When I downloaded a copy of µTorrent on Windows, I noticed that there’s now a license agreement at one stage of the setup process. Whenever someone sees a license agreement on Windows, the first thing they usually do is click on ‘I agree’ to get on with the installation. I did the same thing and I noticed that after I installed uTorrent, I had actually agreed to install the Ask Toolbar and have my home page set to Ask.com on my web browser. This kind of trickery isn’t new – Yahoo! has been doing this with most versions of Yahoo Messenger (only on Windows). The main problem with such installers is that they are designed to hide the opt-out option so that users invariably miss it. And when you’re giving administrative access to the installer so that it can be installed, you’re also allowing it to modify other parts of your sytem.

While Windows 7 brings several improvements in the form of security upgrades and UI enhancements, it’s still this easy for installers to trick users into installing badware. When you’re using a package manager on Linux, it almost never happens this way. On Mac OS X where most applications can be installed just by pasting them to the Applications folder, there are no modifications made to other applications. And modifications, when required in an installer, require users to enter their password.

A reason to hate Windows? No, but definitely another reason to love Mac OS X and Linux. The trickery used in such installers isn’t new and I think it’s really sad to see no one caring to complain about a procedure like this on Windows.