Utorrent Bitcoin Miner

uTorrent angers users with mining software

uTorrent is a popular BitTorrent application that has angered some users by installing a Bitcoin mining application on their computers.

Sean Keach reports for Trusted Reviews:

BitTorrent client uTorrent has come under fire from users after it emerged the software’s latest update comes bundled with Bitcoin mining software. The piece of software, named Epic Scale, is a Bitcoin miner that purports to use your ‘unused processing power to change the world.’ According to one user, the software is ‘easily noticeable by the increased CPU load when the computer is idle.’

Unfortunately, the problem lies in the fact that users say they weren’t asked they wanted the software to be installed, although it must be noted that the uTorrent team flatly denies that silent installs have occurred.

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The report about uTorrent caught the attention of redditors and they shared their thoughts in a long thread:

North7: "What's worse is the rep from utorrent in that thread. That is exactly how you don't do customer service. When a customer says they are experiencing something you don't say, "well we tested that so you must be lying", in so many words. And when multiple customers say the same thing and you still react that way, you have a big, big issue. Goodbye utorrent.

StrawRedditor: "I'm surprised they did this actually. Anyone familiar with the counter-strike scene probably knows that ESEA (A league that has their own anti-cheat) got caught doing the same thing. That anti-cheat program was mining bitcoins without anyone knowing. There was a big class-action lawsuit that they lost, and they had to pay out to replace peoples video cards and such since the program was having them run at 100% for extended periods. "

Occamslaser: "I stopped using it around a year ago."

Master_clown: "I use transmission and you can even set it up so that you can add torrents remotely from your phone much like utorrent. My favorite alternative and super light weight. Deluge is also awesome, but I prefer transmission. Also, transmission comes preloaded on a lot of Linux distros, which is a good sign."

Soul_Rage: "Switched to Deluge after some comment a few months ago. It's everything uTorrent was supposed to be. No non-sense functionality and nothing more. Have Transmission on my work laptop, and it's equally minimalistic in the right ways."

More at Reddit

Update: I received an email from Kevin Fu at BitTorrent. Here it is in its entirety:

There have been some wild claims on this development, in lieu of fact check.

To reiterate on what has been said publicly, we've reviewed this issue very closely and can confirm there is no silent install happening. It's something we're continuing to monitor, but this is likely users accepting the offer during install.

We've seen screenshots out there in press and otherwise (from folks who went through the installation process), showing the prompt provided.

As we've said, like many software companies, we have partner offers in our install path and our policy is that they are strictly optional. We aim to work with partners that would appeal to our tech-forward user base. This is the case with Epic Scale; they are lite-coin based and charity focused. They have a great story and you should consider having a look.

In terms of user complaints in our forums, we always take these claims seriously. We highly value our users, they are a passionate and tech savvy group. In the last 24 hours we have received less than a dozen inquiries out of several million offers.

Kevin

Sabayon Linux 15.02 review

Sabayon Linux offers Gentoo in a rolling release distribution. DistroWatch has a full review of Sabayon Linux 15.02.

Jesse Smith reports for DistroWatch:

Were I to try to sum up my experience with the latest Sabayon snapshot in one word it would be: buggy. Putting aside for a moment my aborted attempt to install 15.02 and waiting until the 15.02.1 release was made available, there were several aspects of Sabayon that just did not work for me. The SteamBox console, Steam on the desktop and exiting the media centre were at the top of my list. Though it did not happen frequently, on a few occasions I was unable to logout of my account or shutdown the computer from within KDE. The Rigo package manager regularly nagged me to update packages, though there never seemed to be anything new to download. When I first installed Sabayon, the system installer finished and left me in the Fluxbox environment and any attempt to shutdown Fluxbox caused the installer to launch and start the installation over again.

My feelings toward Sabayon would be more positive if I felt the distribution was successfully bringing something new or special to the table in exchange for the headaches it caused. At first I had thought having a console-like Steam interface or media centre might be nice, but neither of these features worked for me. All in all, Sabayon provided me with a fairly average KDE desktop experience, with the occasional glitch and frustrating package management.

The Sabayon project claims to provide an experience that offers bleeding edge software on a reliable platform. However, my experiences from this past week suggest that the two characteristics are mutually exclusive. Reliable and bleeding edge do not go merrily hand-in-hand, sooner or later the cutting edge catches up with us and causes problems.

More at DistroWatch

BTFS is both a protocol and network implementation that provides a p2p mechanism for storing and sharing digital content in a decentralized filing system.

Traditional file storage systems have many disadvantages, including centralization or control by a single entity, the ability for governments to censor, higher costs, and low fault tolerance.

BTFS is a decentralized file storage system supported by millions of BitTorrent user nodes.* By running on the blockchain, which has a Delegated proof of Stake method of processing blockchain transactions, BTFS addresses these limitations. BTFS represents the first decentralized storage system that can be used by decentralized application (DApp) developers. Soon, BTT will be introduced into the BTFS ecosystem to incentivize a fair and abundant file system.

*Coming soon.

If you recently installed or updated uTorrent on your PC, you may have have picked up an unwanted passenger: a bitcoin miner called Epic Scale. If you don't pay attention, that piece of code can be inadvertently installed with the latest uTorrent build (version 3.4.2). It can then use your computer as part of a bitcoin farm (Litecoin, to be exact) to generate revenue for third parties. Users first reported the situation on uTorrent's forums, and it was quickly confirmed by a senior support manager. He said that the app "cannot be installed without permission," but one user claimed that there was "never a warning about it," even though he opted out of other bundled software.

Once it's installed, the program will take up CPU cycles, slowing your machine and causing it to burn more power. The support person described Epic Scale as "easy to uninstall," but some users reported otherwise. One said it didn't show up in the "Programs and Features" list for Windows, and another needed anti-adware software to be rid of it. (Epic Scale said the app can be uninstalled normally, but confirmed that it leaves behind registry keys.)

"We have reviewed the issue closely and can confirm there is no silent install happening." -- BitTorrent

uTorrent's parent company BitTorrent has denied that the software is installed without user consent, and told The Verge "we have reviewed the issue closely and can confirm there is no silent install happening... most likely, the users accepted the offer during the install." I attempted to install the software on my own PC, and can confirm that the software gave me the chance to decline or accept the "offer" -- though it could easily slip by a careless user. If it does, most antivirus companies have confirmed that Epic Scale isn't dangerous, though it could certainly be a performance-sapping nuisance.

BitTorrent said that the Epic Scale is "a great partner for us to continue to generate revenue for the company, while contributing funds to (philanthropic initiatives)." With the recent Lenovo SuperFish affair, however, users are on edge about unwanted software. One uTorrent forum user called Epic Scale's unexpected presence "quite a pity," adding "I will switch because of this."

Update: BitTorrent told The Verge that the Epic Scale software is not a "silent install," and we've confirmed it ourselves. It also told us that the user forums where the thread started may be down, and that no users' accounts have been suspended. The post has been updated with that information.

BitTorrent client uTorrent has come under fire from users after it emerged the software’s latest update comes bundled with Bitcoin mining software.

The piece of software, named Epic Scale, is a Bitcoin miner that purports to use your ‘unused processing power to change the world.’

According to one user, the software is ‘easily noticeable by the increased CPU load when the computer is idle.’

Unfortunately, the problem lies in the fact that users say they weren’t asked they wanted the software to be installed, although it must be noted that the uTorrent team flatly denies that silent installs have occurred.

UPDATE: Since this story broke we’ve dug a little deeper into the installation process and story behind Epic Scale. Read: Epic Scale and uTorrent: Bitcoin mining ‘riskware’ investigated

A thread on the uTorrent forums by user ‘Groundrunner’ says: “ and I did opt out of your other bundled software.”

The issue specifically relates to uTorrent version 3.4.2 build 28913 (32-bit), which is the company’s most recent update.

Another user, dubbed ‘Adrenelized’, said there was ‘never a warning about it’, despite installing uTorrent completely fresh to his or her system.

uTorrent’s forum is now inaccessible citing “This account has been suspended”. This could be down to the excessive traffic following the Epic Scale news.

Related:Best Routers 2015

A senior manager for customer support at uTorrent did reply to the thread, explaining that it designs its software to ensure partner software downloads ‘don’t occur without approval by the user’.

“, while contributing funds to good causes,” wrote the uTorrent employee.

“Feel free to delete this folder. You certainly won’t see any persistent auto-reinstalls of the software, it will be gone from your machine for good.”

This may not be the case however. Several users have said that the program does not uninstall completely via Add/Remove Programs, nor by removing the ProgramDataEpicscale folder.

Epic Scale is currently a cryptocurrency miner, but it has future plans to also contribute CPU cycles to other initiatives like Genome mapping.

It’s an ill-timed addition to uTorrent as bundled software however, as laptop manufacturer Lenovo was recently lambasted for its own user-unapproved software bundle of the Superfish program that left user data vulnerable to attack.

Update:

We asked BitTorrent Inc., the company that created uTorrent, for a comment on the matter. Here is the response:

“Like many software companies, we have partner offers in our install path and our policy is that they are strictly optional. We aim to work with partners that would appeal to our tech-forward user base. This is the case with Epic Scale, they are lite-coin based and charity focused. They have a great story and you should consider doing a post on what they are trying to achieve.

In terms of user complaints in our forums, we always take these claims seriously. . In the last 24 hours we have received less than a dozen inquiries out of several million offers.

We have reviewed the issue closely and can confirm there is no silent install happening. We are continuing to look at the issue. But this is most likely these users accepted the offer during install.”

Update #2:

As BitTorrent has suggested that the complaining users are mistaken,
we asked BitTorrent whether it could do more to improve
transparency in the uTorrent installation process. This was the response:

“As with any such offer from any software vendor there is a clear “Accept” and “Do Not Accept” button on this offer.”

Giving BitTorrent the benefit of the doubt, there are three clear scenarios that could have caused this situation. Either the users are collectively mistaken; there is a lack of transparency in the software installation, leading to confusion amongst users; or there is a software fault whereby users are experiencing issues not otherwise intended by BitTorrent.

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If you’re one of the hundreds of thousands of BitTorrent’s uTorrent users, you need to read this.  Just recently, uTorrent has come under fire from its computer services users after word got out that the software’s latest update came bundled with Bitcoin mining software called Epic Scale.  To make matters worse, it’s alleged that the installation took place without the users being aware of it – an allegation that uTorrent’s creators BitTorrent, has flatly denied.

So let’s talk actual facts.  Exactly what is Epic Scale?

Epic Scale is a piece of software that claims to use your ‘unused processing power to change the world.’  What does that mean, precisely?  Basically, what Epic Scale does is mine Bitcoin for charitable purposes whilst also helping process scientific data or so they claim.  Computer services professionals have pointed out that whilst on paper this is not a problem; the matter of whether or not it is being silently installed without the user’s knowledge is still in question.

To test BitTorrent’s claims, some users went ahead and downloaded the latest uTorrent version – 3.4.2 build 38913.  During the installation, there was more than one offer for bundled software.  The software in question, Epic Scale, does let you option out of downloading it as BitTorrent claims by clicking the Decline Offer button.

So why are users still complaining?  How does Epic Scale affect computers?

Fact of the matter is, if you’re like the majority of computer services users who speed click on the NEXT button during installation, you would have accidentally downloaded and installed Epic Scale and wouldn’t even know about it.  This is also primarily why Epic Scale is what most techs refer to as riskware – software that doesn’t necessarily pose a threat per se but has the possibility of being abused by malware to gain access and control of your computer.

This said, BitTorrent needs to rethink or perhaps redesign their installer with their users in mind so issues like this would not happen in the future.