EA can scan your hard drive and flog contents to advertisers

[Jimbo]

Too late for me, but be warned!

EDIT: Probably should have gone in PC gaming sorry, I was just pissed off and wanted everybody to see it.

"The EULA of EA’s new game service, Origin, has some spectacular clauses which would mean you would have to be insane to sign up for it.

Under the title of “Consent to Collection and Use of Data”, you give EA permission to “collect, use, store and transmit technical and related information that identifies your computer, operating system, application usage, software, software usage and peripheral hardware.”

Under the agreement EA may use this information combined with personal information for marketing purposes and to improve its products and services. But it will also flog the information to advertisers who can send you lots of spam based on the contents of your hard-drive.

To make sure that users get the message it puts a warning in capitals. “ IF YOU DO NOT WANT EA TO COLLECT, USE, STORE, TRANSMIT OR DISPLAY THE DATA DESCRIBED IN THIS SECTION, PLEASE DO NOT INSTALL OR USE THE APPLICATION.”

Companies that do this to their customers really do deserve to have their products left on the shelves or never downloaded. Still at least users can say they were warned."

Source

Edited August 26, 2011 by Jimbo

[Stevenxowens792]

Congrats EA.. you've found porn.. I hope that helps you in your quest to figure out what all of us gamers have on our hard drives. Games ... and ... porn...

duh

[mw86]

Or just set your firewall to block anything from the EA folder lol

[svl7]

Or just set your firewall to block anything from the EA folder lol

Won't work, you need to be online for games...

I don't know, I'm not really shocked.... Honestly I don't read all the EULAs I accept, I'm sure Steam or other software vendors aren't completely innocent either. It's annoying, but what can you do? Unless nobody, or at least a lot of people won't accept this, nothing will change. Hundred thousand of people will buy BF3 and won't think about complaining about this. As long as they're still successful they won't see the need to change anything.

This doesn't mean that I think it's ok and should be accepted, but as long as it's legal I can't see EA change anything.

[StamatisX]

^^^ that's true and even if it is illegal, by the time you press accept...

and as @Jimbo mentioned , you have been warned

[Ninjahunter]

Its moments like this that make me wish i knew how to code/hack. Justice need be served.

[mmskate13]

Its moments like this that make me wish i knew how to code/hack. Justice need be served.

Do i smell a SQL injection..?

Select * from table where 1=1 and EA is not allowed in ('HDD1', 'HDD2', 'USB1')

[mw86]

Agreed SVL7 but for me sometimes I do not play the online... only single player which doesn't always require internet. Although the app that sends the info may no be in EA folder itself its more than likely in another folder such as "program data" in C: ... Some of todays firewalls will show every communication in and out of comp... Blocking may not work on all but as example (I don't condone illegal activities) I had per say a copy of quake 4 with a false key and to play single player I blocked the specific app from internet and had no probe but when I didn't it said false key. So I agree most cases you can't block that transmission but I don't think all are good enough to to override blocking the internet if you were lucky enough to find the offending app. Mostly all cases will be unpreventable when you click accept. So it sucks but you are right SVL7.