Steven S.

Bitdefender includes a product, SAFEPAY, that tries to interpose a Bitdefender specific browser for all banking transactions. This puts BitDefender in the position of being able to scarf up all of your bank passwords. SAFEPAY is not vetted. Google, Firefox, and Safari may security issues, but they are well know, well vetted programs from reputable venders. SAFEPAY may be perfectly safe, but it behaves like malware intent on capturing all of your banking information. Perhaps the authors intend to hold this information for a few years, then bank fraud theft on a grand scale.

Most worrisome, the ability to whitelist banks (e.g., chase.com) in SAFEPAY does not work. Additionally, the instruction "do not use SAFEPAY" does nothing in the BitDefender settings does nothing. SAFEPAY insists that it be used to communicate with your bank.

This is very worrisome. If someone wants secure browsing, the open source Firefox would be a good choice. That is what TOR uses.

I asked BitDefender software support how to disable safepay. Since I am using the paid version, they are supposed to respond promptly to this request. They never answered - also worrisome behavior.

I would strongly advise against using BitDefender until the company explains why they added their own proprietary, non-vetted, and highly intrusive browser for banking transactions, why SAFEPAY whitelisting fails, while disabling SAFEPAY in the settings does nothing, and why BitDefender will not answer emails about how to disable SAFEPAY.

If you want to verify my experience, just Google "Disable BitDefender SAFEPAY." You will find may accounts of user frustration over this. All the more reason to worry!

I discovered this weekend that www.chemistry.com has been charging my credit card since 12/1/13. There have been 21 unauthorized transactions against my credit card. I called them today. The confirmed that NONE of the information on file (name, e-mail address, city, state, zip code) associated with my account was accurate. I have no idea how my bank authorized the transactions. Nevertheless, they REFUSED to refund the 21 fraudulent transactions.

Their business model appears to be based on fraudulent recurrent credit card charges.