Unclear from the article: what is IAC, and what did their extensions purport to do?
> Many users of IAC extensions expressed agitation, the audit found. “Tricked into installing it and can’t delete it,” said one user in a review on the Google Chrome store, which the audit called representative. “DO NOT INSTALL” warned another.
“IAC’s business model appears to rely almost exclusively on unintentional installs,” members of the Chrome safety team wrote in the audit.
Of special concern in the audit were ads that IAC ran against search terms such as “how to vote,” “vote by mail” and “voter fraud.” Users who clicked on the ads didn’t get voting-related information, the audit found. Instead, their browser home pages were reset to MyWay, and the separate, IAC-owned Ask.com toolbar was installed on those users’ browsers, the audit found. The audit found that IAC continued to run such ads even after Google told the company to stop.
How is that possible? Or are we simply looking at someone who doesn't know how to use her computer?
Once your adware is installed as a native application, you simply install two copies, each of which immediately reinstalls and restarts the other should it get removed/stopped.
Your second question is valid though
This is the stuff that skynet is made from.
This particular one seems noxious, but there are others which do make useful stuff, e.g. Kraft? Nestle? DuPont? P&G? come to mind.