The anti-virus giant Avast has announced shutting down one of its subsidiaries called Jumpshot after the company was found stealing user data and selling it for big bucks.
On January 28th, 2020 based on the investigation by PCMag and Vice, HackRead reported that Avast was secretly stealing browsing data from millions of its customers and selling it to third-parties. Some of its active buyers included Google, Pepsi, IBM, Yelp, Microsoft, TripAdvisor, and Unilever, etc.
See: Study shows prominent apps are selling your data to 3rd parties
Avast’s data collection worked or still works in such a way that the software collects all of your browsing data which is then accessed by Jumpshot. The latter in return takes it and uses it as a part of what makes up its product offerings.
An example of it is Avast’s “All Clicks Feed” which lets companies access your behavior on the internet and any clicks you make on any particular range of domains. Reportedly, Avast sold user data to one of its New York-based customer for a hefty sum of $2,075,000.
How Jumpshot functioned – Image credit: Motherboard
However, in a blog post published on 30th January Avast CEO Ondrej Vlcek apologized to their customers and announced shutting down Jumpshot.
“Protecting people is Avast’s top priority and must be embedded in everything we do in our business and in our products. Anything to the ..
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