Anti viruses are typical bundleware installed when installing 'free' software. If you don't look carefully, when you click, 'i agree,' you'll get a bunch of other software you don't want.

Some crazy software companies then used a dark pattern - clicking 'I don't agree,' meant you agreed to install unwanted crap.

Adobe flash, Java runtime, utorrent and any installer from cnet.com are examples. That's why I installed Unchecky to protect me from bundleware and automatically uncheck, skip 'offerings' when installing new software.

Edit: As mentioned below, the Chrome team used bundleware extensively in its early days.

Chrome also did this at a massive scale. It's one of the many reasons why I will always prefer firefox.

Sometimes your organisation installs Mcafee, you then proceed to install Firefox.

In addition to this, many products come preinstalled as bloatware. McAfee products (amongst a hoard of other programs) have come preinstalled on Windows laptops I've purchased from Dell and Lenovo.

The "Fresh Start" feature in newer builds of Windows 10 (1709-onwards if I'm not mistaken) will automatically remove these kinds of applications preinstalled on new systems.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10s...

Excellent feature. It's important to note that it's a good idea to have a copy of all of your devices' drivers before using it.

Excellent feature in itself, but also a cludge around a broken economic system. OEMs shouldn't be prioritizing their profits at the expense of the users their business exists for.

Then it's not your computer. What I meant is "the owner of the computer installs (or uninstalls) mcafee at will".