I used the offline installer (and later reinstalled with the online installer). Both times I had the launcher in my list of uninstallable programs in control panel.
I don't understand how the launcher is causing so many posts, is not annoying, how often do you open the AV? 1 per month? doesn't use resources, and you are using a TOP 3 AV's in protection and performance according to AV comparatives for FREE, and the difference with the paid versión in terms of security is almost non-existent. I use Avira on my phone and tablet and other pc's and I find the launcher useful. Just my opinion.
I use the Pro version of Avira and never had a launcher to deal with, I don't think anything Avira decides to add is going to have any consequences for me as long as it is not plain advertising. People who are prepared to have a free lunch should not complain about the menu, period. Obviously it is the Internet and you can voice your anger about something you haven't paid for, but a bit of respect in doing so...
They are planning to implement the launcher in both versions, Free and PAID. Launcher will be mandatory, no option to install it or not, no way to uninstall. Launcher is came to stay. Wait and see.
Do you think that they are not aware re the various tricks & hacks? Time will tell who is right and who's wrong.
I don't use free meals. I'm a customer (paid license up to 2021) https://www.wilderssecurity.com/threads/avira.345492/page-167#post-2585609 and I bought a plain AV, without launchers and other crap. I'm well informed what the launcher is...... From your answer above, I'm confident that you can't say the same.
If you don't like it don't use it, you don't have to come and cry in every single post. I never said you were not informed, who could say that knowing that the launcher is the most important thing in you life.
Last time I installed Avira it forced me to create an account in order to install the antivirus. And I couldn't remove the launcher too, which is very annoying. Oh, and the ads..... Seems like Avira is not my 1st choice anymore. I sent a little explanation of why I completely removed their product from my computer and why I moved to avast. I'd hope they change their way of doing things, but apparently they won't.
I have a question about the Avira Protection Cloud and how the fingerprint detection works. See step #1 & #2 in this diagram: http://www.avira.com/en/avira-protection-cloud The question is regarding step #1. It would seem to require the local PC to detect, or somehow flag a file as "unknown". Then to make a decision to send the fingerprint to the cloud for identification. Does AVIRA keep a local "whitelist" of good file fingerprints, or does it stream all executable file fingerprints to the cloud in real-time? If not, then step #1 is only heuristics based on the local PC, and would seem to require the local PC to detect something "suspicious" before the cloud ever gets a look at it. Seems to me the local PC is still the weak link in this plan?
See this post for details. Local client performs some operations on files to determine whether APC needs to be queried about it. If it determines that's the case, it asks APC about it using the hash, and then by using the whole file if it hasn't seen it before.
Those who have paid for a subscription have a legitimate complaint. Especially if they bought in prior to the change. Those who are eating a free lunch, well they need to move to another product or quit whining and STFU!!!
Well I hope there's more to it than that, otherwise the APC is smoke and mirrors ... if the advanced cloud protection is dependent on the local PC detection ... well
It's so hard to admit the mistake of a purchase... They can always complain to avira a request a refund.
Thanks, I ran across that when I was searching for more info. In addition to Avira, I currently run either HitmanPro.Alert or Malwarebytes Anti-Exploit as my behavior detection layer. For now I am just trying to wrap my head around the fingerprinting process used by APC. As a test, I ran Sysinternals Process Explorer. Then I opened the properties page for the Avira ServiceHost process. You can monitor the real-time I/O for any process this way. I picked out this particular process because I noticed it always maintains a TCP connection to a cloud server. It is a non-secured normal HTTP connection as well (Port 80). Then I launched several applications and noted that the Network I/O incremented in the "Send Bytes" & "Receive Bytes" counters. Hmmmm...
I'm quickly annoyed by this kind of stuff, that's all. Avira shouldn't be wasting their own and our time with stuff like "Launchers".
I was thinking of using Avira again. When I downloaded the Avira Antivirus EXE only, I didn't get the launcher. See official link below. You inserted the license and that was it. Does a new version update add the launcher now? http://www.avira.com/en/download/product/avira-antivirus-pro
Nothing smoke and mirrors about it. It's dependent on the local agent deciding if a file is unknown and sufficiently suspicious so as to warrant communicating with APC. It can go about it lots of ways. It's not unreasonable, and performs well. Local determinations are key to ensuring they're only processing stuff that needs to be processed. It's really easy to trigger APC uploads for testing. Network bytes (assuming you mean system-wide and not per-process) will increment with inter process communication over localhost as well. Just like "io bytes" counters, it's not a great way of measuring anything. You could easily use wireshark to see what, if anything the product is sending over HTTP. All of the APC activity I've seen goes over HTTPS. The product also logs cloud interactions as well if the logging level is set higher. What was the hostname or IP of the "cloud server" you observed?
