Comodo Silent Installation Switches

1. Installaware Silent Switches
2. Cherry Silent Switches
3. Silent Switches For Software Installations

. Comodo has been caught selling its popular SSL certificate to malware distributors/scan websites.

Now in Comodo’s defense, whenever a malware distributor/scan website which has Comodo’s certificate is brought to their attention, they remove it; furthermore the purpose of the SSL certificate, technically, is not to verify the contents of the website but rather to verify how secure it is to buy from (the irony). However the question of why Comodo is repeatedly selling the certificates to known malware distributors/scam websites (there have been cases where a website with the same exact layout, interface, and “product” except different name has been issued a certificate even though their earlier one was revoked) is still a significant one and still an on going issue. Softpedia, once upon a time, labeled Comodo Internet Security as “malware” because CIS included SafeSurf, an optional third party toolbar considered to be malware by Softpedia. Of course Comodo did not like that, so they tried to get Softpedia to remove the label. Softpedia, standing by their high standards, refused. So in the end the result was (is) Comodo Internet Security was (is) removed from Softpedia’s download database.Whatever side you are on for the above two issues, this post is not to discuss them; that is for another time.

I am creating this post to address another (potentially more important) issue with Comodo products.Today as I was checking my e-mail, I got an e-mail from a dotTechie informing me of the fact Comodo Backup, a free backup solution provided by Comodo, was recently updated to v2 with major changes and I should check it out (yes – I do read the e-mails I am sent even if I forget to reply surprise, surprise). So, naturally, I was intrigued and went to download Comodo Backup. While installing Comodo Backup I glanced over its EULA (End User License Agreement) and was shocked by what I saw:I am not legal mind, but to me this says if you install Comodo Backup, Comodo will collect data from your computer such as how you use Comodo Backup.

Not only will Comodo collect data, but the data can potentially be personally identifiable: Comodo won’t disclose the data to a third party in a manner which will personally identify you but that means if they are taking a deliberate and conscious action to make sure the data is not personally identifiable when being passed on to a third party, the data is personally identifiable when Comodo themselves have it. Am I understanding it properly or am I being paranoid?Now it is not just Comodo wanting to collect data from you while you use their software.

Many software developers ask you if you want to send anonymous usage statistics to the developer while using their program; however you can always opt out if you do not want to. I looked up, down, left, right, in, and out – no where in Comodo Backup did I see an option to opt out of sending data to Comodo. At best I found an option under settings named “Enable log” which a user can check or uncheck; however there is no clear indication if this “log” refers to the data collection done by Comodo or a different program function. Shame on you Comodo; not only are you collecting questionable data but the user has no clear way to opt out if they find this action less than desirable (bar blocking the program with Firewall of course and/or not installing the program in the first place).After I got done with Comodo Backup, I was curious to see if other Comodo software do the same thing as Comodo Backup. I found indeed there are other perpetrators which do the exact same thingComodo System CleanerComodo SecureEmailand other Comodo software which do something similar except explicitly state the information collected will be non-personally identifiable:Comodo EasyVPNComodo Internet Security. CIS is the bundle which contains Comodo Firewall, AntiVirus, and AntiMalware solutions.Since EULAs are long, and Comodo did not exactly help by not properly formatting some of the EULAs for some of their software, I may have missed a software or two which act in the same way as Comodo Backup; so if you find another Comodo product which collects data (personally identifiable or not) without an ethical and clear declaration and a user opt-out, please post below and I will be sure to update this post.Furthermore, I visited the you see provided in CIS’s EULA. The description on how user personal data is used is vague at best:So who exactly are Comodo’s affiliates and what are their privacy policies?

Farther down the page Comodo does state more explicitly its partners and affiliates have “similar” privacy policiesbut I am not really impressed in the first place by Comodo so I don’t know what to think.To make matters even more confusing, it turns out there is another currently linked to Comodo’s website (this one was last updated in July as opposed to April for the other one). This one is a little bit more definitive about exactly what Comodo does:Of course Comodo states the affiliates and/or partners have “similar privacy standards” but I am not particularly impressed by Comodo’s “standards” when it collects data related to its programs without obvious user consent and/or clear opt-out option.So what do you guys think. Am I being a daft, paranoid idiot or is Comodo pulling a fast one over all of us? Please, dotTechies, lawyers, Comodo reps, and everyone else: post your thoughts below. As it stands, I don’t know about everyone else, but Comodo has lost at least one potential customer: me.Update.Let me make this clear: If potential data collection is not a concern for you, by all means use Comodo products (I have stated time and time again, at face value, Comodo programs are great). However me, and many others, deplore this practice of data collection without clear notification and/or opt-out option and will probably never use Comodo products again.

I figured out a way to do a totally silent switchless installer for Avira Antivir Personal Edition Classic. It involves a little work but in the end works nicely.

You will need the following:Antivirworkstationwin7uenh.exeWinRARCwnd.exe, executable is in the “release” folderProcess.exeDownload Antivir and extract it with 7-zip or WinRAR to a folder, I called it antivirpec. We are going to create two files and add them to the folder. Open a text editor such as notepad and copy the following text. DATADestinationPath='C:Program FilesAviraAntiVir Workstation'ProgramGroup=1DesktopIcon=0ShellExtension=1Guard=1MailScanner=0KeyFile=C:WindowsTempAvirahbedv.keyShowReadMe=0RestartWindows=0ShowRestartMessage=0If you want a desktop icon change the 0 (no) to 1 (yes). MailScanner must be 0 because it is not included in the free edition. If you want to change the path of the install or the path to the registration key just make sure it is an absolute path, variables such as%windir% will not work.

Save the file as setup.inf and place it in the antivirpec folder.Open notepad again and copy the following text. Cwnd /hide @@echo offstart /wait%windir%TempAvirabasicsetup.exe /inf='%windir%TempAvirasetup.inf'process -k avscan.exeexitcwnd.exe is a utility to hide the DOS box when the command runs. You could also use cmdow.exe. Just be sure that whichever you use is in your system32 folder.The setup command uses the switch /inf which uses the parameters in the setup.inf file we created and causes the setup to be run silently.Process.exe is a utility to kill processes in Windows 2000 and Windows XP Home. If you are using XP Pro you can use the taskkill command instead. This command kills the automatic scan that starts after install. If you use process.exe be sure it is in your system32 folder.

Save the file as antivir.cmd and place it in the antivirpec folder.Now make the installer with WinRAR. Open WinRAR and browse to the antivirpec folder. Right click on a file and choose “select all”, making sure all the files and folders are highlighted, then click “Add” on the Toolbar. You’ll get the “Archive name and parameters” window. On the General tab Select “best” as compression method, and check “create solid archive” and “create SFX archive”. Change the archive name if you like but it must have the.exe extension.Switch to the Advanced tab and select “SFX options” to open Advanced SFX options window.On the General tab in the “Path to extract” box type the path you want to extract the installer to.

Installaware Silent Switches

Make sure it is the same path you have in the antivir.cmd file. Then in the “Run after extraction” box type in the path to the antivir.cmd file.Change to the Modes tab and select the “hide all” and “overwrite existing files” radio buttons.Close the “Advanced SFX Options” window by clicking OK, then click OK on the “Archive name and parameters” window to start creating the installer. The finished installer is created in the antivirpec folder. The registration key file is named hbedv.key.

It is in the antivirpec folder to which you extracted Antivirworkstationwin7uenh.exe. The setup.inf file you created refers to the key file location, which in this example is C:WindowsTempAvira. The paths you enter in the WinRAR Advanced SFX Options window tells the installer to extract to C:WindowsTempAvira, then to run the antivir.cmd file you created, which in turn runs the setup.exe.

Cherry Silent Switches

Make sure your setup.inf and antivir.cmd files have the proper file extension and check all your paths to make sure they are the same as the example. I can't explain it any better than that. @kroseWOW - this is the best idea I ever saw to install AVIRA AntiVir completely silent and unattended! I don't like the AutoIt-scripts where you can see all the windows appearing and disappearing again (BTW, is it possible to hide these installation-windows with AutoIt, maybe with moving it out of the screen?)I ask myself if this also works for the new version 8 of AntiVir?

Silent Switches For Software Installations

Are there any new parameters in the INF-file that should also be considered? Does the INF-file work further?I will test this later today and will report my experiences here!EDIT: works like a charmI also found a way to avoid any kind of window appearing while the installation, so that it's now completely silent and unattended! If you're familiar with German, you can read my posting here:Best regardscool400 Edited April 16, 2008 by cool400.