Brian Krebs blogged yesterday about a broad coalition of technology groups supporting Kaspersky, an internet security company, during its legal fight with Zango. Krebs writes that in May 2007 Zango sued Kaspersky “charging that the company interfered with its business” by removing Zango’s software, which has been classified as adware by multiple groups.

Kaspersky does not deny that its program removes Zango-based software from computers. In August of 2007 the initial case was dismissed by a judge because the court believed that the Communications Decency Act (CDA) allows companies to remove software in order to protect users from material which may be considered objectionable.

Zango had previously faced off against the FTC in 2006. The settlement that resulted from that investigation required the company to pay $3 million. Caroline McCarthy wrote at CNet that the agreement also stipulated that “the company must adhere to FTC regulations that bar it from loading programs onto customers’ computers and monitoring them without their consent.” FTC spokesperson Lydia Barnes was quoted as saying: “It violates federal law to secretly install software that forces consumers to get pop-ups that disrupt their computer use.”

The current case has drawn significant interest within both the security and business fields. A previous amicus brief was filed in favor of Zango by the National Business Coalition on E-Commerce and Privacy, an organization representing powerful corporate interests according to Krebs. Behavioral advertising and many other profitable marketing strategies depend on installing tracking cookies or web beacons on user computers, so they are actions businesses would like to protect. Thomas M. Boyd, attorney for the organization, represents company concerns that “a security software company has unreviewable power to decide that any content is objectionable and to deny user access to that content without any accountability for any damages that action may cause.”

The amicus brief filed this week represents the other side of the issue in a broad coalition including the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Business Software Alliance, and the Anti-Spyware Coalition. Ari Schwartz of the Anti-Spyware Coalition stated: “This is an extremely important case for consumers as to how security software protects them going forward, and whether the onus is put on the security company or [the adware vendor].” It is relevant to all the companies that classify Zango software as “adware” such as Microsoft (which removed 7.1 million instances of Zango software from customer computers) and Symantec (which has a description of Zango’s adware attributes here).

This case remains one to watch, as business and technology duke it out over consumers and rights.

Note: This blog post was updated on May 8, 2008 to make corrections regarding Zango’s 2006 involvement with the FTC.

The FTC this week reached a settlement with the owners of AdultFriendFinder.com over misuse of pornographic pop-up ads. The ads covered users’ full screens and showed pornographic content to users of search engines, including many who had never requested an explicit site. According to the FTC’s statement, some of the ads were distributed through badware.

As part of the settlement, the company behind AdultFriendFinder.com has committed to require consent before showing ads or sexual content. The company must also weed out any of its affiliates who don’t do the same, making it harder for them to pass the buck if there is future abuse.

The FTC’s statement says the practice of displaying explicit ads without consent is a violation of the FTC Act, but does not specify whether the core violation is of consent to being shown ads, consent to being shown sexually explicit imagery, or both.

Security experts who worked together to help win Julie Amero a new trial have now created a blog to educate the public and help other victims of badware in situations like Julie’s. Unfortunately, Julie Amero is not the only apparently innocent person who has been the victim of a lack of understanding about badware in the criminal justice system.

The new blog, The Julie Group, aims to keep watch on new cases, and to help make school districts, employers, and law enforcement more aware of the ways in which badware can undermine a user’s control of her computer.

A former substitute teacher who was convicted in January of exposing students to online pornography has now been granted a new trial.

In October of 2004, Julie Amero was substitute teaching in a Connecticut school when the classroom computer she was using began showing pornographic images. Amero contends that the images were caused by badware infecting the computer. Many security experts have agreed with Amero, citing out of date software on the computer Amero was using along with inadequate protections against badware.

Julie Amero’s case highlights the gap in public knowledge about badware and how to defend computers from infection. If the security experts assembled by Amero’s defense team are correct, the 2004 incident might have been prevented if the classroom computer’s software and anti-virus protections had been up to date.