Melissa Kite Melissa Kite

Real life | 6 September 2018

I have unsubscribed from the software but I can’t remove its presence, or personality, from my computer

issue 08 September 2018

Leaving Norton, the antivirus software package, is a bit like trying to leave the EU.

You may think, once you have decided to click the ‘X’ button in the box that says you don’t want to subscribe to this expensive protection outfit any more, that you have left. You may think that it was your decision to make, and now you’ve made it, you’re free. You’re right if you hold your nerve. But then there is the whole issue of Norton’s feelings on the matter, which are only marginally less difficult to deal with than Jean-Claude Juncker’s feelings about Brexit.

Like Juncker, Norton 360 antivirus software wants you in a way that you didn’t really grasp the potency of until you decided to say goodbye. I mean, you had some inkling, but you didn’t quite understand it fully.

Even though it’s a big outfit, you still half expected them to say something along the lines of: ‘We’re sorry to hear you’re going.

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