About Comodo products & privacy issues

Any other tech-related topics
Post Reply
Message
Author
the_watcher
Posts: 164
Joined: Mon Dec 07, 2009 2:30 am

About Comodo products & privacy issues

#1 Post by the_watcher »

Check out this article : http://dottech.org/headline/10032

To summarize, it states that Comodo :
1) Has been caught selling its popular SSL certificate to malware distributors/scan websites.
2) Comodo is collecting data (usage statistics) while one uses their applications, as stated in their EULA, which they may disclose to their affiliates..

Check the link for more info

User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: About Comodo products & privacy issues

#2 Post by webfork »

Thanks for the post. Won't be using anything from Comodo anytime soon.

freakazoid
Posts: 1212
Joined: Wed Jul 18, 2007 5:45 pm

Re: About Comodo products & privacy issues

#3 Post by freakazoid »

Thanks for posting that!

Good thing I've never used a Comodo product.
is it stealth? ;)

User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: About Comodo products & privacy issues

#4 Post by webfork »

Comodo's Time Machine just came up on Lifehacker.

I tried to comment but, as usual, it got flagged as spam.

User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: About Comodo products & privacy issues

#5 Post by webfork »

There was a note over at FWG about several commercial programs that have gone Freeware (some that I Am Baas posted about), and Comodo Internet Security was mentioned. I posted the following and a link to recent problems as well as the watcher's original link from the beginning of the thread.

With so many companies acting fast and loose with security and privacy, you'd like your firewall and anti-virus service to be one that's outside of all that nonsense. Unfortunately, that would not be Comodo.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/05/24 ... er_hacked/

ChipsNHotSauce
Posts: 16
Joined: Mon Jun 06, 2011 9:35 am
Location: Growls Garden

Re: About Comodo products & privacy issues

#6 Post by ChipsNHotSauce »

I started using Comodo Firewall on my new machine, and was planning to install on other machines. Now I wish I took the foresight that ANYTHING could be a potential privacy/security risk, even those that are supposed to protect your data. Now that I think of it.. Backdoors to the FBI, Big brother, cannibal lawyers, bars of soap; comes to mind. :|

User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: About Comodo products & privacy issues

#7 Post by webfork »

ChipsNHotSauce wrote:I started using Comodo Firewall on my new machine, and was planning to install on other machines. Now I wish I took the foresight that ANYTHING could be a potential privacy/security risk, even those that are supposed to protect your data. Now that I think of it.. Backdoors to the FBI, Big brother, cannibal lawyers, bars of soap; comes to mind. :|
There are privacy security threats that we can control and there are those that without a big expenditure of time and energy that nobody can manage. Even organizations in the news with billion-dollar budgets and private armies have difficulty avoiding security failures. Paranoia doesn't serve any purpose because invariably the threat will inflate to fit our fears. On a day to day basis, taking a little extra time to stay secure is all anyone can do. For Comodo, its pretty easy as there are plenty of other similar services out there.

ChipsNHotSauce
Posts: 16
Joined: Mon Jun 06, 2011 9:35 am
Location: Growls Garden

Re: About Comodo products & privacy issues

#8 Post by ChipsNHotSauce »

That is very true.

I decided to stick with their Firewall because I'm happy with it and it offers enough decent features to keep it (I disabled cloud features/updates though.)

Hydaral
Posts: 194
Joined: Tue Mar 09, 2010 7:36 pm

Re: About Comodo products & privacy issues

#9 Post by Hydaral »

ChipsNHotSauce wrote:I started using Comodo Firewall on my new machine, and was planning to install on other machines. Now I wish I took the foresight that ANYTHING could be a potential privacy/security risk, even those that are supposed to protect your data. Now that I think of it.. Backdoors to the FBI, Big brother, cannibal lawyers, bars of soap; comes to mind. :|
Selling security certificates to malicious groups, even knowingly, doesn't really have anything to do with their software. they would be completely different departments within the company, the certificates would be sold by salespeople and managers (and we all know how trustworthy they are :) ), the software would be written by developers. IMO developers working for a security software company would be the ones who most value privacy and would object to any possibility of backdoors or anything that would make the software less secure. Am I being naive?

As for the data-collection thing, that is a concern, but unfortunately there aren't that many good free, highly configurable firewalls, not last time I looked anyway. I used to use Kerio, until they changed to Sunbelt and made the software a system hog and simplified it. The IP can always be blocked by the hosts file.

carbonize
Posts: 363
Joined: Wed Jan 09, 2008 1:16 am
Location: Bristol, UK
Contact:

Re: About Comodo products & privacy issues

#10 Post by carbonize »

Hydaral wrote:
ChipsNHotSauce wrote:The IP can always be blocked by the hosts file.
You cannot block an ip with the hosts file only domains.

User avatar
webfork
Posts: 10818
Joined: Wed Apr 11, 2007 8:06 pm
Location: US, Texas
Contact:

Re: About Comodo products & privacy issues

#11 Post by webfork »

This is an few months old now, but having had a conversation along similar lines...
Hydaral wrote:Selling security certificates to malicious groups, even knowingly, doesn't really have anything to do with their software. they would be completely different departments within the company, the certificates would be sold by salespeople and managers (and we all know how trustworthy they are :) ), the software would be written by developers. IMO developers working for a security software company would be the ones who most value privacy and would object to any possibility of backdoors or anything that would make the software less secure. Am I being naive?
I think reputations for security are important:
  • Like user ChipsNHotSauce I have traded some of my privacy to get some great, free features from some companies (notably Google). Comodo is a great product, but the certificate issue isn't just a hiccup -- its a huge failure to maintain some kind of trust system on the internet. Now discussions are up on Slashdot about abandoning the cert system altogether. There are a long list of problems with this, such as sellers forced to use the crappy Amazon interface for its reputation as a strong security portal, good web traffic getting dumped or blocked because it doesn't have trusted certs, and even fewer ways to discern good from bad companies.
  • Additionally, assuming you're right and its the marketing guys misbehaving while the devs are innocent, companies like this shouldn't be run in a distributed fashion like that: a top-down emphasis on reliability is the only way to run a security company.
  • As such, when security companies make mistakes and expose their users, the revenues for their company as a whole should take a hit. This is the only way to encourage these groups to stay on track.
On a side note, I'm aware someone named "webfork" saying reputations are important is a little odd.

portafreeuser
Posts: 11
Joined: Sun Jul 24, 2011 9:16 pm

Re: About Comodo products & privacy issues

#12 Post by portafreeuser »

Damn, that really disappoints me. I like Comodo software, but now I feel that I can't trust it since I can't trust the company that runs it. Whoever sold that data has really no integrity whatsoever. Such a low low blow to it's own userbase!

Post Reply