Simon Willison’s Weblog

End user license agreements hit a new low

17th February 2004

So apparently there’s an unpleasant worm going around AOL Instant Messenger at the moment. Only it’s not a worm—it’s a semi-legitimate piece of adware which asks you for permission to “modify the instant messenger software, deliver additional content such as advertisements and promotional messages” and announces that “In addition, the software will interoperate with your current instant messaging client so as to permit the automatic sending of advertising messages originating from your computer to your contact or ’buddy’ list regarding content offered by PSD Tools or its suppliers.”

In other words, it spams itself to everyone on your buddy list. Naturally, since no one ever reads the terms and conditions on those things it’s spreading like wildfire.