Lenovo settles with the FTC for pre-installing dangerous adware on its computers

Lenovo has settled with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and 32 states over charges related to malicious Superfish adware that came pre-installed on laptops from Aug. 2014 to Feb. 2015 — but the company still won't admit it did anything wrong.

The Chinese computer maker was found to be shipping computers with Superfish adware, a program called VisualDiscovery, back in Feb. 2015. The company was hit with consumer backlash and the Department of Homeland Security even advised users to delete the software after the initial discovery of the security breach, but this settlement is the first concrete consequence for putting the personal information of users in danger.

Lenovo agreed to pay a fine of $3.5 million and will implement a comprehensive security program for "most consumer software" preloaded on its computers for the next 20 years, which will be subject to audit. Lenovo will also be required to get consumers’ affirmative consent before pre-installing software like this on its computers going forward.

The major concern for the researchers who discovered the security flaws back in 2015 was that the program broke HTTPS connections, exposing users to potentially malicious websites and attacks by hackers when they visited otherwise secure sites online. The FTC also claims that the adware was able to access users' personal data, but none of that data was ever sent to Superfish.

Lenovo isn't totally owning up to the charges, however. The company "disagrees with allegations contained in these complaints," according to a statement — even though Lenovo CTO Peter Hortensius admitted to Mashable two years ago that the adware created a security vulnerability for users.

The company insists that there have been no incidents where anyone actually took advantage of the vulnerabilities, and that its response to beef up its security and limit the amount of bloatware it preloads onto PCs afterwards was sufficient.

By settling, Lenovo gets to close the the controversy with little more than a slap on the wrist. The Superfish adware saga might not have led to anyone's data being stolen — but it did expose what computer makers can get away with when they put your data at risk.