Lenovo Group Ltd (聯想) apologized to customers as it works with users to enable laptop computer owners to remove pre-installed software that potentially exposed them to hacking attacks and unauthorized activity monitoring.
The biggest maker of personal computers said it was a mistake to have the software, made by a company called Superfish, included on Lenovo machines. Lenovo posted links on Twitter to its Web site with information about the software and removal instructions.
The Beijing-based company was responding to a deluge of criticism from cybersecurity specialists regarding Superfish’s ability to monitor Web behavior and suggest advertisements based on images that a user might be viewing. The technology used by Superfish essentially breaks the encryption between Web browsers and banking, e-commerce and other sites that handle sensitive information, potentially exposing machines to hacking.
“The Superfish software undermines Internet security for the rather ridiculous purpose of serving advertisements,” said Rainey Reitman, director of activism at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. “It’s a severe security issue, and frankly a betrayal by Lenovo of all of its affected customers.”
Superfish uses image-recognition algorithms that watch where users point on their screens and suggest ads based on the images they are looking at. The software was included on some models of consumer laptops sold worldwide between September and December and was turned off last month after user complaints, Lenovo said.
“We messed up badly here,” Lenovo chief technology officer Peter Hortensius said in an interview. “We made a mistake. Our guys missed it. We’re not trying to hide from the issue — we’re owning it.”
Superfish said in a statement that the company is “completely transparent in what our software does and at no time were consumers vulnerable.”
Lenovo got some “very minor compensation” for installing the software and the aim was to “try to improve people’s experience,” Hortensius said.
The use of Superfish software only impacted consumer laptops and did not violate any parts of Lenovo’s agreements with the US government in 2005 when it acquired the PC business from International Business Machines Corp for US$1.75 billion, Hortensius said.
“We apologize for causing any concern to any users for any reason,” the company said in a statement. “Lenovo never installed this software on any ThinkPad notebooks, nor any Lenovo desktops or smartphones.”
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