Get McAfee off Facebook

If you’ve ever bought a computer with McAfee pre-installed and then tried to get rid of it or disable its incessant barrage of the-sky-is-falling hysterical warnings about viruses and worms, you know my skeptism about today’s announcement that Facebook has teamed up with McAfee to supposedly shield users from attacks.

What they’ve really done in providing a free six-month trial of McAfee’s Internet Security Suite to Facebook users is to give McAfee access to your computer to sell you a renewal after six months. And to nag you and nag you until you do.

Just try and get rid of it.

I distrust McAfee. And I’m starting to distrust Facebook, especially this week after owner, founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg in trying to defend the December decision to make users’ information publicly searchable, said that “the social norm has evolved over time” and, in essense, people don’t care about privacy anymore because “People have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people.”

Go away McAfee.