Viber calls out ESET for flagging them, ESET responds with a digital uppercut

[BoraMurdar]

Content source

http://www.neowin.net/news/viber-calls-out-eset-for-flagging-them-eset-responds-with-a-digital-uppercut

Viber has slowly become more and more popular in recent times and was even acquired by Rakuten earlier this year for almost a billion dollars. Going beyond mere mobiles, the service was alsoexpanded to desktops in 2013.

It appears that at some point, however, ESET's NOD32— the anti-virus software— began flagging Viber as a threat. Whenever a user would try to install Viber, NOD32 would return a pop-up saying that a "potential threat" has been found (with what appears to be a toolbar that Viber tries to install into IE) and asks the user whether or not the user would want to proceed.

This action appears to have annoyed the Viber team, prompting them to post an image of the pop-up with an overlay of "#EsetSucks" in big red text, alongside a tweet saying that the software is buggy and that users should uninstall it.

What Viber wasn't expecting, however, was for ESET to respond, and the response was as classy as it can get. ESET tweeted back it's own image, this time, however, it was an image of the Viber installer's source code showing silent downloads and silent statistics being sent back to Viber, and a message from ESET saying that their user's privacy comes first. Oh, and they also included an "#esetDOESNTsuck" hashtag at the end of their tweet.

Word to the wise: if your product is being flagged by anti-malware software, its best not to make a public spectacle of it. And if you really must, then make sure to not tag the company you're calling out— it's probably not going to end well.

 

[MrExplorer]

ESET Rocks, ESET, A Salute.

 

[omidomi]

i trust eset more than viber...

 

[jamescv7]

In such large picture, most users may think that ESET made a mistake however if we can focus on much clearer information, its rated as PUA/PUP therefore still safe to use but some behaviour that is related for suspicious.

 

[Kate_L]

ESET did a good thing, that is a PUP (UnsafeApplication = DLL Injection). I love ESET for this.

 

[Tinm]

Viber should fix this problem quickly or eventually they themselves will stand to lose.

 

[Exterminator]

ESET is and has always been a very classy & reputable company.Their products have always been top notch and even with some FP's I would rather have to deal with a few of them than not getting anything at all and something getting through. Guess they should have contacted ESET before tweeting instead they now look bad

 

[darko999]

Being an ESET user myself found this funny and interesting. Great for ESET, that's how you roll.

 

[yigido]

#ESETRocks Good job ESET Team with an answer (smack on their face)