PRIVACY ALERT: HP Quietly Installs System-Slowing Spyware On Its PCs Without Consent

SHTF Plan ^ | 11-29-2017

[blam]

On the heels of Lenovo’s massive $3.5 million fine for preinstalling adware on laptops without users‘ consent, Hewlett-Packard is jumping in with both feet when it comes to installing spyware on its PCs without the consumer’s permission.

According to numerous reports gathered by Computer World, the brand is deploying a telemetry client (a system data that is uploaded by the Connected User Experience and Telemetry component), on customer computers without asking permission.

The software, which was first identified on November 15 of this year, is called “HP Touchpoint Analytics Service” and appears to replace the self-managed HP Touchpoint Manager solution. According to the official productivity description, it features “the tools you need to ensure all your managed devices’ security — and brings you greater peace of mind”. The problem is, it’s installing itself without permission and is wreaking havoc on customers’ systems.

And the consumers are noticing:

(snip)

[blam]

I have HP laptops. Can they download this spyware onto my computers I already have?

Is this something that should concern me?

[Dr. Sivana]

I use a MS supplied copy of Windows, wipe the drive, and start from scratch.

I also redo that about once per year.

[Bob434]

one thing i did was to download windows 7 ISO- reformat my compute,r and install the new ISO and of course i had to go and find a few drivers for certain components in computer, but it’s now HP crapware free-

[RitchieAprile]

https://www.slashgear.com/heres-how-to-remove-the-new-hp-touchpoint-telemetry-bloatware-28509659/

[Bob434]

where di you get the MS supplied one? Was it for windows 7? (because you really gotta jump through hoops to get that fro m the MS site now- You used to be able TO DOWNLOAD THE iso FROM THE SITE WITHOUT HAVING TO DO ALL THE FOLLOWING STEPS- BUT NOW THEY HAVE HIDDEN IT- WOOPS CPS LOCK- SORRY-

it’s now hidden, but it’s there- ya just gotta know how to get the drop down menu to reveal it when going through the ISO’s which are now all windows 10 (unless you ‘unlock’ the drop down menu- it’s kinda complicated- but legal- gotta do it through the F-12 console and paste in a script I guess-)

[Tucker39]

Something that torques my jaws is all the wortless crapware apps that come PRE-INSTALLED on my Samsung smart phones. And WORSE than that, is that the techs at the phone store tell me the apps cannot be uninstalled or disabled. Is there a brand that DOESN’T do that?

[TomServo]

Why don’t you just build an image and restore from there? Easier than staring from scratch every time. I do mine several times a year..

[vette6387]

Why in the world would you purchase a computer from a company that treats you like it’s slave?

[House Atreides]

Ping

[z3n]

I stopped buying HP printers over 15 years ago because they came packaged with all sorts of software to run on PCs, and made it difficult to simply locate and install print drivers alone. It’s ridiculous that a peripheral device need 6 programs running in the background. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of it was spyware

[HiTech RedNeck]

You might have to look to unofficial channels to get the how-to for getting rid of the things you supposedly can’t get rid of.

Just don’t install some other piece of “ware” that isn’t publicly well known and vouched for.

[Dr. Sivana]

Why don’t you just build an image and restore from there? Easier than staring from scratch every time. I do mine several times a year..

I wind up cycling through different apps and customize a bit each time. Either way works.

[HiTech RedNeck]

Well the concept kind of grew from a simple printer driver. Now it’s got to be able to tell you that it needs ink or paper or whatever, and sit waiting for requests from the printer to save scanned images, and the like.

Using it on Linux gets around all that stuff.

[95Theses]

THANK YOU so much for posting this - my new(ish)HP was bogging down this week and now I know why; disabled and uninstalled the garbage program and all is well.

[TomServo]

Ahhh..gotcha..

[Bob434]

I’m their slave? Dang- and here i thought I’d been freed from slavery all these years? HP doesn’t own me- I own an awesome HP computer that is crapware free now- and has awesome components-

[RinaseaofDs]

Are you downloading a copy of windows to a DVD or USB drive and then using the license code upon a reformat of the C:\ drive?

Sounds like a really good idea. I suppose you are reinstalling Office and other application software too.

I’m not a cloud guy yet. I use apps on the local drive.

[Dr. Sivana]

I’m not a cloud guy yet. I use apps on the local drive.

I am NOT a cloud guy and will do my darnedest NOT to be (unless it is my own personal "cloud". We used to call them WANs or off-sire storage.)

I do NOT have a Microsoft account or a Google account. I did get Skype and Linked In before MS bought them out. I do NOT use iCloud on my iPod Touch, despite constant hectoring from Apple. I will not use Google, and will probably use a non-iOS/Android solution when a decent one is available for portable devices. (HP was the last to make a serious try, and it bombed).

Yes, I do use the downloaded Win OS on a bootable USB drive with the code. I reinstall apps from DVD, unless I had to buy as a download. I always get a physical version if possible (usually for $20 or so additional).

[dayglored]

HP Security / Privacy Issue ... PING!

You can find all the Windows Ping list threads with FR search: just search on keyword "windowspinglist".

Thanks to House Atreides for the ping!!

[RinaseaofDs]

Very much appreciated.

I’m going to begin the process of doing that with all my machines.

The old ones ran very nicely and then they didn’t.

When you do a reformat, are you doing a command line reformat, or do you let the Windows installer handle that for you?