EA Revises Origin's EULA to Make it Sound Decidedly Less Sinister

After the outrage over the last few days regarding EA'sOrigin service, its EULA--which, at one point, made it sound like EA was collecting a great deal of user information and reserving the right to willingly distribute it to unnamed partner third parties--and the distinct lack of an opt-out feature for any of its apparent data mining activities, EA has responded by apparently updating its EULA to rephrase any and all references to data collection in such a way as to not make it sound quite as insidious as before.

The new EULA, posted on August 24th (and brought to my attention by GB user Commisar), addresses data collection with the following language:

EA knows that you care how information about you is collected, used and shared, and we appreciate your trust that we will do so carefully and sensibly. Information about our customers is an important part of our business, and EA would never sell your personally identifiable information to anyone, nor would it ever use spyware or install spyware on users’ machines. We and agents acting 37683v1 on our behalf do not share information that personally identifies you without your consent, except in rare instances where disclosure is required by law or to enforce EA’s legal rights.

In addition to information that you give EA directly, EA collects nonpersonally identifiable (or anonymous) information for purposes of improving our products and services, providing services to you, facilitating the provision of software updates, dynamically served content and product support as well as communicating with you. The non-personally identifiable information that EA collects includes technical and related information that identifies your computer (including the Internet Protocol Address) and operating system, as well as information about your Application usage (including but not limited to successful installation and/or removal), software, software usage and peripheral hardware.

As noted above, this information is gathered periodically for purposes such as improving our products and services, troubleshooting bugs, and otherwise enhancing your user experience. This and all other data provided to EA and/or collected by EA in connection with your installation and use of this Application is collected, used, stored and transmitted in accordance with EA’s Privacy Policy located at www.ea.com. To the extent that anything in this section conflicts or is inconsistent with the terms of EA’s Privacy Policy, the terms of the Privacy Policy shall control.

The original EULA can still be found here, if you want to check for comparison's sake. While the fact that you still can't opt out of any data collection whatsoever is still a bit troubling, the changes here are definitely a huge improvement over the murky and downright hostile language that was previously posted. So what say you, Giant Bomb community? Are you satiated by the changes EA has made?

Meh.

We'll just wait and see, won't we?

i wouldn't use origin anyway. no matter how nice they are about it.

So what does the Privacy Policy say Patrick?

Never mattered to me in the first place, since I'm never getting Origins. Even if it means losing out on BF3.

lol tanx but no danx EA! n0 moni 4 u frm me! :)

This just goes to show how few people actually bother to read the EULAs they agree to. The reason they aren't more careful about wording is they figure no one is actually going to read it. They got caught this time, but I wouldn't be surprised if there were hundreds of other games/services that had similar or worse wording in their EULA that haven't ever been exposed.

Seems more clear, but I already uninstalled Origin and I don't have a reason to put that software on my machine ever again.

Oh, EA.

i still get the feeling they'll watch me watch porn....

@ArcadiaExeter said:

i wouldn't use origin anyway. no matter how nice they are about it.

May I ask why?

They removed every reference to "own your [henceforth, "the client"] soul", right? Just kidding. Couldn't care less about Origin.

I deleted the executable yesterday. I hadn't installed it yet.
Is there paragraph that says they can change the EULA whenever they want? That's what I'd look for. Companies change them all the time. The thing is, they can change it after they already have your data. It's not like you can delete the data from their systems by uninstalling Origin at that point.

They'll still do it though, just making it seem like they aren't. It's EA people, they are the fucking devil.

I have Origin beta thing installed. So far there haven't been any robots or anything coming for me yet.

I'm updating it right now though, so so things could get messy.

Edit: Hey awesome! I own Burnout Paradise. Uh-oh, being occupied by the update made me forget about my pizza in the oven. Now the cheese a little more done than I would like it.

FUCK YOU ORIGIN

@Elusionar said:

Origin needs to die...Long live Steam.

This, and they can make it sound less sinister, but they can't hide their intent. It's already clearly been proven by this action alone without the need of help from any other bad PR. We got a peek at their cards, and they've asked the dealer to deal a fresh hand. Doesn't change the fact there's still a douchebag holding the cards. (EA)

I will never be satisfied.

@nintendoeats said:

So what does the Privacy Policy say Patrick?

It says this: http://tos.ea.com/legalapp/WEBPRIVACY/US/en/PC/

Note that this policy was, effectively, in place already. The previous version of the EULA said that the PP takes precedence over the Origin EULA, and the new EULA's language is very similar, now, to the PP.

whatever, i'm just gonna disable that crazy service once i install origin anyway. not like i'm not gonna use origin if BF3 and SWTOR use it anyway

Good Old Games and Steam are much better services then Origin currently is and they have games i would actually want to play, so my video game needs have been met.

Legal hypocracy alert: For file-sharing trials they WILL track your Internet Protocol address as if it's "you", but for Origin: 
 

The non-personally identifiable information that EA collects includes technical and related information that identifies your computer (including the Internet Protocol Address) and operating system, as well as information about your Application usage (including but not limited to successful installation and/or removal), software, software usage and peripheral hardware.  

Well it's a start. Still will only use Origin if I really really really REALLY have to in order to play BF3 and ME3.

Unless they plan on making origin a prereqesit to install their new games, I will never install it on my computer.

And even if they do I might think twice about getting that particular title. I just hope SW: TOR doesn't require it.

@CosmicQueso: What EA is going with Origin and more specifically in regards with its implementation coinciding BF3 is wrong and damaging to the customers who would like to enjoy a game like BF3 at its most potential.

You cannot fight the internet.

This is a better and faster response than I ever would have imagined coming out of EA but they seriously need to add the ability to opt-out ad just leave the collecting info setting as the default.

Good thing we have so many watchdogs to save the internet from the evils of EA.

Too bad they can't be bothered to help with problems that actually matter.

I would literally post my SS number and bank info in these comments before I let EA install anything like this on my PC. I'm willing to bet anything they won't act any differently just want to seem less scummy.

HAH!

@KarateKid said:

Unless they plan on making origin a prereqesit to install their new games, I will never install it on my computer.

And even if they do I might think twice about getting that particular title. I just hope SW: TOR doesn't require it.

SWTOR will definitely use Origin

Isn't it illigal to pull peoples IPs in most western countries?

@Buccura said:

Well it's a start. Still will only use Origin if I really really really REALLY have to in order to play BF3 and ME3.

From my understanding it doesn't matter if you're actually playing a game that uses Origin or not, it installs a service that runs on your PC at all times that does the data mining shady business. Fortunately services can be disabled =)

Still hate Origins with every single fiber of my being, but I'm still getting BF3 for PC, because it's just worth it.

That "agents acting on our behalf" line sounds pretty damn sinister.

You can't spell Versa-Life without EA. THINK ABOUT IT.

@ncr100: @ncr100 said:

Legal hypocracy alert: For file-sharing trials they WILL track your Internet Protocol address as if it's "you", but for Origin:

The non-personally identifiable information that EA collects includes technical and related information that identifies your computer (including the Internet Protocol Address) and operating system, as well as information about your Application usage (including but not limited to successful installation and/or removal), software, software usage and peripheral hardware.

Businesses - having it "their way" for hundreds of years. Perhaps any EA file-sharing trials will now be invalid since they claim IP addresses are "non-personally" identifiable! Could break their lawsuits!

A hell of an interesting point. I think precedent was recently established that IP does not equate to an individual person, but that won't stop the people who jam the legal system with piracy suits. Personally I'm never going to have the time or money to find out how this would shake out.

At this point (since I'll be playing BF3) I'm more wondering how this sort of data collection can be contained, blocked or spoofed on my end.

Good enough for me. Far from ideal, but good enough for me.

To bad EA its too little to late. Im not buying the great game of the year battlefield 3 because of you. THANKS ALOT EA!

See, guys? EA wants to be your friend. They only want to collect your information to better service you.
 
What a nice, caring group of people over at EA.

These comments are hilarious. Can't wait to see half the people here playing BF3 when it comes out.

That new EULA is still claiming to mine data on application usage, that is spyware. Anonymously or not, it's still spyware, using my connection and CPU time for sending marketing data is plain shitty.

Glad this means nothing to console users.

Spy on my naked body EA. TAKE IT.

Really don't care about any of that. If EA wants me to play any of their games, it's gonna happen through Steam, or not at all. Origin needs to die.

Could you PLEASE put a note in the article that Application (with an upper-case A) means origin, not ANY application on your computer? It says that at the beginning of the EULA, but people seem to be ignoring that part.

"This License governs

your use of this application and all related software, documentation, and updates

and upgrades that replace or supplement the application and are not distributed

with a separate license (together, the “Application”)"

Application, with an upper-case A refers to Origin and any games installed with Origin. This is an important detail that is being ignored in favour of hivemind outrage.

Sometimes I feel like EA is that Brazilian guy you're playing against in an MMO. BR? U GIB ME INFO OR I REPORT U. 

I will still avoid Origin until I am allowed to opt-out of data collection (or until someone analyzes the program and discovers what is being collected).

These comments are hilarious. Can't wait to see half the people here playing BF3 when it comes out.