ALERT!!! Sony's DRMed CD installs malware in your system!

Stormwatch · Post by **Stormwatch** » Mon Oct 31, 2005 11:40 pm

Sony, Rootkits and Digital Rights Management Gone Too Far

Post by **system11** » Tue Nov 01, 2005 12:00 am

Ok, I am broadling speaking, pro-copyright - if the copyright holders are being reasonable. DRM encumbered bastardisations of the CD format, are not reasonable. DVDs that force you to watch fucking commercials are not reasonable.

This, is not reasonable.

I'm not sure whats worst here - there are so many evils to weigh up.

* Why wasn't this invasive rubbish mentioned on the case? This is past 'won't play on a PC'.
* Surely this is computer misuse? Installing software that can screw peoples machines up, that they don't know about?
* Why the fuck does Windows even allow this to happen? What world do M$ live in where a media player can hide crap throughout the system?

I'm disgusted. I hope this story gets a lot of publicity.

Post by **Icarus** » Tue Nov 01, 2005 12:46 am

Makes you wonder just how far companies will go to protect copyright.
"I see you use iTunes on your PC to transfer your CDs to iPod. Well, have a trojan horse as punishment!"

Wouldn't put it past them. -_-;;

bigbadboaz · Post by **bigbadboaz** » Tue Nov 01, 2005 1:20 am

Link's not working for me. Anyone know what's going on?

Stormwatch · Post by **Stormwatch** » Tue Nov 01, 2005 1:23 am

The Slashdot effect.

Thunder Force · Post by **Thunder Force** » Tue Nov 01, 2005 1:37 am

bigbadboaz wrote:Link's not working for me. Anyone know what's going on?

While the original direct link seems broken, the "Sony, Rootkits and Digital Rights Management Gone Too Far" article is current still readable from the front page: http://www.sysinternals.com/blog/

Dylan1CC · Post by **Dylan1CC** » Tue Nov 01, 2005 2:14 am

Way to scare people into buying even less CDs, Sony and 'tards in the record industry. This has got to be illegal for them to do.

And hopefully http://www.eff.org will be all over this soon.

FatCobra · Post by **FatCobra** » Tue Nov 01, 2005 3:21 am

Arrr, it'd be time to download Mp3's then mateys!

The n00b · Post by **The n00b** » Tue Nov 01, 2005 3:36 am

I'm really pro-copyright too but this increasingly invasive copy protection bullshit is fucked up. It seems law abiding citizens who buy their music are caught between overzealous corporations and pirates. Pirates encourage this copy protection stuff while corporate stuff like this just encourages more people to becomes pirates.

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Tue Nov 01, 2005 6:51 am

**** YOU SONY!

Is this the way to treat your royal customers? Didn't you understand that excessive DRM crap hurts only you by alienating customers? Didn't you understand from all the mistakes you made with OMG Jukebox and later SonicStage for your loyal minidisc users?

What about OUR digital and analog rights? Your copy-my ass-right ends where my freedom begins.

You deserve to have your projects and the blueprints for the PS3 stolen or deleted by a trojan for this. What a shame. You've lowered yourself to the level of CoolWebSearch and Bonzi Buddy. Today is protecting your interests. What guarantees us you or someone else won't be abusing this to plant kid pr0n on our systems and get us in trouble? (Ok, I'm getting paranoid. But you'll recall an initiative that the RIAA or MPAA was trying to get approved, allowing it to install software on pretty much everyone's systems so they could spy and catch whoever downloaded copyrighted material without permission and thus prosecute. Of course, they got denied, but who knows what those money-loving pigs will come up with, from the results of this.)

CMoon · Post by **CMoon** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 11:31 am

Seems this tactic has earned Sony some headlines...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4400148.stm

Icecap Veiwin · Post by **Icecap Veiwin** » Thu Nov 03, 2005 1:47 pm

Holy shit, and they say Capcom doesn't care about their fans...Sony just downright kicks them in the dirt!

gameoverDude · Post by **gameoverDude** » Sun Nov 06, 2005 5:24 am

Mark Russinovich has said that the XCP software seems to "phone home". If this means Sony is getting the IP of the computer playing the CD- bad news for privacy. A company spokesman claims that no information is being gathered, but that could be outright bull.

Never trust any "Content Enhanced" CDs as far as playing them in the PC.

Thanks be to Sony for teaching the world exactly what rootkits are.

benstylus · Post by **benstylus** » Sun Nov 06, 2005 3:11 pm

I remember reading somewhere that many copy protection schemes on cds are ignored if you have autorun turned off (as it won't autorun the copy-protection routines).

As I own no copy-protected cds, I don't know if this is true. But it's worth trying, since Autorun is quite easy to disable.

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Mon Nov 07, 2005 3:19 am

gameoverDude wrote:Mark Russinovich has said that the XCP software seems to "phone home". If this means Sony is getting the IP of the computer playing the CD- bad news for privacy. A company spokesman claims that no information is being gathered, but that could be outright bull.

Never trust any "Content Enhanced" CDs as far as playing them in the PC.

Thanks be to Sony for teaching the world exactly what rootkits are.

http://www.sysinternals.com/blog/2005/1 ... aking.html

Here's the update. Sony is going to get their sorry asses sued. By Blizzard, and by anyone who has gotten BSOD due to this. Serves you well, you bastards.

zaphod · Post by **zaphod** » Mon Nov 07, 2005 11:07 pm

OUCH OUCH OUCH!

This means that all anti-cheat programs need to scan for rootkits as well, because rotkits can stop anti-cheats from working!

That said I dont' think it was Sony's intention to put rootkits on our machines, and they were simply attempting damage control.

And yes, bypassing autorun defeats this.

Clearly the peoel that mae the DRM softweare are to blame. They decided it would be a good idea to make their software cloak itself to keep people from removing it. This is downright evil. Then they were caught,and deicded to stop.

ALso note that there used to be a big controversey of the shift key turning into a circumvention device. ANother company did something similar. a DRM app is auto-installed that prevents you from rippig their protected CDs by interfering with the reads. But the worst thing is, they have said that they were going to try to get their DRM bundled in with unrelated software, to bypas the shift key users! Yo uoucld install a freeware appa nd find that you cant' rip CDs any more, and you wouldn't even know why. COmbien that with a rootkti to hide the fact that the DRM was eve installed by the software, and you've got yourself somethng VERY EVIL.

This s why i haven't bought a CD in years...

Zach Keene · Post by **Zach Keene** » Fri Nov 11, 2005 2:02 pm

This just keeps getting better.

Post by **Icarus** » Fri Nov 11, 2005 2:36 pm

Zach Keene wrote:This just keeps getting better.

Jeez. Looks like I was almost right about the trojan thing then -_-;;;
Thanks, Sony. Thanks for giving people who buy legitimate CDs a nice little security hole for hackers, virii and trojans to target.
Let me get a peg leg, an eye patch and a parrot for my shoulder. ARRRR.

EDIT: Hahaha! ^_^

Tar-Palantir · Post by **Tar-Palantir** » Fri Nov 11, 2005 3:36 pm

Zach Keene wrote:This just keeps getting better.

Hey! Graham Cluley! He used to write text adventures

</tangent>

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Sat Nov 12, 2005 12:47 pm

Icarus wrote: Let me get a peg leg, an eye patch and a parrot for my shoulder. ARRRR.

Where's Captain Ahar when you need him?

Love the killer Muppets.

Stormwatch · Post by **Stormwatch** » Sun Nov 13, 2005 1:47 am

Microsoft's anti-spyware tool to remove Sony's rootkit. Sure, we knew it was malware, but it is official now!

Stormwatch · Post by **Stormwatch** » Sun Nov 13, 2005 6:17 pm

And when you think things can't get worse... Sony's DRM scheme uses code from open-source MP3 encoder LAME, but fails to comply with the LGPL requirements. Which means that, oh delicious irony, Sony is the one violating copyrights.

Who's the pirate now, bitch?

Post by **Icarus** » Sun Nov 13, 2005 6:59 pm

I think it's funny how corporations are always complaining about the little people taking the piss and ripping off their IPs, disrespecting their business, and other stuff, when they themselves do it, and they're allowed to get away with it. It'll be very disappointing if Sony isn't held accountable for all their little violations that have come to light recently. There's only so much they can do, and they should be punished suitably for all this.

While I believe that the reasons were fair in that they should be able to protect their copyrights, I do not agree at all with the methods taken to do so.

Maybe this will be the first signs of a shift in power, so to speak, and the big corporations will start to fall in line, and conform to better business practices, instead of operating on the "GIVE ME MORE MONEY NOW!" business ethic.

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Sun Nov 13, 2005 8:54 pm

Thanks for the update, Stormwatch. I wonder if they'll ask Kutaragi to come and explain for them that people have to put up with it, because this is the design they came up with, and no one (God forbid they do so!) should question an architect about the placement of a gate or window. Also, *insert rant here about how he thinks that rootkits are a beautiful thing, that can be used for this this and this, etc, etc...*

Edit Update:

ZOMG! Sony's working for teh terr0rists!!11ONE!!

Ok. Not yet, but the DHS had something to say about it.

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Wed Nov 16, 2005 5:55 am

Sorry for the bump, guys. It gets worse.

http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/?p=925

chtimi-CLA · Post by **chtimi-CLA** » Wed Nov 16, 2005 10:20 am

i wonder what is going to happen with the next windows, of course for now ms is jumping on the occasion to make sony look bad, but i'm sure they have their own plans of spying on the user.

Stormwatch · Post by **Stormwatch** » Wed Nov 16, 2005 10:27 am

Waitwaitwait... wasn't it P2P that filled your computer with viruses?

Post by **system11** » Fri Nov 18, 2005 8:59 am

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/11/17 ... ler_peril/

Oh dear.

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Tue Nov 22, 2005 7:48 am

The list of the Filthy, Unclean, Sinful and Anathemic (SP?) CDs.

http://cp.sonybmg.com/xcp/english/titles.html

Cleanse your system before it's too late. Purify and exorcise your computer if this filth has defiled your OS. There's still time.

Post by **system11** » Tue Nov 22, 2005 1:32 pm

The backlash continues:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051121/tc_nm/sony_texas_dc
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4456970.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4459620.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4434852.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4445550.stm

It just gets more and more hilarious. Burn Sony, burn.