Geek Squad Lawsuit Opens Up With Employee Confession

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So why are people trusting their (compromising) personal documents and images to minimum wage A+ (laugh) certified children at Best Buy? Can there be any reasonable expectation of privacy when you hand over your computer to a place like this?

I have to say, if you do own a computer that requires you to go to a big box store for repairs and/or warranty (and sometimes you have no choice) then don't keep anything important on that computer. Get an external hard drive or USB memory stick.
 

snajper69

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Ha ha ha Kids will be kids lol no matter how old they are. Next time guys before you service your PC at best buy make sure you remove those naked pictures of you/wife/gf lol :) or if not Geek Squad will enjoy them lol hahahhaha
 
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This is news? Unfortunately, when one turns over their computer to a repair agency (ANY AGENCY), they are handing any and all personal data over to said agency. In doing so, they are taking that risk. It's not to say that I support repair shops snooping through someone's data, but it is why I keep any private or sensetive information on a thumb drive or removable hard drive to prevent something like this.

 
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This is exactly the kind of stuff that happens when a company employs immature teenagers instead of , imagine this, qualified personell. As a former employee of Compusa, I'm not shocked at all about this. And it will continue to happen as long as the predominant demo of these stores are teenagers.
 

Oh Snap

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Thing is, these companies are cheap and are only willing to pay the kind of wages that only teenagers and highly uneducated adults are willing to take. If they up the pay, they end up having to up the costs, and the ever wise consumer will end up going elsewhere where teenagers are still getting $8.50 an hour. Sure a few might be willing to pay more, but then again, those people are probably already receiving tech support from someone other than Best Buy or CompUSA. You get what you pay for.
 

Oh Snap

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Thing is, these companies are cheap and are only willing to pay the kind of wages that only teenagers and highly uneducated adults are willing to take. If they up the pay, they end up having to up the costs, and the ever wise consumer will end up going elsewhere where teenagers are still getting $8.50 an hour. Sure a few might be willing to pay more, but then again, those people are probably already receiving tech support from someone other than Best Buy or CompUSA. You get what you pay for.
 

cscpianoman

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Oh Snap,
Actually, Best Buy still charges out-landish fees to get your computer serviced and still hire teenagers. Every time I walked through Best Buy and saw someone in line for the Geek Squad I cringed. I know full well that I could do it for half they were going to charge and half the time.
 
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it doesnt matter what you pay, if you take your computer to any repair shop anywhere they are going to snoop around. whether they keep copies or not they are looking.
 
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I'm a network admin at my 9-5, but do a bit of moon lighting on the side. If I had to put an estimate on it, I'd say that 80% of my clients are dissatisfied customers of Geek Squad (and Best Buy altogether) - who are looking for a competent computer consultant, not some kid making $12/hour with maybe one junior level cert. I'm not at all surprised that people are doing this. If you've been to a Best Buy with a Geek Squad "center" in it, just about ANYONE can walk into the "repair cage" and do whatever they want... How are the audits going to stop that?
 

terror112

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I have to agree. Most often they employ teens (I am one) with little computer repair experience. People believe the most idiotic things. Most consumers of best buy will think, "wow it's Best Buy, they wont mess it up!" But then you don't know that they have an employee base of a bunch of little incompetent kids that cannot tell the difference between a P4 and a Core2 other than their names and clock speeds. However if they manage to find people that have at least some Competence, maby they could get the job down right. As for me I am just wanting to rub my intelligence in all of the other co-workers faces that cannot get the job done right, Nico Verrelli.
 
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Funny, I just saw this thread AFTER removing the HD from my Compaq laptop to send it in for warranty repair. Nothing but common sense told me to take such a prudent step.

There are idiots out there, and then there are idiots out there.
 

mikeynavy1976

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I don't see how this is any different than people bringing getting photos developed or transferring old "home movies" to DVD format. While I think this reflects poorly on the individual, I don't think the computer user is entirely to blame. You get what you pay for. Geek squad is likely cheaper than a specialized computer repair and data recovery place, so that's a risk you take. Guys should be flattered if the Geek Squad folks find their girlfriend, wife, etc. hot enough to keep her pictures...haha...just kidding. I think the people should be held accountable, and this country needs to stop suing the companies. We all know what happens. The money Best Buy loses ends up being recouped through price increases which we all have to pay...same with doctor's bills, pharmaceuticals, insurance, food, etc.
 

navvara

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me turns in computer i broke through overclocking for repairs (2.8 ghz p4 northwood at 3.8 ftw). me watches tech support guys struggle to mount my hardrives on a replacement rig till they can fix my main (it was 2 days before christmas). me goes home and finds the replacement (p4 b 2.4, maxed out at 2.6 :( ) belonged to someone else and had a hardrive containing a sizeable amount of adult content. me being underage could not possibly watch such content and so wiped the hardrive before returning the replacement two weeks later (only left windows on). hardware guys are very happy when i inform them that i found adult content on the other customers hardrive and that I wiped everything out (that's after I take possetion of my computer ofc). me goes home and only overclocks sweet northwood chip to a reasonable 3.6. me wonders why the computer store refuses warranty service the next time i come calling (dead mobo)
 

stichy

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I can't wait till these Squad members fall. I was with BB for 10 years through upper management and I'll tell ya, because of my battles with corporate BB over issues just like this, being a whistle blower gets you fired, period. I terminated 2 squad members at my store at a time when I caught them red handed doing this stuff, worked with upper HR control and we terminated them. 2 months later the 2 guys showed up as rehires at 2 different BB's, same position, and after I raised hell and found out what went on, I was told they were rehired by the same corporate HR person whom cleared me to fire them, only to be rehired because the employees claim, "discrimination"???????? WHAT?
This is such an evil empire.....I've never purchased anything there nor will I ever again. But with respect to "Geek Squad", they were a very good company before BB purchased and outsourced them. Speaking with the CEO of the Squad, these were issues and a lot others which came up during their acquisition in which I had even voiced concerns of due to how BB had tried this before and failed due to thousands of
confidentiality breaches as well as law suits. Geek Sqd had also been bid on at the time by Circuit City but lost to BB's capitalism and market share. I know, I was a share holding in this merging. There is a 10 year term with Geek Sqd. and BB and I know before I left, GS will pull out soon. There was no contract renewel...............
This all happened after the acquisition when BB started throwing regular employees into the mix with no concern for lawsuits...
Now they're paying for it!!!! Yea!!!!









 

davidgbailey

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Next time I take my computer in I'm loading it up with pr0n. Hopefully, the techs appreciate the effort in gathering such a large assortment and variety of nudies for their visual pleasures that they give special treatment to my computers service. I just hope they don't jerk off on my keyboard.
 
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