Update Checks and Privacy
Many customers asked us for a simple way to be notified of product updates. We responded by building it into the application via the Settings dialog. You can control whether you check for updates, and how you are notified.
When an update check happens, an HTTP request is made to a page on our webserver. Appended to the URL we send the current version that is running (so the web server can decide whether a newer version is available or not, as well as whether any version-specific message needs to be sent back).
The product also sends three additional pieces of information for statistical purposes:
- Whether the product is in demo mode or not
- The number of servers being monitored
- How often the update check will happen (every 30 days if enabled)
Nothing in the list above identifies you, your company or the computer (no license information, no machine names, no expiration dates, no email addresses, etc). While it's true that all HTTP requests send an IP address, we do not and will not be tracking that.
Basically we'd like to eventually be able to report (well, brag) that X number of servers are being monitored by our products. We hope this update check mechanism will be viewed as a win-win.
