After its Superfish was caught, Lenovo might actually get bigger
Lenovo's stated intention to stop installing third-party apps on its PCs in the near future could have a dramatic effect on the PC industry, perhaps driving smaller rivals out of business altogether. Already the world's biggest PC company, both by revenue and unit shipments, Lenovo could actually get bigger because it got caught.
In case the first part passed you by, Lenovo was discovered in late February to have been pre-installing an app called Superfish on its consumer PCs between October and December 2014. Superfish, it breezily declared, would help you by offering "suitable ads". It did this by interposing its secure certificate into any secure SSL connections you made - to Google, a shopping site, your bank - and watching what was transmitted. If it saw something ad-like, it could replace that with its own Superfish-supplied ad.
Continue reading...