What I Found
Until this message appeared I did not know that Concentric existed. The Windows Registry did because it listed a path to the program that presented this message. I confirmed later that running this program would cause the wizard to re-appear.
| Concentric Internet Regerstration Wizard (sic) |
Registry key |
| C:\WINDOWS\Intuit\Shared\Register.exe |
Value (path) |
A Google search quickly revealed that Concentric provides Internet services, and that Intuit and Concentric are working together. Three of those many references are listed below.
http://www.internetnews.com/xSP/article.php/43961
http://contracts.corporate.findlaw.com/agreements/concentric/intuit.internet.1995.08.01.html
http://www.morebusiness.com/running_your_business/marketing/d935705559.brc
So, this is not a pop-up ad and it is not Malware being pushed onto the computer by an unscrupulous marketer. This is software that was apparently placed on the system by Intuit when Quickbooks was either installed or updated. The use of financial software while connected to the Internet requires a certain level of trust of the software vendor. It appears that Intuit has violated that trust.
The "last modified" date for Register.exe is 09/11/1997, which is the date for many of my original QuickBooks program files. That means it is part of the Quickbooks software package. I also found a new file named Accwiz.ini (Access Wizard), also dated 02/11/2004, which is when I re-installed Quickbooks. Note in the "mouse-over" listing below the spellling of the word "Registration".
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We Seem To Have A Cover-Up
There is no indication how this program was executed. The day after the incident I found no entries in the Windows scheduler or in an "AT" listing from the command prompt. Of course, a file could have been executed and then deleted. The only clues to anything unusual were the files Register.ini and Conhelp.GID, both of which were updated the day of the incident.
The removal process was actually quite simple: I did nothing. Several days after dissecting this incident I found that the Registry key "Concentric Internet Regerstration Wizard" (sic) no longer existed. The program and its supporting files were still on disk. Running this program would bring up the Registration Wizard but the auto-run feature was no longer active.
All of this is really quite foolish. Obviously, if I am connecting to their service then I have an Internet Service Provider and probably do not need another one. One must wonder what else Intuit has monitoring my activities to decide what to try and sell me.
But Wait - There Is Still More!
In 2005 I switched from Quickbooks to Quicken. In early 2006, following an on-line update, I found that a number of Quicken menus had a new entry for something from Intuit called Zipingo, a vendor rating service. As I learned from their Website:
"Zipingo is the fastest way to find the best local businesses based on community feedback.
(Oh, and it’s free.) Think of it as the yellow pages with customer ratings."
So now Quicken nags us to rate our vendors. Based on my ratings, Intuit will update their entries in their Zipingo directory. When will Intuit compensate me for my contributions should I choose to participate? Considering how the cost of Quicken seems to escalate every year, that may not be any time soon.
If they are rating their customers' vendors, one must also wonder if they are collecting other information about their customers' personal lives for their own benefit.
| Intuit is not the only the only company using (or abusing) their position of trust as a marketing tool. See our story about Adobe Reader, which now attempts to install the Yahoo! Tool Bar when it is updated. |
What Is Our Intuit Comfort Factor?
Our comfort factor with Intuit is now less than zero.
It seems rather unethical for a company to load marketing software onto my computer, as Intuit has done. It would also be unethical for them to extract data from my computer and I have absolutely no confidence that they have not already done that.
One would think that Intuit would have learned their lesson about messing with their customers' computers but they did not.
Intuit added a Digital Rights Management (DRM) scheme called C-Dilla to their TurboTax 2002 program. This DRM prevented users from installing TurboTax on one machine to process the information, i.e., a laptop, and then moving it to another machine to print the reports, i.e., a desktop.
Customers were not informed by Intuit that DRM was being used, there was no "splash screen" advising that C-Dilla was being installed, and removing TurboTax did not remove C-Dilla. Worse, re-installing TurboTax required justifying your actions to Intuit Tech Support.
A large number of Intuit's customers were not happy to find their favorite product had been crippled. There was quite a bit of traffic in the forums and in the media. Suffice to say, Intuit made a LOT of enemies. Ultimately they released a patch that unlocked the program after the tax season was over but the damage had already been done.
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Intuit probably did prevent some software piracy with their DRM scheme. There is no way to gauge the number of customers they lost in the process. The switch to a new accounting product is not simple and once people go to that amount of effort they rarely switch back.
First the Concentric problem. Then C-Dilla. Now we have Zipingo. When will it ever end?
Postscript
About the time of the Concentric incident I had an offer to upgrade Quickbooks sitting on my desk. I was seriously considering mailing it in since my version was so far out of date. The main obstacle was the cost, which has grown substantially over the years.
As you can see, I did not update Quickbooks; I bought Quicken Deluxe instead. That little Concentric trick cost Intuit several hundred dollars. I update software about every two years so the cost to Intuit for their antics is probably in excess of $500 for this one customer. Multipy that by thousands of customers and the cost of protecting themselves from piracy is rather high.
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