Just about had enough

I agree with you, @, that there are many areas where Webroot are ropey or not as solid as we might want them to be, some of which you have mentioned in your post, but there is one area where imho they are rock-solid and that is their AV engine/technologies (and associated Support services). Fuzzy at the edges but rock-solid at the centre.
 
Bear this in mind as you weigh your decision whether to ditch Webroot or not.

@ wrote:
I'm about to ditch Webroot AV, I think. I've used it for a year or two (I can't remember now), and was always rather worried that they don't seem able to write a functioning website. When you trust your PC security to a company, you expect them to be able to code a website that works. It never did. I'm reasonably savvy and know things that can cause problems, and avoided them doing so (ad blockers and so on).
 
I've just had the reminder that my subs need renewing in a few weeks, so I followed the link to do so, found my email with my keycode, but the website doesn't recognise it. I tried various things - checked in the program's UI itself - same keycode, tried formatting it, nope, it likes it without dashes even though the control has dashes in the hint text, "XXXX-XXXX....". Navigating the site, I go round in various circles until I work out the stupid logic of it and find my way to my "web console", but unfortunately I've either forgotten my password or it's not working (I use a system, so probably I do remember it and it's not working). I try various things, nothing. I click on the link for forgotten password, and it kindly reports that it's sent me an email with a link to reset my password. It hasn't. Even after several attempts, and 48 hours later, no emails, so I can't even log in to my web console to check what's going on. In the meantime, I check the price - already beginning to think that I might go somewhere else - and find that it's advertised at £22.49. I first find the US site where it's 29.99 USD, but this is about the same anyway. However, the UK version is apparently discounted from £29.99.
 
The only part of the site I seem able to rely on being there (indeed I never have to log in, and it's got my queries from before I even purchased right on the page) is the Webroot Support page. I get prompt replies as usual when I complain that your web systems are a disgrace and I can't renew or log in. The reply gives me a link to renew (not tried yet), no apology or explanation or thanks for my feedback, and "I'd like to offer the product at £29.99."
 
I reply that I've seen it at £22.49, and are they getting mixed up with USD? No, they reply after the weekend, "I am quoting the price in British pounds as you're in the UK. If you like, I could quote you a price in USD."
 
At time of writing, I'm querying why, as an existing customer, I'd be required to pay £7.50 more to renew my subscription than the same product is being offered to new customers, and I may perhaps be offered it at the lower price. Who knows?
 
These things don't inspire confidence. I've not had an infection using the software, but then I suspect that as an experienced and cautious user, I probably don't actually need AV at all. The only threats it's disabled have been programming languages' exes, such as AutoHotkey and BBC Basic for Windows, which required me to get help and then put these in the whitelist area.
 
Although the CPU overheads are low, I have always found a problem with it scrambling text in the input buffer if ever my system can't quite keep up, so the order I type characters into web fields ans such isn't the same after the brief pause when they're output again to the screen. I was advised this was perhaps the Identity Protection, to switch that off, download logging routines and upload the results. It never got fixed.
 
A bit fed just now, I thought I'd click on "Write a Review", and then wondered who actually got to see (negative) reviews - why waste my time ranting to some insider mod to be ignored? So I clicked instead on "Read more Reviews" to see what the spread was like.
 
Guess what? That part of the site wasn't working, or wasn't meant to work, I could only see the three glowing reviews Webroot chose to put on the page. So I came to rant at you instead. You're welcome.
 
It's such a pity. If the website worked a bit better, and the pricing didn't keep trying to swindle me (I had a similar issue when I first bought the AV, where I wasn't able to take advantage of an offer, for reasons I can't now remember but seemed irritating at the time), and if the help staff responded with a bit of personality and grace, I might consider carrying on with this, but I think it might be better just to just let it expire. An occasional zap with ... er ... a well-known anti-malware scanner is probably as good (or better).

For one, I'm actually the individual that sorts through the reivews, so I'm sure I'll see it if you do post anything. I tested the "Write a review" function and it seems to be working, I'm not sure what happened there. In regards to the price fluctuating, I believe there may have been some confusion with whomever you spoke to, and I am more than happy to put you in touch with the right department should you still want it. Sorry to hear you're having trouble with the site, and if you would like, I can help you get your password fixed (if it hasn't been resolved already). Feel free to message me directly if you do still need help on that.

Thanks, Lliddell.
 
I didn't try writing a review. I wanted to read some to see if there was a fair spread of good and bad, and get more insight on whether it was just me being unlucky or a more general failing with Webroot. What didn't work was reading reviews, so I didn't leave one.
 
I have made the decision to move on now, to try the free version of Kaspersky. Your offer of help is kind, and I appreciate it. I've had offers of help from the support team, who also suggested they could refer some of my issues to another part of the business in the UK, if I remember right. This is my issue - things don't work properly, like my keycode not being recognised; there are different prices all over the place (and I'm only offered a higher price unless I start digging); etc. and offers of help to sort these out don't really cut it for a paid service, IMHO. If it were free, I'd still be wondering if it's worth going through this every year, but it's costing me money to go through it every year. And when I complain to the support people, although they offer help, I get no indication that they're interested in taking my issues seriously and trying to fix them at the systems level, nor grateful for feedback that could be useful to the business, nor apologetic for the problems the company has caused me.
Cheers

@ wrote:
Thanks, Lliddell.
 
I didn't try writing a review. I wanted to read some to see if there was a fair spread of good and bad, and get more insight on whether it was just me being unlucky or a more general failing with Webroot. What didn't work was reading reviews, so I didn't leave one.
 
I have made the decision to move on now, to try the free version of Kaspersky. Your offer of help is kind, and I appreciate it. I've had offers of help from the support team, who also suggested they could refer some of my issues to another part of the business in the UK, if I remember right. This is my issue - things don't work properly, like my keycode not being recognised; there are different prices all over the place (and I'm only offered a higher price unless I start digging); etc. and offers of help to sort these out don't really cut it for a paid service, IMHO. If it were free, I'd still be wondering if it's worth going through this every year, but it's costing me money to go through it every year. And when I complain to the support people, although they offer help, I get no indication that they're interested in taking my issues seriously and trying to fix them at the systems level, nor grateful for feedback that could be useful to the business, nor apologetic for the problems the company has caused me.
Cheers

Well on behalf of Webroot, I would like to apologize for the mixed messages and apathy. Input like this does resonate with the Community, and as such, those of us who are engaged here. When a customer experiences this much hassle, I do everything I can to relay the concerns and add it to the conversation.

Thanks Lliddell, all the best.

Could you tell me how to delete this account, and also advise if I should delete my main account with Webroot and/or Webroot Support and how to do that, please? I can't find anything in the help. Thanks

Sorry to hear you will be leaving Webroot. I will ping @ and she will advise on how to do this. The Employees should be in about 10 am tomorrow east coast time.

I would like to add to ProTruckDriver's reply, my regret also that Webroot did not live up to what you were expecting from it.
 
In case you're interested, you might want to check out my post at Wilders Security Forum here which will explain why, despite some annoying shortcomings and weaknesses that Webroot has, some of which you mention in your posts in this thread, I still stick with it.
 
I wish you all the best with whatever other security solution you choose.
 
 

Thanks guys, everyone here's been great and no hard feelings. Muddy7, that's great it worked out for you. I had a similar experience going from one AV to another (different again) on several occasions. I've no complaints on the protection side of things, other than the false positives...well, actually now I think about it, my other issue seems back to normal - it was scrambling text sometimes in web page inputs and the like, which I never got to the bottom of. You pays yer money (or not in my case) and takes yer choice.

@ wrote:
it was scrambling text sometimes in web page inputs and the like, which I never got to the bottom of.

Yeah, that's the Identity Shield, which is protecting your personal data against phishing. It causes a lag between key input and text output which tends to scramble the text if you input it at normal speed. The Identity Shield is very effective, but it does come with that drawback. So you have to be slow and aware of this problem when entering text into webpages.
 
By the way, did you read the posts by Techfox1976, zfactor and PC_Fiddler that I referenced in my Wilders post (if you click the vertical arrow at the top of each quoted post, you can go to the original threads to see each of those posts in their surrounding context)?
 
Anyway, once again I wish you the best with whatever security solution you opt for.

Hi Muddy, no, I missed that the first time round! It's pretty persuasive, even alarming, on first reading, and who knows, I might be making a mistake and find my way back to Webroot after some awful infection. However, there are quite a number of factors to take into account. Your post is from 2010 and describes your experience of the preceding 12 years, and things seem to have changed a fair bit in the technology. Not that I'm an expert by any means.
 
I used to have a few infections in previous decades (not anywhere near the rate you describe). Now, let me think back (it's getting hard!). If I remember right, I've never had a viral infection that I couldn't fix myself (with help and advice from formus), or that wasn't immediately quarantined by traditional-type AVs, almost always running the free versions. That's quite important: NEVER. There were, I have to admit, one or two scary moments, and one or two infections that required a lot of help and a lot of stages, installing various tools, running them, posting the results on forums, then getting the next step. But we're still going back a decade or more. And I had probably been lazy and not run scans enough.
 
I've had, in comparison, several computers that I had to scrap or reformat, reinstalling Windows (and one time Linux), and every time it was due (as far as I can tell) to physical wear on hard drives, since they don't last forever, or just hardware not keeping up with the rate of data increase (and the deprecation of XP). I've had several laptops given to me second hand by members of the family, complete wrecks, ground to a halt or with popups and obvious infections due to reckless surfing and installing masses of free games, signing up to things without reading EULAs and ignoring warning signs, never doing any maintenance or running scans, never using cleaners, etc., and with their kids let loose on them too. I've often found that just running a few tools I know about, deleting lots of garbage, checking discs and defragging, etc., they're as good as new again. The one I'm using now I did that with, but unfortunately after about a year I found that the disc was shot, so I switched it for a new one and all's well.
 
So, all in all, in my experience, computers are much more vulnerable to old age than virus infection, as long as they're used fairly responsibly. I use Firefox with uBlockOrigin (and usually an AV addon - Webroot's now replaced with Kaspersky's), but I also generally know where I'm surfing and why, and I don't take unnecessary risks. I regularly run Ccleaner, which gets rid of a lot of tracking files, and I search with duckduckgo. Even without addons, browsers have become vastly safer over the last decade, Net protocols have done a lot (almost everything has to be https now or your browser will start complaining), ISPs seem to have invested massively in anti-virus and anti-spam, removing most of it before it gets anywhere near us. I almost never get a spam email these days.
 
My partner is anything but careful, surfing from Facebook to just about anything she wants to click on, with no ad blockers, and her Windows 10 seems to cope with Avast freeware (although I hated that after several years - like many of the free versions it just gets naggier and naggier and worries you with all sorts of stuff you don't need to worry about, actually becoming malware itself!). Some of the experts on the Windows 7 forums advised me that AVs cause more problems than they fix these days, and certainly, when I ran some tools, I had several computational issues (not infections) due to errors caused by Avast. This is what took me to the forum, and getting rid of Avast and all its debris fixed the issues. Now, I can't say that of all AVs, and not of Webroot, but the scrambling of text in web-pages issue does show that it's got downsides (if it's slow, it should still be able to output from the keyboard buffer in the same order as keys were entered, it seems to me). I asked support about it. I had to download a tool and run it and upload the results. I was advised to switch off the ID protection, but they appeared to be working on a solution. After a while, that just seemed to be lost in the mists of time. It's still the same many months later. You have the same problem. I can't use the ID protection without annoying issues entering text, so there's no point in it. For best part of a year I'm running an AV with one of the main features switched off because it doesn't work. Nobody has given me any explanation or update on what's being done. This is not good.
 
There were a number of those people jumped in to say they've not had AV for years, and no infections to date. That seems a little risky to me, but maybe they have other security that's not strictly an AV suite. Bottom line, I think many people will have switched from one AV to another over recent years, or got rid of it altogether, and imagine that their lower incidence rate is due to that when it's just due to the Internet filtering out most of it at source. And there are probably lots of people whose computers crash out or grind to a halt, who replace it and blame infections when it's just old and badly maintained. Major scares, like the British NHS and others having ransomware, always involve idiots opening obvious spam, usually on outdated OSs, with budgets so stretched that the security is compromised.
 
I do take the point that tests may not be representative, although it seems odd that nobody has objectified the sort of evidence you refer to here, which can't be that difficult to do. It also seems odd to me that Webroot - from what I read - actually don't submit their product to testing companies. Is that true; any idea why? It ought to stand up to tests on an equal footing with other AVs, even if the tests don't perfectly reproduce real-life, novel attacks. They seem to shoot themselves in the foot by doing this.
 
But I'm also concerned about the quality of their code. This is perhaps a poor piece of logic on my part, but it's my subjective impression and it bugs me (pardon the pun): if a company can't write a decent website, keep track of my product key, or even email me to let me update my forgotten password (if it was in fact forgotten) when I use the relevant part of the site (having disabled anything that might be blocking this at my end and trying several times), I worry about their abilities to write AV. It's likely to be a different department, of course, or even outsourced to a different company. If so, Webroot are still ultimately responsible and somebody needs to fix it, and that somebody doesn't seem to have noticed in the last year, because when I first installed it I had to overlook the same sort of merry-go-round, actually going to their support service before I bought it in order to work out why offer prices didn't seem to make sense (there was a reduction on the year's subscription, but if you tried to save by getting a 3-year one instead, it worked out more expensive per year). Assuming you can't buy it even cheaper off a guy on a street corner.
 
And if, every time my subscription needs renewing, they keep offering me that at an inflated price unless I dig around, talk to people, search and find it at significantly less, I don't trust them on those grounds either. AV companies should be on our side, making things easier for us and trying to save us money and time. Instead, I have to spend hours trying to problem-solve updating my subscription, and eventually have to do that by following a link from the support people (no explanation, just like this is normal). I didn't try it - god knows whether that would have worked or not. I made a mental note that if I did stick with it, next year it might be better to uninstall it and start again and save myself the run-around.

Wow, @, that's quite a post. Thank you for that!
 
First a quick correction: my Wilders post was not written in 2010 but barely a couple of weeks ago. And it refers to my experience with Prevx/Webroot from 2006 to today. (2010 was the year Webroot acquired Prevx ;)).
 
Anyway, you certainly sound like the kind of guy (unlike me :() who doesn't need an AV. As for your partner, that's another story!
 
Let me now take up a few points you made:
 

@ wrote:
For best part of a year I'm running an AV with one of the main features (Identity Shield) switched off because it doesn't work.

Personally, I wouldn't express it like that. In fact, Identity Shield works extremely well. While it does have the key input/output lag downside, for me personally it is only occasionally that I notice this problem (for example, as I am typing this in a https page, this being done on my extremely sluggish and slightly buggy Windows 7 device, I am experiencing no lag and therefore no scrambled text at all—presumably because though it is a https page, it is not a page that is processing sensitive personal information and so, however it worked that one out, Webroot recognises that it doesn't need to intensively protect my keyboard input to this Forum post?) and it is therefore just a problem that needs my attending to from time to time.
 

@ wrote:
It also seems odd to me that Webroot - from what I read - actually don't submit their product to testing companies. Is that true; any idea why? It ought to stand up to tests on an equal footing with other AVs, even if the tests don't perfectly reproduce real-life, novel attacks. They seem to shoot themselves in the foot by doing this.

Problem is, Webroot has a different approach to traditional AVs (see my post here—also, if you have time see this Webroot video).
 
As a result, Webroot does not sit well with traditional AV tests—see this post (another post by Techfox 1976) which sums up the situation pretty neatly. Webroot have been trying for some time to get the testing organisations to change the way they test AV products (and I believe they are not the only AV company that have been attempting to do this) but so far, it would appear, without success 😞.
 
I do agree with you about Webroot's general organisation. You will also find me here on this Forum bemoaning the mediocre quality of many of the bells and whistles that come together with some of WSA's product packages. But thanks to Joe Jaroch (the architect of Prevx's and WSA's AV technology, going btw on Wilders Security Forum by the name of PrevxHelp) and the rest of the Prevx team (all of whom came, with the acquisition of Prevx, to Webroot to build its product, Webroot SecureAnywhere), this is NOT true at all of its AV technology (and I speak of its AV technology in its entirety).
 
And by the way, all the developers and all the coding remains in-house (true, Webroot has acquired other companies such as, for example, BrightCloud which deals with the website reputational listing and is therefore is at the heart of the Web Shield, Web Filtering Extensions and the Web Filtering Driver).
 
Finally, the best place to go for prices is (almost without fail) here (I agree that it is not satisfactory that I have to tell you this in order for you to avoid a steep price hike relative to the price you paid for your first year's subscription, but that is how it is. Apparently, according to ProTruckDriver, this is the business model for nearly all AV companies. If true, that would make it hard to survive by bucking the trend and adopting a different, evidently fairer, price policy.).
 
Anyway, hope that helps!

Hi Liddell, I better say I'm ready, before I change my mind feeling all the lurve!
 
I wouldn't bother, but it's one of my habits just to tidy up my accounts online.
 
Ciao for now!
treehouse

Hello @JJJacobs1944

 

Webroot doesn't support Chromebook at this time and see here for more info: https://community.webroot.com/got-an-idea-29/webroot-for-chromebook-76171 and see a search of the Community: https://community.webroot.com/search?q=Chromebook

 

See this also: https://support.google.com/chromebook/answer/3438631?hl=en and here: https://anz.dynabook.com/support/items/faq/814

Thanks,