Is NortonLifeLock Stock Halal?

October 7, 2021

Table of Contents

How much of NortonLifeLock’s revenue comes from haram?

NortonLifeLock provides cyber safety solutions to nearly 80 million users in more than 150 countries.

The company operates through the following segments:

Consumer Security:

Includes revenue generated from consumer security products, including Norton 360 Security offerings, Norton Security, Norton Secure VPN, Avira Security (antivirus), and other consumer security solutions.

Identity & Information Protection:

Includes revenue generated from identity and information protection products including, Norton 360 with LifeLock offerings, LifeLock identity theft protection, and other information protection solutions.

The contributions from each of Norton’s revenue segments in their 2021 annual report were as follows:

Practical Islamic Finance concludes:

None of Norton’s revenue comes from anything inherently haram.

Does NortonLifeLock rely on interest to operate?

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What is NortonLifeLock’s Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) impact?

Environment

According to Norton’s 2021 ESG report, the company reduced direct and indirect greenhouse emissions associated with purchasing electricity, heat, cooling, or steam by 52% between FY20 and FY21.

In addition, with support from NortonLifeLock, in FY21, SayTrees planted 3,500 tree saplings in Bangalore and Chennai, India.

Social

According to Norton’s 2021 ESG report, in FY21, Norton donated $1.9 million to charities, matched $407 thousand in employee donations, helped more than 9,900 nonprofits and public libraries keep their devices and data secure for free, and detected 250 thousand malicious stalkerware.

Norton has a Glassdoor rating of 3.8 out of 5.0 from over 5,000 current and previous employees compared to a 3.3 average for all other Glassdoor rated companies.

Governance

Norton has previously faced criticism from several browser developers, including Google, for improper SSL certificate issuance, due to allegedly wrongly issuing thousands of SSL certificates.

Subsequently, NortonLifeLock exited the TLS/SSL segment by selling its SSL unit to Digicert for $950 million in mid-2017.

Practical Islamic Finance concludes:

Norton has a net positive ESG impact.

Comfort Rating

From NortonLifeLock’s business, financial, and ESG reviews, Practical Islamic Finance rates NortonLifeLock stock as:

Uncomfortable to invest in from a halal perspective.

Justification for our rating

NortonLifeLock’s consistent elevated use of interest to run its operations suggests a systemic reliance on Riba. This causes Practical Islamic Finance to be Uncomfortable investing in the company from a Halal perspective.