Forced software agreement on new HP PC

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I am not sure if this should be under McAfee or Hewlett Packard (HP) but since the most egregious portion is from McAfee I am starting this about them. This also might need to be moved as it is not strictly about McAfee as a company and rather a complaint. If it needs moved I apologize and understand. However I am sure that there are many many more stories about McAfee participating in anti-consumer actions and shady business practices and this could be the start.

Background

A friend of mine recently purchased an HP desktop from Costco, and I was helping set it up when I encountered an unexpected hurdle. Upon first boot, I was presented with a mandatory terms and conditions page created by HP. This page required acceptance of two agreements: one for HP, which was expected, and another for McAfee. What felt off about this terms of service agreement was the placement of the McAfee terms—they were about one-third of the way down the scrollable document, tucked beneath a lengthy sliding-bar section dedicated to HP’s terms, making them easy to overlook and hard to find.

There was no option to bypass this agreement without accepting both sets of terms, nor was there an option to accept them later. I think that this is on all new HP PCs. It is also in the tutorial levels of a new PC owners experience so most are not looking for it there. While many users plan to reinstall Windows on a new machine, I had only intended to do a quick wipe rather than a full reinstallation. Unfortunately, the only way to bypass the forced acceptance was to perform a complete Windows reinstall.

Complicating matters further, the system's drivers did not function correctly post-reinstallation. It remains unclear whether this was due to an issue with HP, my old installation media, or Windows itself. After additional troubleshooting, the machine was successfully restored and is now functioning properly. However, the experience required significantly more time and effort than I had initially anticipated.

I did not take screen grabs since this was a new install and while I should have take a phone photo I did not think to do it. I also did not take the time to read all of the terms of service for both companies, and I am unsure if there is a way to copy them here.

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