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Lenovo To Wipe Superfish Off PCs
An anonymous reader send news from the Wall Street Journal, where Lenovo CTO Peter Hortensius said in an interview that the company will roll out a software update to remove the Superfish adware from its laptops. "As soon as the programmer is finished, we will provide a tool that removes all traces of the app from people’s laptops; this goes further than simply uninstalling the app. Once the app-wiping software is finished tonight or tomorrow, we’ll issue a press release with information on how to get it." When asked whether his company vets the software they pre-install on their machines, he said, "Yes, we do. Obviously in this case we didn't do enough. The intent of loading this tool was to help enhance our users’ shopping experience. The feedback from users was that it wasn’t useful, and that’s why we turned it off. Our reputation is everything and our products are ultimately how we have our reputation."
Hmm..... Who would have thought a Chinese company would install software that is capable of spying on laptops? Wonder how the world's secrets keep getting stolen? If you buy a Lenovo and expect anything different, you deserve what you get. This is not the first time, nor will it be the last time. They just got caught this time.
I will guarantee you that this particular 'update' will only take care of the core OS infection. If you have FF, Opera, or Thunderbird, do not expect this to work. You're stuck fixing those programs and their cert stores on your own.
I wouldn't trust Lenovo, anyways. They can't keep a story straight.
First they say 'Between October and December' and then just a few lines later contradict themselves by saying they stopped in January.
Then they further contradict their words by releasing a security advisory stating they stopped in February.
We know this software has been on Lenovo laptops since June, at the least. So the Oct-Dec statement is a lie. Three straight lies in a row.
Simply put, you cannot trust this company any longer. Their 'fix' is a lie, their statements are lies, and they're trying to save face to avoid the Federal hand of pain bearing down upon them.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
http://www.pcworld.com/article...
Samsung also got caught this month injecting ads into TV viewing. They only got caught because they screwed up the algorithm and injected ads into people's personal ad-free videos. And then samsung's genius engineers biffed again by sending the TV microphone pickups back to samsung (which is okay--that's what siri, alexa, cortana, and google do) but doing so unencrypted.
Obviously parasitic ad injection is the the single most lucrative way to earn money on the internet. Your doing it just like google does for nearly all its revenue, selling ads and harvesting click-thru data, but your doing it without the associated cost of attracting customers with a product. No wonder Lenovo wanted this action.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
From a partner email regarding the SuperFish software:
"Please note that Lenovo has NOT loaded this software on any ThinkPad notebooks, nor any desktops, tablets, workstations, servers or smartphones. The only impacted models are the following consumer notebook series: Z-series, Y-Series, U-Series, G-Series, S-Series, Flex-Series, Yoga, Miix and E-Series."
They don't believe that. They believe their customers are stupid enough to believe it.
Our reputation is everything and our products are ultimately how we have our reputation.
Well, they'll miss it then! Their reputation is now that they are a sleazebag company willing to compromise their customers security so they can make a few bucks injecting unwanted advertising, then lying about the security risk when they got caught.
That's a company I will never do business with again.
February 20, 2015 Dear Andrew, As you may have heard, select Lenovo consumer notebooks shipped after September 2014 included Superfish Visual Discovery software as a shopping aid to customers. Superfish is a TrustE certified third-party software vendor, with offices in Palo Alto, CA. User feedback on the software was not positive and we received some reports of security concerns. Please note that Lenovo has NOT loaded this software on any ThinkPad notebooks, nor any desktops, tablets, workstations, servers or smartphones. The only impacted models are the following consumer notebook series: Z-series, Y-Series, U-Series, G-Series, S-Series, Flex-Series, Yoga, Miix and E-Series. If you use any of these Lenovo consumer models in your enterprise, please refer to the Customer Support information below. While this software does not impact the models typically used by businesses, we wanted to let you know that we take user feedback seriously at Lenovo. We know that millions of people rely on our devices every day, and it is our responsibility to deliver quality, reliability, innovation and security to each and every customer. We make every effort to provide a great user experience for our customers. We recognize that the Superfish software has caused concern. Lenovo has taken steps to address that concern. â Superfish has completely disabled server side interactions (since January) on all Lenovo products so that the software is no longer active. â Lenovo has stopped preloading the software and will not preload this software again in the future. â Lenovo has provided instructions for uninstalling this software and will soon provide a software removal patch. For more information on this, or for instructions on Superfish software removal, please visit http://support.lenovo.com/us/e.... We appreciate your confidence in Lenovo. Unsubscribe | Privacy Policy Lenovo reserves the right to alter product offerings or specifications at any time without notice. Models pictured are for illustrative purposes only. Lenovo is not responsible for typographic or photographic errors. Information advertised has no contractual effect. You are subscribed as andrew.coleman@dpw.com. To ensure delivery of Lenovo email offers to your inbox, please add lenovo@update.lenovo.com to your address book. Lenovo and the Lenovo logo are trademarks of Lenovo. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Lenovo 1009 Think Place Morrisville, NC 27560 © 2015 Lenovo. All rights reserved.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
they'd already turned the thinkpad line into boring mass-market hunt-and-peck-optimised dvd ogling boxes. In that sense, I'd written them off years ago.
Really? I have used both IBM and Lenovo ThinkPads and while the Lenovo ones aren't quite as great as what IBM made, they are still vastly superior to any consumer laptop on the market today. You might be thinking of the IdeaPad line, which looks like a ThinkPad to a small degree but isn't nearly the same thing. The ThinkPads are still solid - and someone else pointed out they don't have Superfish on the, either.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
In other news, Superfish has now been added to the Windows Defender malware database.
Just download the ISO from MS and use the key that comes with the laptop to install. Problem solved. I wound up doing that with my last Thinkpad and apart from having to install some special apps to make use of the special buttons it worked out just fine.
But, the real answer here is to not buy consumer computers and expect them to be good. The markup on those is probably about $20 over the actual cost of the hardware and the service and support reflects that.
Nobody does that any more.
In addition the ability of a consumer to install from that disc is about equal to their ability to install Linux. It is not going to happen.
You haven't been buying laptops for very long, have you? I've bought:
A Thinkpad 700 (monochrome, not color) in 1994 for about $2100.
A Thinkpad 701c in 1996 for about $2800 (original retail in 1995 was about $3800)
A Thinkpad 560E in 1999 (2 years after release) on sale for about $2600 (nearly $4000 in 1997)
A Toshiba Portege 3440CT in 2001 on a killer sale for $1750 (was $2500 when new)
A Thinkpad T40 in 2004 for $1800
A Sony S360 in 2006 for $600 in a killer sale (original retail approx 2x).
A Sony Z122 - their top of the line model - in 2010 for $800 in a killer sale (original retail approx 2x).
The ubiquity of cheap components has been translating into much cheaper laptops over time. If you look at the profit margins of these companies, they've been pretty stable at 5%-10%. Apple is the only one who's figured out a way to sell cheap components at a huge markup.