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McAfee Acquires VPN Provider TunnelBear (venturebeat.com)

McAfee announced that it has acquired Canada-based virtual private network (VPN) company TunnelBear. From a report: Founded in 2011, Toronto-based TunnelBear has gained a solid reputation for its fun, cross-platform VPN app that uses quirky bear-burrowing animations to bring online privacy to the masses. The company claims around 20 million people have used its service across mobile and desktop, while a few months back it branched out into password management with the launch of the standalone RememBear app. [...] That TunnelBear has sold to a major brand such as McAfee won't be greeted warmly by many of the product's existing users. However, with significantly more resources now at its disposal, TunnelBear should be in a good position to absorb any losses that result from the transfer of ownership.

56 comments

  1. Well... by ChodaBoyUSA · · Score: 5, Interesting

    RIP TunnelBear VPN. I won't touch ANYTHING with the name McAfee on it.

    1. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Uninstalled it from Chrome just now. When I did, it took me to a page to leave feedback. I left a comment that tried to make it clear (civilly) that selling out was an epic mistake. Others might enjoy installing this extension just for the joy of uninstalling it and sharing additional opinions...

    2. Re:Well... by DontBeAMoran · · Score: 1

      You just typed the word McAfee. Better rip the A,C,E,F and M keys from your keyboard.

      --
      #DeleteFacebook
    3. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ...but a quirky and fun app with bear animations was A-OK?

    4. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's not what your mom said.

    5. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Unless those keys have the brand "McAfee" inscribed on them somehow, then your post is nonsense. Now, his monitor after having typed "McAfee" would have some credence, but then he can close the window to remove the name before touching his monitor again.

    6. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yep. Just like sticking my thick, veiny, throbbing 10-inch member into your dad’s quivering asshole was A-OK.

    7. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well that escalated quickly.

    8. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I wasn't as civil. I have no qualms about telling the developers they are cheap whores.

    9. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Even worse, McAfee is now owned by Intel. I'm sure they're installing taps to the NSA as we speak.

    10. Re:Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      RIP TunnelBear VPN. I won't touch ANYTHING with the name McAfee on it.

      Yeah, esp since Intel bought McAfee back in what? 2010? I'm happy with ExpressVPN, thx.

  2. Get ready for the bundle! by sabbede · · Score: 2

    Because it won't be long before you're accidentally installing it along with McAfee Security Scan and TrueKey when you just want Adobe Reader.

    1. Re: Get ready for the bundle! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nobody wants to install Adobe Reader. Nobody.

    2. Re:Get ready for the bundle! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There is no Adobe Reader for Linux

    3. Re: Get ready for the bundle! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nobody wants to install Adobe Reader. Nobody.

      Mod up.

  3. it just died by jbmartin6 · · Score: 1

    That TunnelBear has sold to a major brand such as McAfee won't be greeted warmly by many of the product's existing users.

    Nor should it be, McAfee will cease any meaningful development on it until it languishes far behind the alternatives. And support will get worse and worse.

    --
    This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
    1. Re:it just died by rmdingler · · Score: 1

      Are you saying McAfee will develop a Don't feed the bear policy?

      --
      Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

      Ernest Hemingway

    2. Re:it just died by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, McAfee will apply their existing "Milk it for all it's worth, bundle the useful parts into McAfee suite, and fire the developers" policy.

  4. Should of sold to by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    With a name like TunnelBear they should have sold themselves to The Boring Company.

    I'll see myself out...

    1. Re:Should of sold to by xxxJonBoyxxx · · Score: 1

      I think it's odd enough that anyone would take a flyer on a security brand with "Bear" in the name with all the "Russia! Russia! Marsha! Russia!" talk recently.

    2. Re:Should of sold to by jbmartin6 · · Score: 1

      That's bearism and is not to be tolerated.

      --
      This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
    3. Re: Should of sold to by bn-7bc · · Score: 1

      Who is Maria and how do you know her(well by the form of here name you use), and whst does she have to do whith this?

  5. The real question to ask: by Kokuyo · · Score: 2

    Will Linus Tech Tips drop TunnelBear as a sponsor or won't they?

    1. Re:The real question to ask: by EvilSS · · Score: 3, Funny

      Only if they stop paying him.

      --
      I browse on +1 so AC's need not respond, I won't see it.
    2. Re:The real question to ask: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Will Linus Tech Tips drop TunnelBear as a sponsor or won't they?

      Given that he is a huge intel fanboi and mcafee belongs to intel, nope, it iwll be business as usual for him.

    3. Re:The real question to ask: by DigiShaman · · Score: 1

      His audience is gaming and computing savvy. With almost certainty, the grand majority have a disdain for McAfee.

      It remains to be seen if McAfee will re-brand TunnelBear, or allow it to still run independently as always. Oh, and keep in mind both TunnelBear and Linus are Canadian.

      --
      Life is not for the lazy.
    4. Re:The real question to ask: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You must not actually watch his stuff ... he was a big fan when Intel was all that the world had to offer. Now that AMD has awakened again he is on board, even cracking some Intel heads in a couple vids ...

    5. Re:The real question to ask: by sexconker · · Score: 1

      His audience is gaming and computing savvy.

      Nope, his audience is tweens and early teens who don't know shit and love ridiculous clickbait.

    6. Re:The real question to ask: by Kokuyo · · Score: 1

      I am 36 but okay.

    7. Re:The real question to ask: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You must not actually watch his stuff ... he was a big fan when Intel was all that the world had to offer. Now that AMD has awakened again he is on board, even cracking some Intel heads in a couple vids ...

      You mean like the video he did imploring intel to do something about amd, crying in the rain and everything, because he pretty much cannot live in a world where amd is better?

      After that, it has being business as usual, only intel crap gets used or reviewed and the few time he does something with amd CPU's is belittling them and reminding us how great intel cpus are.

    8. Re:The real question to ask: by EvilSS · · Score: 1

      He just did a sponsored video for a vacuum cleaner. I don't think Tunnel Bear being owned by McAfee is going to sway him on rejecting their sponsorship and ad money.

      --
      I browse on +1 so AC's need not respond, I won't see it.
    9. Re:The real question to ask: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      lets be honest what he is doing is playing to the "gamer and Fastest P.C. on paper" group of users, Single Core IPC is king, cost means little and FPS Must be over 9000 with the refresh rate of 240 Hz.

      Overall uneatable by most and honest he is doing some really pointless but cool "Will it work" style computers overall he wants high Benchmark numbers that AMD will never achieve because they are tuned for many slower cores doing work symmetricly and have been sense 2006 with the athlon 64 x2

    10. Re:The real question to ask: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So did Austin and I down voted both.

  6. Should HAVE BEEN sold to by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Learn english.

  7. Dancing pigs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Per the old security axiom, I'm sure their next move will be to replace the animation of burrowing bears with dancing pigs.

  8. **WARNING this is a Security Alert** by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Your FREE TRIAL of Tunnel Bear is about to expire!

  9. "significantly more resources now at its disposal" by mwvdlee · · Score: 1

    significantly more resources now at its disposal

    Since this is McAfee, this can be interpreted in multiple ways.
    Most likely, it means the TunnelBear app will soon bloat to an obtrusive adware monster, using only 2GB RAM (while inactive).

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  10. BUT IT'S FUN MAN! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's FUN! A VPN. That's FUN! You against FUN? What is YOUR problem?!!!

  11. Re:my popcorn is ready by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Hitler did nothing wrong.....

    -Per Djoos

  12. Fixed a computer last week by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    It was a brand new Win 10 laptop. Nothing had been installed. It wouldn't connect to the internet and moved at a crawl.

    I finally managed to partially get it working by disabling all non-Microsoft services and programs at startup. I then "uninstalled" McAfee from the computer. After a reboot I noticed that there were still active McAfee services running. Some Googling revealed I needed to run the "McAfee Removal Tool" to get rid of this junk.

    I ran "McAfee Removal Tool" for 20 minutes, which never completed, and eventually hard-reset the machine. Finally the McAfee processes weren't showing up any more, but who knows what remained from the software.

    TLDR; McAfee is still a piece of shit

  13. Breaking - John McAfee is sueing McAfee Inc by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Breaking - John McAfee is sueing McAfee Inc for $300 Million. "People assume that I have something to do with this terrible software" John McAfee explained. "My good name is being dragged through the mud by this company. I'm not some kind of monster who would deliberately wreck millions of peoples machines with malware posing as an anti-virus program."

  14. Why bother by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...and thus has eliminated all reasons for using a VPN, as McAfee will happily hand over any and all surveillance of their users to whomever asks for it.

    1. Re:Why bother by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Use a VPN platform that can take connections from OpenVPN. No need to run their stupid dumbed down for grandma client that gobbles up 2 GB or RAM just sitting there idle.

      Best part of a VPN provider that accepts connections from OpenVPN clients. You can use the VPN client on something like a router running DD-WRT. This runs everything on your LAN though the VPN tunnel seamlessly. None of your client devices have any clue they are on a VPN.

      Private Internet Access is one that I use https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/

      This is a list of all their world wide VPN endpoints that you can point your OpenVPN client at https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/pages/network/

      And they support multiple encryption strengths and run on multiple "common" ports to get though firewalls https://helpdesk.privateinternetaccess.com/hc/en-us/articles/225274288-Which-encryption-auth-settings-should-I-use-for-ports-on-your-gateways-

  15. Re: my popcorn is ready by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If it were John McAfee I'd grab some popcorn too. But it's the AV vendor so they will just make TunnelBear stop working. It's going to be boring.

  16. The service is no longer safe to use by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    if you think otherwise you're just kidding yourself.

  17. Tunnel Bear Just Committed Corporate Suicide RIP by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Account Already Canceled. Goodbye. Moving on to another.
    Anti-virus makers, McAfee and Norton have done themselves such disservice to their customer base that nobody with a right mind and isn't Mom and Dad trying to get on the information super highway, have moved away. Maybe when they can solve their issues with performance, actual virus & malware detection, and doesn't present security holes, then maybe they will earn a better rep. But I doubt it, The damage has been done. Time to Re-brand.

  18. If only we could convince... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    barely consent aged foreign women to hold to that same standard :)

  19. Linus by sexconker · · Score: 0

    I'm Linus from Linus Tech Tips and it's time to talk about Tunnel Bear! Tunnel Bear is paying me money to tell you about Tunnel Bear! I'm a fucking clown that puts out awful clickbait shit on YouTube! Tunnel Bear!!

  20. playbook for acquisitions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Here's the playbook:

    - major shareholder- employees get 18 month handcuffs, then will quit

    - g&a employees get whacked in next rolling RIF. At McAfee they're currently RIFs twice yearly

    - in 18 months, product dev is shifted to Bangalore and remaining engineering is given the opportunity to find open reqs somewhere in the US

    Innovation will stop once it's rebranded.

    If the new TPG McAfee is anything like the pre Intel one.

  21. Oh, the company. Not John. by aussiekrom · · Score: 1

    Because it might have made an interesting story if it had been.

  22. But why? by eneville · · Score: 1

    Why would you use a VPN to do anything these days? The VPN offers nothing that a cheap throw away OpenVZ machine could, but at least with the OpenVZ you have some chance of knowing what the outbound traffic is doing, its much less likely that the provider is going to sniff you traffic.

    Given there are more uses for a VPS than a VPN, I don't see the VPN market growing, this cannot be a good business move.

    1. Re:But why? by pnutjam · · Score: 1

      Unlimited bandwidth for a way lower price. I use pia for about $30 a year. I get access to more exit points, and I trust them more then verizon or xfinity.
      They have no incentive to insert ads or share my browsing data with every advertiser, this is directly contrary to their business model. I'm sure they'd roll over for a warrant, but that's not the risk I'm mitigating.

  23. McAfee is Intel by HermMunster · · Score: 1

    I've seen a couple of antivirus distributors include VPN as a choice in their offerings. Kaspersky is one of them. Avg is another. If you want to remain anonymous then don't use those from your VPN provider. Intel actively participates with the US government so using their VPN likely gives the US government access to your activities when using the VPN. I would question their av product as well.

    --
    You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
    1. Re:McAfee is Intel by pnutjam · · Score: 1

      US government is not the risk most VPN users are mitigating. File sharing is a civil issue and most of us are just trying to avoid being bundled into an advertisers portfolio by verizon, comcast, at&t, etc.

      I don't know why the ISP's think it's their right and this should be a standard part of their business model, but as long as it is, I'll use a vpn.

  24. Step 4 achieved by Brockmire · · Score: 1

    1. Start VPN company 2. ??? 3. ??? 4. Profit