Why does Adobe Acrobat 7 Standard secretly phone home?

As a matter of habit and good computer hygiene, I block all "phone-home" requests. I bought the software - not a monitoring service.

Reply to
Erica Eshoo
Loading thread data ...

I was just curious nothing intended by the question - thanks.

Reply to
Leythos

SOCKOPT_NO_HOSTS is a well-documented standard way for letting every unprivileged application resolve hostnames while bypassing the HOSTS file. It effectively makes your 127.0.0.1 entry void. And since it uses a hardwired list of IP addresses anyway, and could merely bypass the stub resolver using kernel sockets, or simply change the entry back while masquerading it, and simply does its own resolving, it's futile anyway.

Reply to
Sebastian G.

Since you had the chance to read the documentation (which mentions the monitoring) before installing the software, you could have just returned it. If you informed yourself earlier, you wouldn't even have bought this software.

Reply to
Sebastian G.

it's a system call with arguments the memory address of a pointer and optional options (SOCKOPT_NO_HOSTS).

Reply to
goarilla

Tia B. McMahon wrote: > Re: Why does Adobe Acrobat 7 Standard secretly phone home?

Because it misses its obese, over-bloated mummy?

Reply to
occam

newsdbm02.news.prodigy.net!newsdst02.news.prodigy.net!prodigy.com!newscon02.news.prodigy.net!prodigy.net!fu-berlin.de!uni-berlin.de!news.dfncis.de!not-for-mail

a30F6LI8aNgFWJKucSCW5Ax7FJIMHaVSSMNav5zuSl1thNVFo1UD+Od/MS

Gecko/20071030 MultiZilla/1.8.3.2g SeaMonkey/1.1.6

alt.privacy.spyware:81531

My dear Sebastian, You are either joking, or unrealistic, or you really are a fastidious personality who painstakingly reads everyt word of the documentation BEFORE buying the software. I'm not.

As such, I consider myself "normal" that I don't read the documentation until I get into trouble and then only to solve the problem. Certainly never before I purchase the software. Even so, I don't recall ever seeing in the "documentation" that the software must phone home and that there is nothing we can do about it.

Even if the "documentation" did say that, Adobe would never answer the question posed here which would block their monitoring of my useage of their software for their marketing purposes. So, this question would

*still* need to be asked.

Or am I unrealistic?

Since you obviously do read the documentation, unlike almost every single person I've ever met, before you buy the software - can you point me to the location that discusses this "feature" in the documentation?

Reply to
Erica Eshoo

My dear Sebastian,

You are either joking, or unrealistic, or you really are a fastidious personality who painstakingly reads every word of the documentation BEFORE buying the software. I'm not.

As such, I consider myself close to "normal" that I don't read the documentation until/unless I get into trouble and then only to solve the problem. Certainly never before I purchase the software. Even so, I don't recall ever seeing in the "documentation" that the software must phone home and that there is nothing we can do about it.

Even if the "documentation" did say that, Adobe would never answer the question posed here which would block their monitoring of my useage of their software for their marketing purposes. So, this question would

*still* need to be asked. Why does Adobe phone home every day anyway?

What business benefit do they get out of this monitoring activity? Is that in the documentation?

Can you point me to then location that discusses this "feature" in the documentation and why Adobe monitors our activity?

Reply to
Erica Eshoo

Well, you're free to not do so. But then accept that the consequences are

*your* problem, not the problem of the software vendor.

The communication behaviour of the Adobe License Manager service is documented in there.

The real reason is much less conspirative: If you'd actually block it, the software would simply cease to function.

Page 47, License Manager Configuration

Reply to
Sebastian G.

There can be a world of difference between the mission of the programmers and that of the marketing department at large software companies. Most software does not explicitly divulge that it phones home.

Reply to
M.L.

Cabling-Design.com Forums website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.