It has been reported that Avast, the maker of the popular free antivirus program used by millions of people around the world, is selling highly sensitive user browsing data to a number of major companies, such as Google, Microsoft, Pepsi, Yelp, Home Depot and Intuit, through a subsidiary called Jumpshot. .
The joint report prepared by PCMag and Motherboard relies on a similar investigation by Vladimir Palant, developer of the Adblock Plus, who reported in October 2019 that Avast Online Security Extension and AVG Secure Browser spy on users and collect their information.
The report details in detail how the data that users choose to share, and which are claimed to be anonymous to hide their individual identities, includes accurate insights that can help companies like Google and Microsoft know a lot about you.
Reports indicated that Jumpshot sold information about Avast users to a number of companies, including IBM, Intuit, L'Oréal and Home Depot, however, many of these companies, along with other companies named in the joint investigation, refused to work with Jumpshot.
The information sold included Google searches, location searches, GPS coordinates on Google Maps, people’s visits to LinkedIn’s corporate pages, specific YouTube videos, and pornographic site visits.
The information was said to have been stripped of personally identifiable information, such as usernames, but experts fear that some activities cannot be anonymized by combining data sold by Jumpshot and other data sets, in violation of the privacy of people who may not have realized that their data is being sold.
Experts explained that revealing the identity of the owner of that data would be difficult, but not impossible, and Jumpshot is said to offer multiple feeds, including detailed information on the sites an avast user has visited, when and on which device.
Companies can use these detailed records along with their data sets to identify anonymous individuals, however, an avast spokesperson has explained that Jumpshot does not collect personally identifiable information, including name, email address or contact details.
He said: Users always have the ability to unsubscribe from sharing data with Jumpshot, and as of July 2019 we started implementing an explicit subscription selection for all new downloads from our AV, and we now urge our existing free users to make the option to subscribe or unsubscribe, a process that will be completed in February 2020.
The spokesperson continued by noting that avast has a long record of protecting users ’devices and data from malware, and that it understands and takes seriously responsibility for striking a balance between user privacy and the necessary use of data for its core security products.
It is reported that more than 435 million people per month use avast! Antivirus software, and Jumpshot claims to have access to information from 100 million devices.
The joint report prepared by PCMag and Motherboard relies on a similar investigation by Vladimir Palant, developer of the Adblock Plus, who reported in October 2019 that Avast Online Security Extension and AVG Secure Browser spy on users and collect their information.
The report details in detail how the data that users choose to share, and which are claimed to be anonymous to hide their individual identities, includes accurate insights that can help companies like Google and Microsoft know a lot about you.
Reports indicated that Jumpshot sold information about Avast users to a number of companies, including IBM, Intuit, L'Oréal and Home Depot, however, many of these companies, along with other companies named in the joint investigation, refused to work with Jumpshot.
The information sold included Google searches, location searches, GPS coordinates on Google Maps, people’s visits to LinkedIn’s corporate pages, specific YouTube videos, and pornographic site visits.
The information was said to have been stripped of personally identifiable information, such as usernames, but experts fear that some activities cannot be anonymized by combining data sold by Jumpshot and other data sets, in violation of the privacy of people who may not have realized that their data is being sold.
Experts explained that revealing the identity of the owner of that data would be difficult, but not impossible, and Jumpshot is said to offer multiple feeds, including detailed information on the sites an avast user has visited, when and on which device.
Companies can use these detailed records along with their data sets to identify anonymous individuals, however, an avast spokesperson has explained that Jumpshot does not collect personally identifiable information, including name, email address or contact details.
He said: Users always have the ability to unsubscribe from sharing data with Jumpshot, and as of July 2019 we started implementing an explicit subscription selection for all new downloads from our AV, and we now urge our existing free users to make the option to subscribe or unsubscribe, a process that will be completed in February 2020.
The spokesperson continued by noting that avast has a long record of protecting users ’devices and data from malware, and that it understands and takes seriously responsibility for striking a balance between user privacy and the necessary use of data for its core security products.
It is reported that more than 435 million people per month use avast! Antivirus software, and Jumpshot claims to have access to information from 100 million devices.
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