Sony Do It Again....

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Sony Do It Again....

Postby maxpayne2409 on Sat Nov 05, 2005 11:47 pm

[Sarcasm] Well it would seem Sony seem to really know how to treat customers well [/Sarcasm]

Sony Patch Uncloaks Hidden DRM Code
In General, submitted by Forcefire on 11/4/2005 11:02:17 AM

After facing a chorus of criticism from computer enthusiasts, Sony BMG has released a software patch that removes controversial cloaking technology found in copy protection software the company has been shipping with some of its CDs.

Critics had slammed the software for being invasive and extremely difficult to remove because it uses some of the same "rootkit" cloaking techniques normally found in spyware or viruses.

Rootkit software uses a variety of techniques to gain access to a system and then cover up any traces of its existence so that it cannot be detected by system tools or antivirus software.

The patch, which was posted to Sony's Web site on Wednesday, was posted to "alleviate any concerns that users may have about the program posing potential security vulnerabilities," Sony said in a statement on its Web site. By installing the patch, users will not remove the copy protection software, called XPC, but they will make it visible to system tools and antivirus software.

XCP has been shipping on some Sony music CDs since early 2005. Licensed by Sony from a UK-based company called First 4 Internet, XCP prevents users from making more than three backup copies of any XCP-protected CD. Sony will not say how many of its CDs use the software.

Critics had complained that because the software was virtually impossible to detect, hackers might somehow take advantage of it in order to hide their own malicious code from antivirus software. They had also slammed Sony for not adequately informing users of how it worked and for making it extremely difficult to remove XCP.

First 4 has described such concerns as "unnecessary."

In addition to writing the patch posted to Sony's Web site, First 4 has given software to antivirus vendors so that their products can now detect the XCP software, said First 4's CEO Mathew Gilliat-Smith.

First 4 is also in the process of developing a new version of XCP that will not use the controversial cloaking techniques, he added. "We feel it's sensible to allay any unnecessary fears," Gilliat-Smith said in a Thursday interview.

Gilliat-Smith said that the cloaking techniques were used in order to keep one step ahead of illegal copiers. "This is content protection software. One of the additional measures is to try and dissuade someone who is aggressively trying to circumvent the protections."

In this case, however, First 4 and Sony went too far, according to Mark Russinovich, the computer expert who first revealed how XCP works. "Not only had Sony put software on my system that uses techniques commonly used by malware to mask its presence, the software is poorly written," he wrote in a Web log posting. "Worse, most users that stumble across the cloaked files... will cripple their computer if they attempt the obvious step of deleting the cloaked files."


this really isn't suprising and for a company surely trying to save a failing industry this isn't really a clever way of going about it

i thought i had seen it all but apparently i hadn't seen the level of stupidity these companys have
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Postby spudthedestroyer on Sun Nov 06, 2005 12:46 am

never use music cds in my pc, beyond occasional rippings. Don't have autoplay turned on either so sucks to you sony :lol:

Not that I buy much current music anyway, infact i haven't bought an album for a new band in quite a while now.
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Postby maxpayne2409 on Sun Nov 06, 2005 12:15 pm

spudthedestroyer wrote:never use music cds in my pc, beyond occasional rippings. Don't have autoplay turned on either so sucks to you sony :lol:

Not that I buy much current music anyway, infact i haven't bought an album for a new band in quite a while now.


i also dont use music cds in pc (thats what mp3s and emule/torrent are for :lol:

theres no current bands really worth buying stuff for anyway

plus we know full well its mostly just gonna be on crappy pop acts and hiphop/cRap cds i doubt if the greatest hits of the bay city rollers will ever have it :lol: :lol: :lol:
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Postby dinky on Sun Nov 06, 2005 4:29 pm

spudthedestroyer wrote:never use music cds in my pc, beyond occasional rippings. Don't have autoplay turned on either so sucks to you sony :lol:

fecking school computers (running win2k mostly) run whatever autoplay .exe is on the cds, so I constantly have to cancel the interactual pcdvd app whenever I put in a new dvd. fecking annoying.

...just sayin'...

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Postby maxpayne2409 on Sun Nov 06, 2005 4:31 pm

i think ive got autoplay turned off on xp but i swear it turns itself back on, hmmm maybe theres a way to premanently turn it off that im missing
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Postby spudthedestroyer on Sun Nov 06, 2005 6:47 pm

there is, but i find your struggle comical. :lol:



2nd button on the drive>autoplay>music cd>take no action. You can also hold down shift to by-pass autoplay.
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Postby maxpayne2409 on Sun Nov 06, 2005 7:15 pm

ah but you see i knew about teh shift thing and the rmb one but it never works, it still goes right ahead and autostarts tehn, time to go into services and see if its in there too, knowing my luck ill probably accidentally disable the drive :lol:
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Postby spudthedestroyer on Sun Nov 06, 2005 7:20 pm

hehe you might want to make sure your shift key works too :lol:
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Postby maxpayne2409 on Sun Nov 06, 2005 7:23 pm

and my rmb, altho my mouse has been playing up lately, especially in bf2.. fire, fire FUCKING FIRE, great now im frigging dead
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Postby dinky on Mon Nov 07, 2005 12:37 am

well your name is FragPuss ffs. :matrix:
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