[Rick James]

Wut?

[Nuke]

ive suspected them of being ****s for years, now we have pwoof

[NGTM-1R]

They make a shoddy product, Norton has repeatedly failed for me, so I've alternated between McAffe and AVG for the last two years or so. Somehow, I'm not surprised.

[Hellstryker]

They make a shoddy product, Norton has repeatedly failed for me, so I've alternated between McAffe and AVG for the last two years or so. Somehow, I'm not surprised.

McAfee is terrible.

And yeah, this doesn't surprise me at all either.

[Androgeos Exeunt]

PIFTS.exe?

Thank god I'm on a Mac, where EXEs are completely useless.

[castor]

What are they thinking They must know there are hordes of people who watch super closely for things like that.
Careless or ignorant? Considering the filed they are working at I guess it doesn't make any difference

[Charismatic]

ive suspected them of being ****s for years, now we have pwoof

really? wow. I know of people back in the day used Norton.

[Hellstryker]

What are they thinking They must know there are hordes of people who watch super closely for things like that.
Careless or ignorant? Considering the filed they are working at I guess it doesn't make any difference

My guess would be careless. They forgot to hide their malware 

[Rick James]

    An admin over at The Bleeping Computer clarifies why the other content is being accessed:


Unfortunately, most people here do not understand programming. The reason why this program opens up so many of these folders is not because they are scraping the contents, but because the libraries and modules they are using to access the Internet automatically access them. I monitored all file access while running the program, and yes they did access the folders, but did not query the contents.

This is just conspiracy theory fodder at its best.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Slightly reassuring, right? I have only these things to say:

Symantec will most likely not provide us any more information, since they will assume that for the most part, the damage is done. They've "pulled" the patch, despite that it was apparently necessary enough to include in the update at one point. Only a limited number of users will ever hear about it.

They've posted an official statement, and most people will read that, and be satisfied. The information in the official PIFTS.EXE topic will most likely be passed right by.

If the pifts.exe process WAS necessary for them to determine all that information about which clients needed upgrading, upon installation of windows 7 (This, when you think about it, really makes absolutely no sense), then chances are they have remodeled the file so that it now runs in secrecy, and did not actually "pull" the patch.

Beyond that, even if the file is not scraping information from all these "conspicuous" places that it now has access to, who's to say that in the future, new updates might make use of those new access points that Symantec has, on all the users hit by the "blunder" ? Consider upon this, friends .

Even if PIFTS.EXE accesses these sensitive areas of your computer as a result of .net framework, or whatever it is it needs to do to "phone home", this at least proves that Norton has no qualms about sending you new executable files that access your computer in unexplained ways, with no "release notes", unsigned, and are not too worried about leaving the issue open for debate for days until really providing any insight whatsoever. They also have no qualms about deleting paying customers topics and posts whenever a support issue comes up, as well as banning them, merely as the result of trying to cover up their own mistake. Not a reassuring way to treat customers, if you ask me.

[The E]

What have random conspiracy theories got to do with this? Way I see it, this is just Norton's PR Department failing spectacularly. There is no reason to bring the X-Files into it.

[NGTM-1R]

McAfee is terrible.

Perhaps, but it has yet to fail spectacularly at keeping my computer secure. That's good enough.

[Daniel P]

Yeah, it's very hard to trust people because many lie. All these greedy corrupt selfish companies. Most deceive in order to make money off of you, even if it means your health is at stake. Same with many fast food restaurants. That also applies to any company who sells foods with artificial sweeteners who don't want you to know that their sweeteners are toxic and cause a host of diseases and mental problems, nerve damage, and often times don't even help you lose fat. They have a very similar molecular composition to embalming fluid.

This is very sick and makes me angry and I'm sure it make others angry too. How low can they go? Same with a lot of western medicine. They don't want you to know about natural remedies because they want you to keep buying their medicine (that often times does more harm than good) and want you to stay sick so you will keep buying more and give you nasty side effects thinking that buying more will help it go away. Much of it is fake just to make money off of you. I would only use western medicine and surgery as a last resort. Prevention is the best method. I take none and no vitamins and know how to stay healthy and what to include in my diet, including a lot of anti-oxidants in my brewed green tea, and I'm healthier than many people around me who do take all this stuff and I can keep off the fat even if I eat a lot and I save much more money too. Knowledge is power.

The point is, all these companies care about is their stupid money. They don't want you to know the truth. Nothing surprises me these days. You have to be very careful. Those are good conspiricy theories that I'm sure are true in most cases.

Here is a good program for anti-malware: http://www.malwarebytes.org/. Of course I would also have another anti-malware program with this one since some catch certain malware that others don't notice. As long as you don't run them both at the same time in memory, you can have more than one anti-malware program without conflicting, and I would recommend it.

meh, not all companies are evil.

What wrong about western medicine (they work for me). Those herbal medicine cost more and with all Quackery.

Same with organic foods and most other stuff.

I use Norton anti-virus for some time and found no problem with it. Maybe it is a lie to scare off Norton anti-virus products.

[Rick James]

meh, not all companies are evil.

What wrong about western medicine (they work for me). Those herbal medicine cost more and with all Quackery.

Same with organic foods and most other stuff.

I use Norton anti-virus for some time and found no problem with it. Maybe it is a lie to scare off Norton anti-virus products.

Unlikely. The delightful anons of the partyvan wiki and others have decompiled and recompiled the suspect .exe over and over again with the same result. The program makes contact with a small variety of different IPs, including one which is apparently from Africa. It is also confirmed that the .exe is accessing folders without the end-user's consent, even though it might not necessarily be scraping the contents of those folders and shooting them off to wherever.

Let's face it. Symantec rolled the 20-sided die on this one and ended up with a 1.

[Daniel P]

What happen it was a scare tactic, It been used many times to scare people off from using their products.

[The E]

Maybe, but by deleting support requests and forum postings by their own customers about this topic they certainly didn't inspire confidence in their products.

[Rick James]

What happen it was a scare tactic, It been used many times to scare people off from using their products.

Um, no. Have you even read the blog? PIFTS.exe was sent out as part of a Norton LiveUpdate patch. If Symantec really wanted to alienate their customer base, then mission successful, but I see no other reason why they would shoot themselves in their collective foot like this.

[Daniel P]

Read this one

http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/161038/bad_symantec_update_leads_to_trouble.html

[Charismatic]

My guess would be careless. They forgot to hide their malware 

Who 4 gets? Newbies!

[FUBAR-BDHR]

Through all the BS I see three facts:

1.  Norton sent out an update containing a program called PIFTS
2.  That program was meant to collect information on Norton's user base and report it to Norton (AKA Spyware)
3.  Had the program been signed the firewall would have let it access the internet without intervention or approval from the user. 

Now out of that I get that Norton is willing to let spyware (and probably other programs) through their firewall without the user ever knowing.  This is scary.  All it takes is one hacker to figure out how to send out a virus with a valid signature and Norton lets it right through spreading like wildfire. 

[Nuke]

ive suspected them of being ****s for years, now we have pwoof

really? wow. I know of people back in the day used Norton.

the reason for that is because a lot of oems pre-installed norton with an introductory license (usually 3 months). thing is if you didnt update the license you were completely unprotected and most users just uninstalled it never knowing what it was (or liked the idea of buying something they already had). its ridiculous how many people didnt understand the message "your license has expired" means.  ive also seen infected computers explode when you install it. in all my years of geekdom ive never really trusted norton or any other virus scanner at least till i discovered avg.

one way ive afoided viruses is by not letting myself be forcefed what programs i use. using firefox instead of ie, winamp instead of wmp, open office over ms office, pidgin instead of msn messanger, ect. essentially dont use the software that came with the os. frankly id wish theyd gut those programs and reduce the cost of the os to compensate.