F-Secure’s F1 giveaway through Optus Broadband

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Monday, 16 February 2009 14:37

IT Industry - Market

In an attempt to gain some headway against Symantec and its Norton suites, F-Secure has done a deal for Optus broadband customers, giving them a free trial of its Internet Security suite and a chance to win a trip to the 2009 Malaysian Grand Prix.

F-Secure and Optus have banded together to create the “Optus Internet Security Suite”, a rebadged version of F-Secure’s security software, and are offering it as a free trial until June 30, 2009.

After this time, Optus says it “may” start charging AUD $7 per month, which if you multiply over a 12 month period ends up costing AUD $84.

The use of the word “may” is interesting – will Optus start charging its customers $7 per month from July 1, or not?

My expectation is that the word "may" really means "will", but I guess we'll see if a three letter word starting with "m" really is just a codeword for a four letter word starting with "w", or if the decision to start charging customers "may" or "will" take place at some later time.

Either way, Optus’ entry into Internet security software is a counterpoint to Telstra BigPond’s Internet Security offering, for which BigPond charges its customers AUD $99 per year.

Thus, Optus’ offering is cheaper than Telstra’s, but when both are compared with security suites such as Norton Internet Security 2009 and Norton 360, which offer 3-user license versions for a similar price, Optus customers need to ask themselves a question.

Are they happy with whatever software they’re currently using, or is the temptation of four and a half months of free Internet security and a chance to win a ticket for yourself and three of your friends enough to give the Optus/F-Secure Internet security suite a go?

If Optus/F-Secure’s software is able to be loaded on more than one computer, this wasn’t obvious from the software download page (link on page 2), which leads me to conclude it’s a single user license only.

That said, if the software can be installed on more than one computer, then hello Optus, please make this obvious. Indeed, please make it obvious what kind of license it is, and if it isn’t a 3-user license, then please consider making it so, especially given the fact many households have more than one computer these days.

So when was this offer first unveiled? Please read on to page 2.