The primary issue I have with McAfee is that they're obviously yet another company that cut corners in critical areas (customer support, QA testing) to pad their bottom line.
Here's my experience with them, just to make a point:
- I disabled ActiveX on my machine for everything except trusted sites (Windows Update, the scum!)
- When I installed McAfee. It wouldn't run. I discovered it was because McAfee required ActiveX controls.
- I contacted McAfee multiple times through multiple channels (2 chats and more than a dozen e-mails, working with at least 6 different agents and a supervisor). Every time, the conversation went like this:
"Hello. I've disabled ActiveX for all but trusted sites. I've added mcafee.com and the McAfee executables to my Trusted Sites list, but McAfee still can't run. Can you tell me what else I need to do?"
"Please enable ActiveX on your system."
"No. That's not an acceptable answer. I'm willing to activate ActiveX for McAfee alone, but I'm not going to activate it system-wide."
"I understand. Here are the instructions for enabling ActiveX system-wide".
"No. I won't do that."
"I understand. Here are the instructions for enabling ActiveX system-wide".
"Wait a minute. I just want to know how to enable ActiveX for McAfee without enabling it for everything else!"
"I understand. Here are the instructions for enabling ActiveX system-wide".
*Sound of me switching to a new vendor*
In short, I found myself working with a "security" firm where no one in their support department could figure out why on Earth I'd disabled ActiveX. It made me less than confident in their abilities, to say the least.
