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I've used Daemon Tools (free) for years. It's one of the first things I install on a fresh windows install. Don't you love a fresh windows install? I do too! That's why it's extra frustrating when you run into the wall of spyware the latest Daemon Tools Lite installer attempts to force upon you.
The first thing I see after telling DT Lite what components to install, is a special offer to go along with my DT Lite. This window attempts to mock the appearance of a standard install window with "Typical Installation (Recommended)", and "Custom Installation" radio buttons. Read the fine print, which most people don't, and under the typical installation option it says "Install sweetpacks toolbar, change and maintain your default search and homepage to sweetpacks powered by bing". Wow so it's not only going to change my start page, default search engine, and install a toolbar to execute and upload my personal data to some unknown entity for lord knows what...it's also going to maintain it's changes to the start page and search engine. That means if I were to install this crap, and tried to change my options back to the original settings..this would go ahead and override my choices. Ok, let's opt out of that! If I click "custom installation radio button, then uncheck the box next to "Install sweetpacks toolbar, change and maintain your default search and homepage to sweetpacks powered by bing" and then click next, a new window pops up titled "Confirmation". The text in this confirmation window describes sweetpacks, and tells me it's free and features web search, social networks, online games, weather, etc. Then it says, "By clicking OK you agree to install sweetpacks toolbar, homepage, and set sweetpacks search engine by default. The options are "OK", and "Cancel". I thought I already jumped through this hoop once just s second ago. Pretty pushy. Clicking cancel now as it's the only other option besides "OK". There was also a button titles "Skip" but pressing this button also displays the "Confirmation" that tries a second time to get you to install it. It's also worth mentioning that on the confirmation window features some invalid characters, which reeks of foreign shadey hacker stuff. Not Western or UTF8 character set huh?
Next the installer window features another spyware product, "Instant access to coupons - save money with the luckysaving widget!". "Luckysavings is ad-supported software that is provided at no cost..blah blah...By clicking "Next you agree to install...". Again the options are "skip", next, or cancel. Clicking skip!
Next is the "Mount Space" spyware, which doesn't feature a skip button..only a radio button, "Don't allow mountspace to use my statistics". This part doesn't look as much like spyware as the rest..in fact it almost appears to be a component of the actual daemon tools program......yeah right! Call me paranoid..but at this point wouldn't you be?
At this point I'm prompted to install a daemon tools gadget...which after all the junk you just threw at me...I am in no mood to trust one bit. No Gadget.
Now the program finally installs with an option to launch after exiting the installer. Then it goes ahead and launches a website in my default browser that it never asked me about.
Look people...spyware is not new, and it's sure as sh|t not amusing to me. Most free products that come bundled with 3rd party software take steps to make it transparent and straightforward. The stuff that comes with daemon tools is intentionally counter intuitive. I have never sweated installing daemon tools before today...but I made sure to virus scan it, and the system...with 2 different trusted spyware/antivirus apps. I even created a manual restore point, and considered software to track registry changes. This is the level of trust I now have in daemon tools.
I advise anyone installing daemon tools lite to first DISCONNECT FROM THE INTERNETS. This will prevent the installer from connecting to whatever service it uses to dynamically serve up terrible spyware, and will allow you to instead proceed to the window asking about the "Mount Space" service. It's scary to think what would happen if one of daemon tools "trusted" partners were hacked or for any reason should be less trusted. Could the content being installed by this actual installer file I downloaded be changed in the future to any sort of terrible thing? Yes. I did also try making a windows firewall rule to specifically forbid the installer from sending outbound data, yet it still managed to contact the evil servers. So, yes...disconnect the internet entirely!
I just wanted to post here, to let the great people behind daemon tools know how disappointed in them I am. If you're going to be dirty dogs and include this crud, please do it in a respectful way. Make the options to opt in or out of this very clear and straightforward and include a complete review of what will be installed before it is installed. My only concern here is trust, and after the experience installing...I'm not feeling the trust. I *think* I installed daemon tools with no spyware, but I'm not certain...I should be able to feel certain about what I did and didn't just install right?
The first thing I see after telling DT Lite what components to install, is a special offer to go along with my DT Lite. This window attempts to mock the appearance of a standard install window with "Typical Installation (Recommended)", and "Custom Installation" radio buttons. Read the fine print, which most people don't, and under the typical installation option it says "Install sweetpacks toolbar, change and maintain your default search and homepage to sweetpacks powered by bing". Wow so it's not only going to change my start page, default search engine, and install a toolbar to execute and upload my personal data to some unknown entity for lord knows what...it's also going to maintain it's changes to the start page and search engine. That means if I were to install this crap, and tried to change my options back to the original settings..this would go ahead and override my choices. Ok, let's opt out of that! If I click "custom installation radio button, then uncheck the box next to "Install sweetpacks toolbar, change and maintain your default search and homepage to sweetpacks powered by bing" and then click next, a new window pops up titled "Confirmation". The text in this confirmation window describes sweetpacks, and tells me it's free and features web search, social networks, online games, weather, etc. Then it says, "By clicking OK you agree to install sweetpacks toolbar, homepage, and set sweetpacks search engine by default. The options are "OK", and "Cancel". I thought I already jumped through this hoop once just s second ago. Pretty pushy. Clicking cancel now as it's the only other option besides "OK". There was also a button titles "Skip" but pressing this button also displays the "Confirmation" that tries a second time to get you to install it. It's also worth mentioning that on the confirmation window features some invalid characters, which reeks of foreign shadey hacker stuff. Not Western or UTF8 character set huh?
Next the installer window features another spyware product, "Instant access to coupons - save money with the luckysaving widget!". "Luckysavings is ad-supported software that is provided at no cost..blah blah...By clicking "Next you agree to install...". Again the options are "skip", next, or cancel. Clicking skip!
Next is the "Mount Space" spyware, which doesn't feature a skip button..only a radio button, "Don't allow mountspace to use my statistics". This part doesn't look as much like spyware as the rest..in fact it almost appears to be a component of the actual daemon tools program......yeah right! Call me paranoid..but at this point wouldn't you be?
At this point I'm prompted to install a daemon tools gadget...which after all the junk you just threw at me...I am in no mood to trust one bit. No Gadget.
Now the program finally installs with an option to launch after exiting the installer. Then it goes ahead and launches a website in my default browser that it never asked me about.
Look people...spyware is not new, and it's sure as sh|t not amusing to me. Most free products that come bundled with 3rd party software take steps to make it transparent and straightforward. The stuff that comes with daemon tools is intentionally counter intuitive. I have never sweated installing daemon tools before today...but I made sure to virus scan it, and the system...with 2 different trusted spyware/antivirus apps. I even created a manual restore point, and considered software to track registry changes. This is the level of trust I now have in daemon tools.
I advise anyone installing daemon tools lite to first DISCONNECT FROM THE INTERNETS. This will prevent the installer from connecting to whatever service it uses to dynamically serve up terrible spyware, and will allow you to instead proceed to the window asking about the "Mount Space" service. It's scary to think what would happen if one of daemon tools "trusted" partners were hacked or for any reason should be less trusted. Could the content being installed by this actual installer file I downloaded be changed in the future to any sort of terrible thing? Yes. I did also try making a windows firewall rule to specifically forbid the installer from sending outbound data, yet it still managed to contact the evil servers. So, yes...disconnect the internet entirely!
I just wanted to post here, to let the great people behind daemon tools know how disappointed in them I am. If you're going to be dirty dogs and include this crud, please do it in a respectful way. Make the options to opt in or out of this very clear and straightforward and include a complete review of what will be installed before it is installed. My only concern here is trust, and after the experience installing...I'm not feeling the trust. I *think* I installed daemon tools with no spyware, but I'm not certain...I should be able to feel certain about what I did and didn't just install right?
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