown sources": if you download an Android application package (APK), you can open it in a file manager (or even just the Downloads app) and install it. Just about every Android device, except AT&T's first few months of Android phones, has a checkbox in Settings to allow "Unknown sources" installations. But even on those more restricted AT&T devices, one can still use Android Debug Bridge (ADB) to install any APK through a USB cable. Google in fact requires ADB to work as a condition of being allowed to bundle Google Play Store on a device (source: Android CDD).
Worse that pay-to-play software of dubious quality is the entire lack of support for major applications, and a complete lack of serious productivity and mainstream apps. Many of the apps are poor stepchildren of their Android and iOS counterparts if they even exist at all. A useful, app-style browser is woefully missing (for those who have convertible tablet/laptops, you can't have Chrome, IE or FF act as an app/finger centric if you use them in desktop mode.)
The iOS and Android app stores are full of shit, too, but at least there's some good stuff out there. For MS, all they have is the shit.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Get a job with a company and develop software
Who starts such companies?
News flash, "internet full of scamware."
....to the table. Some of it might even be good, but hiding it under a steaming pile of UI was not the smoothest of moves. As for their store, color me shocked that MS of all people copied a competitor's product with a half-assed implementation.
Never let a lack of data get in the way of a good rant.
Some "software" (Like Nook for example) requires this method. Barnes and Noble no longer makes a proper desktop version
Google barnes noble nook windows 7 led me to this app that works on Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7. What do you mean by "proper"?
Why should Apple care?
Apple should care about the misuse of its own trademarks because of the threat that they'll become no longer distinctive.
But why should I get Win8 when I have to get it and then jump a few hoops to get what I already had with Win7?
Because Windows operating systems have a finite life cycle. Mainstream support will end three years earlier for Windows 7 than for Windows 8, as will extended support.
many open-source apps can be found at the store from unofficial sources that have a cost
So, serious question... is this a bad thing? With a few caveats, I don't really see a problem with someone making a bit of money from packaging an open-source program for a different OS, if they're going to the work of compiling, testing and packaging it. Obviously they should somehow make the source available if the license requires it, but beyond that they may be doing that software a favor, assuming an official package doesn't exist (which for the Windows app store, may very well be the case).
Who cares if there are 103,000 shitty apps.
I got the new windows 8.1 phone just to try something different after being bored by ios and android. The app store is packed full of scam shit. Packed. Full. Saw a game using assassins creed art passing itself as an original game yesterday. Lots of fucktarded apps too like "google hangouts features" which tells you what google hangouts does. That is the entire app. There are some super high quality apps hidden in there but the store has 0 moderation. Saw a Sword Art Online streamer in the Business category.
Is anyone really surprised? The OS is a piece of crap and so are the apps. I only lasted 2 days on this pathetic platform before ditching it.
When my son was a kindergartener, we we would receive quarterly reports as to his progress. there were three possible scores. there was 'I' for independent -- the student could do the assigned task without assistance. There was 'W' for 'with assistance' -- the student could do the task with help from the teacher. And then there was 'N'.
I asked my son what did the letter 'N' mean? His response was: "nothing done right".
I guess I would have to give Microsoft a grade of N.
That answer was just as bland and useless as the form letters most tech support sites give you. You said the official policy but didn't answer the question. To answer his question, the answer is a simple "You shouldn't." I have plenty of PC's running old versions of Windows and they chug along just fine even though they officially EOL'd decades ago. My first industrial control system (Wonderware HMI, Modicon PLC) is chugging along fine on a 486 running Win 95 and I built it in 1994 while I was still in high school. I did have to source a replacement VLB video card about 10 years ago but as far as I know the rest of that hardware is still original. The whole EOL thing is laughed at by us out in the real world building things. If it ain't broke, don't fix it, and if it is broken, it still won't get fixed until it costs the company less money than the amount they're losing. At my current job, we just shut down our last PDP-11 last fall and I'm not entirely sure why- it still worked.
MS can have my old ass Windows when they delete it from my cold, dead hard drive!
One useful metric is how long one can get security updates without having to pay. By this metric, GNU/Linux distributions have only one "version" because users can upgrade from one major version to the next without charge. Someone who jumped into Ubuntu in the Hardy Heron era (mid-2008) and who has followed LTS releases can be running Trusty Tahr by now for the cost of bandwidth.
The whole EOL thing is laughed at by us out in the real world building things. If it ain't broke, don't fix it, and if it is broken, it still won't get fixed until it costs the company less money than the amount they're losing.
I agree with you so long as a device is not connected to the Internet. I still run a game console made in the late 1980s, for instance. Devices connected to the Internet, on the other hand, are subject to attacks that were not foreseen prior to EOL.
That's why I only install software from trusted repositories.
Oh wait, thats Linux. Windows doesn't have that feature.
Hell, I noticed it almost a month after the Store Debuted.
As I said in the AV is Dead Article, I tell our customers "Don't download or install anything" and I mean it. The windows store is like the wild west. They do no QA on the content and refuse to remove obvious scam acts. Hell, MS in many cases doesn't even host the files, they post a button that says "Get App From Publisher" that leads to a third party site where you can "download" the file. That's just stupid.
The other thing that really needs to get drilled home from this is that Open Source Software is getting totally Hosed by scammers forking Code or distributing installers and the community needs to find a solution that is acceptable with OSS Practices. 77zip (not 7zip. 7zip is the legitimate one. 77zip is the adware infested one.) is an excellent example of what happens when OSS and Scams collide. VLC media player has been ripped off so much it's downright scary to do searches for it. Libreoffice and Openoffice (as well as VLC, 7zip, ETC) are constantly installer repackaged to install Adware garbage. Hell, even SourceForge is doing it to Filezilla and other OSS Apps hosted on their site. There's a ton of malware infested fake chrome's out there. Hell, It's getting to the point where I'm seeing chromium installed on PC's and all it does is download and execute rogue apps in the background with no user intervention whatsoever. They're just using it as a specifically coded malware platform which can be installed even on guest level accounts.
In Soviet Russia, Trojan exploits YOU!
I've developed an app for Windows Phone which have the same store requirements. It needed some credentials in order to be tested and I gave them the wrong credentials on purpose. It was only on the fourth update that someone actually noticed it, unfortunately the "certification process" can take up to week. It's faster now, sometimes it can pass in less than half an hour which further strengthens the theory that they are not being tested at all or they just test that the back button exits the app from the first screen...
App stores attract scammers like **** attracts flies. Any app store is an ideal means to get scam- and malware to a gigantic group of, on average, not really tech-savvy people. An app store is basically a mark store for scammers.
I understand you have strongly held beliefs about turning development of computer programs distributed to the public into an apprenticeship system analogous to Professional Engineer licensure. But thought-terminating cliches like "history doesn't matter" don't help others understand your reasoning. The conditions that allowed an an institution to come to power certainly have a bearing on why it should remain in power. Otherwise, for example, why would any JRPG have a flashback to events that occurred before the start of the game?
You deal with the situation you have, not the one you want to have.
To do so, I must understand under what conditions I will continue to have the situation I have.
Quit yer bitchin
I will once the present suggestion has been proved to be workable.
go to work for someone else for a while
In a strict apprenticeship paradigm, only an established software development firm should be allowed to make computer programs and distribute copies of them to the public. So in such a paradigm, how would someone applying for a job with "someone else" distribute copies of his own portfolio or otherwise demonstrate skills to prospective employers?
Nolan Bushnell [...] Steve Wozniak [...] Ralph Baer
Everyone on your list jumped into the video game or home computing industries after having been employed in a different branch of the information technology or electronic (or electromechanical) entertainment industry. Likewise, I currently have a programming job with someone else. But I got my first programming job for someone else several years ago by demonstrating software that I had developed as a hobby. A strict apprenticeship paradigm, with the requirement of a license to own a debugger as in Richard M. Stallman's short story "The Right to Read", would rule out even that.
"Microsoft Windows Store Is Polluted With Scamware And Microsoft Doesn't Seem To Care. Posted Monday, August 18, 2014 - by Rob Williams" (How can he be posting stuff? i thought he died...)
Hey now, what if I WANTED to have over 500 flashlight apps on my phone? You never know when the batteries will run out in one of them.
I don't understand some people's insistence on a downgrade, especially because there's no big change in driver model like there was between Windows XP and Windows Vista.
Because Win 8 is such a PITA to use. Yes Win8 seems to be a fairly decent OS, but it is burdened by a pathetic UI.
Normal: MS is full of crap.