NVIDIA 436.02 Installer Buggy, Always Installs GeForce Experience, No GDPR Consent

[btarunr]

NVIDIA today released its GeForce 436.02 WHQL Gamescom Special graphics drivers. You can read all about them here. The installer of these drivers appears to have a major bug that forces the installation of GeForce Experience without obtaining GDPR-compliant consent from the user. With the ratification of GDPR, NVIDIA driver installers present a selection screen right at the start of the installation, which lets users opt to install GeForce Experience (and give their GDPR consent in doing so), but a second option lets users decline GDPR consent, forcing the installer to install GeForce drivers without GeForce Experience. A bug with the installer of GeForce 436.02 WHQL disregards the user's choice at this screen, and installs GeForce Experience without the GDPR-mandated user-consent.

Making matters far worse is the fact that you cannot deselect GeForce Experience from the list of components in the Custom Install screen. The Custom Install list lets you make the installer skip installation of optional components that are otherwise installed by default in Express Install (GeForce Experience features in this list only if a user gives GDPR consent in the previous screen). We're hoping that this is a simple installer bug by NVIDIA, because anything worse would put the company in violation of EU privacy laws. We at TechPowerUp are in the final stages of developing a free utility that lets users take complete control over their NVIDIA graphics driver installation, called NVCleanstall. Using this software you may skip lot more optional components than what the NVIDIA Installer allows, such as Telemetry. Grab a beta version of NVCleanstall from here.



Update 16:27 UTC: NVIDIA has removed the 436.02 drivers from their website, and confirmed that this is a bug.

Update Aug 21st: The 436.02 drivers are available again, and the GeForce Experience install problem is fixed. Look for the suffix "-rp" in the file name to identify the fixed version.

View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[Ed_1]

Nvcleanstall.exe worked fine for me (GTX970), no GFE.

 

[P4-630]

I installed it offline and yes it installed GFE, I just uninstalled GFE afterwards.

 

[Fluffmeister]

First world problems eh?

 

[PerfectWave]

NVIDIA in trouble cos of GDPR LUL

 

[xkm1948]

First world problems eh?

EU and its absurd law problems.

Seriously on one hand, EU screams about protection of privacy. On the other hand it moves to censor as much as it can regarding information. So weird.

 

[Dave65]

And people complain about AMD drivers

 

[neatfeatguy]

I'm still rocking whatever drivers I installed nearly a year back for my 980Ti. No issues playing anything.....then again, the most recent game I've gotten my hands on to play is FarCry 5. The game constantly told me that my driver was out of date and that I should update it, but I didn't pay it any attention. Game ran fine without any issues.

The saying goes, if it's not broke, don't fix it.

 

[btarunr]

"Installing GeForce drivers without our data-mining app is crazy"

 

[EarthDog]

Yeah, happened here too as expected. Silly. Standby for incoming hotfix drivers in..........................................?????

I just uninstalled it as well.

And people complain about AMD drivers

Yes they do... and with good reason. Both camps have had issues.

Now run along and play!

 

[Mistral]

What some people might call a bug, Jensen calls it a feature...

 

[Agent_D]

And people complain about AMD drivers

While I've always been an AMD fan, I have to say their drivers continuously disappoint on the video front. I can't get a decent driver for the Radeon VII that fully works as intended, at least as far as wattman and clock speeds go. With 19.5.2 I can run my 2025/1200 overclock, but memory clock never drops down from 1200, with 19.8.1, the clock speeds drop when not in use as normal, but if I try to set any overclock value it automatically runs the card at 1650/850. After numerous full clean uninstalls and reinstalls, and even a Windows fresh install, it's just a buggy driver issue. That's just the easy stuff, not to mention the random times the memory clock gets locked at 350 or 500MHz and I have to reboot to fix it. While I hate ngreedia and their business practices, I sometimes consider going back because, well, "it just works", or at least that was my experience owning a 970/1060/1080/1080ti.

 

[tangelo]

The saying goes, if it's not broke, don't fix it.

But it is broken.

NVIDIA Patches High Severity Flaws in Windows GPU Display Driver

NVIDIA released a GPU display driver security update to fix five high and medium severity vulnerabilities that could lead to local code execution, escalation of privileges, and denial of service on vulnerable Windows computers.

www.bleepingcomputer.com

 

[bug]

But it is broken.

NVIDIA Patches High Severity Flaws in Windows GPU Display Driver

NVIDIA released a GPU display driver security update to fix five high and medium severity vulnerabilities that could lead to local code execution, escalation of privileges, and denial of service on vulnerable Windows computers.

www.bleepingcomputer.com

Cherry picking much?

Driver Disaster: Over 40 Signed Drivers Can’t Pass Security Muster

Dozens of insecure drivers from 20 vendors illustrate widespread weaknesses when it comes to kernel protection.

threatpost.com

 

[PrEzi]

While I've always been an AMD fan, I have to say their drivers continuously disappoint on the video front. I can't get a decent driver for the Radeon VII that fully works as intended, at least as far as wattman and clock speeds go. With 19.5.2 I can run my 2025/1200 overclock, but memory clock never drops down from 1200, with 19.8.1, the clock speeds drop when not in use as normal, but if I try to set any overclock value it automatically runs the card at 1650/850. After numerous full clean uninstalls and reinstalls, and even a Windows fresh install, it's just a buggy driver issue. That's just the easy stuff, not to mention the random times the memory clock gets locked at 350 or 500MHz and I have to reboot to fix it. While I hate ngreedia and their business practices, I sometimes consider going back because, well, "it just works", or at least that was my experience owning a 970/1060/1080/1080ti.

Powerplay Tables for OC. Reboot / reinitialize graphic adapter for the other (works without reboot, been using it for ages a few years back during the mining-boom).

 

[Vayra86]

Seriously on one hand, EU screams about protection of privacy. On the other hand it moves to censor as much as it can regarding information. So weird.

Why are privacy and companies holding as little info as possible on you, at odds with each other? Your comment here underlines that we need GDPR to start thinking differently about (personal) data - and redefining data ownership too. That is the goal of it, is it the best implementation... probably not. But a good start nonetheless.

Maybe you're confusing 'weird' with 'difficult'?

 

[dozenfury]

NV slipping a bit lately. The last couple of drivers have been more problematic than usual. Raytracing has also kind of been a mess with low adoption rates, games dropping support for it, and it killing fps. I'm pretty happy still with my 1080ti from the mining craze days. But I'll take another look at AMD for my next build.

 

[tangelo]

Cherry picking much?

Driver Disaster: Over 40 Signed Drivers Can’t Pass Security Muster

Dozens of insecure drivers from 20 vendors illustrate widespread weaknesses when it comes to kernel protection.

threatpost.com

Not really. Just noting that it is broken.

 

[TheoneandonlyMrK]

Cherry picking much?

Driver Disaster: Over 40 Signed Drivers Can’t Pass Security Muster

Dozens of insecure drivers from 20 vendors illustrate widespread weaknesses when it comes to kernel protection.

threatpost.com

I think his, quite correct point, is that newer drivers have FIXEs updates and optimisations that the other guy is missing as well as performance improvements.
!Not !haha check Nvidia.

 

[ZoneDymo]

EU and its absurd law problems.

Seriously on one hand, EU screams about protection of privacy. On the other hand it moves to censor as much as it can regarding information. So weird.

ermm what is weird about that?
protecting privacy, aka, not showing others about your stuff aka censoring that information.

IF you can say at all those 2 are linked in anyway, then it seems perfectly logical to me.

 

[Metroid]

not only this driver, some earlier drivers also have not asked for permission to install that.

 

[TheLostSwede]

404 - Not Found
is what you get if you try to download it from Nvidia now...

 

[okidna]

They removed the installer file from NVIDIA and GeForce website :


EDIT : @TheLostSwede beat me to it

 

[Deleted member 177333]

Good info on the NVclean software - looking forward to using that in the future, especially if Nvidia ever tries to force the GFE bloatware down our throats.

 

[sam_86314]

Good thing I use NVCleanstall.