Call it a necro. I call it an ongoing issue that's been pissing people off for years, and four pages of snide remarks talking to users like they are idiots. This topic should be a sticky link over at AVG and Avira forums.
SO! I found this little Gem on Howtogeek.com. I found it by going to Avast.com and trying to find the link to the forums (buried in footer,) which was a bad enough sign that I chose not to limit my browsing to Avast.com and searched for "avast advertising" to raise the subject elsewhere. I arrive to a white collar flame war and I want to take a moment and speak on it.
See, I had just gone to my bank's web site and was then bombarded with ads for Avast up-sales IN MY BROWSER WINDOW.
They look EXACTLY like the ads on HowToGeek.com. A lot like other AdWare tool bars (DON'T start again. It's what they are.)
I don't care if it's safeprice, safezone, safety scissors, I don't care. I spent over an hour configuring the most fine-grained antivirus settings I possibly could.
How many times am I going to tell you people no? And then I find this page! So I'm going to pepper the OP with some inline aggression. The words reached me poorly, and I want some particularly insensitive remarks to resonate. Let's begin!
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"Avast’s browser extensions, together with some other modules inside Avast, rely heavily on cloud functionality."
That's how Microsoft and Google explain everything they do (when silence fails.) Switch to Windows Defender! Message received.
"You may not realize but collecting URL information for this very purpose is extremely common in the security industry, as this information is essential to providing this kind of service."
We do realize it. It's common in every industry. That's why we're asking you to protect us from it. Why else would we be speaking to you? And what kind of service, exactly? Not the one we asked for. The one we got. Your use of pronouns is consistently deceptive throughout the piece.
"I mean, did you expect SafePrice to have all the product IDs and all the offers stored locally? That just doesn’t make sense at all."
What, like virus definitions? SHUT THE FRONT DOOR! Also, good catch, another snide remark directed at people who have yet to speak on this.
"...and became the most popular shopping extension for Chrome."
As opposed to becoming the least popular AntiVirus extension for Chrome. Good save. You also managed to throw an argumentum ad populum into the mix. You've gone from trying to call me stupid, to trying to prove it (and I feel it is necessary to react.)
"So by itself, it is certainly not a piece of PII. And the reason we include it in the request is because context is very important."
By itself... we include it... you're not really trying to convince anyone, are you? By the way, "context is very important" is a statement which lacks a lot of context. Anybody trying to reach open minds would catch that and elaborate.
"the user ID is there just as a regular json field. Which makes me even more frustrated, as it is very likely that if we actually made the field less noticeable, the article probably wouldn’t have been written. We’re not trying to hide anything."
You're not trying to hide anything? Certainly not your own frustration that you... didn't try to hide it...
"If you have any additional questions, I’d be happy to answer them."
I'm sure you'll find a way to continue being snide about it. My whole point is, no amount of technical knowledge - even if you completely prove that I have no leg to stand on - can hide what you really think of us with that damn tone you all kept using on people who didn't give you the feedback you were looking for.