In fact, they started deleting forum theads about Pifts on their support forum, leading to even more speculation about what this might be.  This lead to widespread stories about the problem and Symantec’s coverup including CrunchGear (Digg), the Telegraph and many blogs and even ranked highly in Google Trends for a while.

They’re now saying that it was simply a diagnostic patch and the forum deletions were due to a spammer on their boards at the same time.  As CrunchGear says, “Ver-r-r-y convenient”.

Mike at Freebase summed it up best:

Now, this could be a benign program. But Norton’s absolutely bizarre behavior has given this PIFTS file a life of its own.

What’s up with Symantec and PIFTS? is a post from: The Streisand Effect