| reply to K McAleavey
Re: Microsoft will wipe Sony's 'rootkit' and more I personally think it'd be a shame if you managed to get a trojan that shared parts of your hard drive on some bittorrent tracker. It'd be just your luck that the removal tool is sitting on that part of the drive. Oh, the horrors!
I like the idea of selling it for a minimal cost. If some unscrupulous customer decides to upload it to a bittorrent tracker, that's outside of your control. Write it off as being a bad business decision. The only problem is that major distribution sites would probably still not touch it, due to it technically being "pirated" material. This wouldn't matter to most people here, but Joe User that hasn't been following the story might not download software from an "untrusted" site. |
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 Khaine
join:2003-03-03
Australia | reply to Shadye
said by Shadye:said by Khaine:Its not the stores fault really, they are trying to protect their revenue. Many people simply buy a CD take it home copy it, and return it the next day. Rinse. Repeat. To stop people from doing this most stores not place seals on DVD's ands CD's and say they will only refund you if the seal is unbroken. I heard there are these places that let you take home media and return it after a short duration FOR FREE! These evil dens of piracy have a slang term that most people know them by: a library. The poor content creators are not getting their fair share everytime someone "checks out" media without paying a licensing fee! I believe that libraries pay more for their CD's to account for these actions, and to have the right to rent out the CD's. Retailers do not.
Anyway good retailers (like where I work) will at least give you a store credit voucher, which is nearly as good as a refund |
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davePremium,MVM
join:2000-05-04
not in ohio
kudos:7 Reviews:
 ·Verizon FiOS
 ·Verizon Online DSL
| reply to cacroll
said by cacroll:said by dave:I assume it was something simple like "we'll give them 5 days to reply". They sent out the ultimatum on Sunday? Or was it 5 business days as of Friday? OK, "we'll give them 4 days". Or, "we'll give them 100 hours". Or "we'll give them 285714 microfortnights".
It was the general algorithm I was getting at, not the precise time interval. |
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1 edit | reply to K McAleavey
However, any other files that are part of this "Digital Rights Management" collection have been placed "off limits" by ALL vendors, "
Computer Associates has been calling the entire DRM kit a threat, not just the rootkit component and give their reasons for it.
»www3.ca.com/securityadvisor/pest···53096362
And the component that CA calls "music player"
"the software is designed to prevent protected CDs being played with anything other than an included Media Player, Music Player."
The program itself cannot be removed.
eTrust PestPatrol will locate it and terminate the running process as of the signatures released November 11th, 2005."
I think that is what ZOverLord has been calling the "wire tap" component.
"Upon launching the player, it attempts to connect to servers registered to Sony BMG and located in Cary, NC. The application then sends an HTTP request to 66.14.39.158 that contains an ID number as a get parameter."
»www3.ca.com/securityadvisor/pest···53096364
Appears they are disabling one additional portion of Sony's program.
Edit:
An easily accessible removal tool would certainly be in the public interest.
It's appalling that Sony thought this acceptable. |
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 Link LoggerPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-29
Calgary, AB
kudos:3
 ·Shaw
| reply to K McAleavey
I love all of this, what a world. First we have the evil Microsoft (personally I have always liked Microsoft, but lots of people see them as the evil empire) taking on the now far eviler Sony in what some would hope breaks down into a huge court case (Sony has no choice but to turn tail and run on this one and do as much consumer damage control as possible along the way, so they will not challenge anyone for removal or otherwise disabling their little 'oops', a court cases where they try to defend this would pretty well finish off whatever consumer confidence they have left).
This would be a perfect example of why there needs to be a legal definition of malware (some companies are working towards it). One, it would allow malware fighters to jump all over 'malware' without fear, and second it would define limits to which companies like Sony can use to protect their property, so its an around good idea. The downside of course is every scum bag on the planet is going to push the legal definition to the very edge, but at least we would have an idea where that edge is.
It would be interesting to see what the final cost of this is to Sony in lost consumer trust as I would think lots of people (regardless if they understand the issues or not) are going to avoid purchasing Sony products in the future as the trust thing has been damaged, but certainly this is going to have a lasting and noticeable effect on Sony's bottom line.
Blake
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Vendor: Firewall Logging Software »www.SonicLogger.com - SonicWall and 3Com »www.LinkLogger.com - Linksys, Netgear and Zyxel |
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 La LunaSurvived AshrafulPremium
join:2001-07-12
Warwick, NY
kudos:3
 ·Vonage
·Optimum Online
| reply to K McAleavey
....and they wonder why people "download" music "illegally". They are, in fact, givng people another reason to do just that. Isn't Sony cutting off their nose to spite their face?
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~~~...and I miss you, like the deserts miss the rain...~~~ |
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Reviews:
·Shaw
| reply to K McAleavey
said by K McAleavey:Anyone WITH me here on the basis of my argument? Does anyone actually BELIEVE we could be sued when we're NOT circumventing the protection, but simply planning on REMOVING it? Kevin that is an interesting proposition. Perhaps if I may examine the issue from s slightly different aspect. While Sony has a right to provide copy protection to prevent illegal use of its intellectual property does that right protect it from potentially tortuous conduct in pursuing those rights as set out under s.1201(a)(1)?
For the sake of argument, I will assume that I the user of any Sony digital media came by that product via a legal means ie purchase. I have now entered into a contract with Sony and I am subject to the provisions of the WIPO and DCMA in respect to the legitimate use of their intellectual property.
However, it is certainly arguable that I did not agree to the surreptitious installation of a potentially dangerous and damaging "rootkit" under the guise of Digital Rights Management, thereby exposing my private property to the potential risk of theft, invasion of privacy and actual physical damage occasioned by use and/or attempts at removal.
By concealing the installation of the "rootkit" there never was any consensus ad idem or meeting of the minds between myself and Sony and as a result there is certainly no legitimate contract with Sony. Furthermore Sony has now put me in a situation where I am exposed to the risks as set out above.
As the owner of the computer I am certainly entitled to take whatever steps necessary return my computer to the state it was in before Sony, without any agreement on my part, installed their potentially dangerous copy protection. I would suggest that a strong argument can be made in respect to Sony's potential liability for any reasonably foreseeable costs or damages I occasion in pursuing that end.
Accordingly it would be open for me to contact Sony, demand my money back upon return of any affected digital media, and demand that my computer be immediately returned to its original state, before the installation of the Sony DRM protection, particularly since there are now viruses which exploit the latter, or given the worst case scenario sue them for any damage caused by the legitimate use of their digital media.
I would suggest however, those remedies may not as clearly extend to protect a well meaning third party who is willing to facilitate my efforts at returning my computer to its original state by providing software which might be seen as potentially compromising Sony's protection scheme, in spite of the questionable legality of Sony's conduct on the first place.
Although, I strongly suspect that Sony may not so readily pursue any remedies available to them vis a vis the DCMA, given their present potential liability exposure, occasioned by the covert installation of their copy protection software.
Realistically, your efforts would only serve to potentially minimize that liability, however there is no guarantee that Sony would be willing to see the common sense of a freeware removal tool, particularly given the lack of common sense they have displayed so far.
Regards |
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Link LoggerPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-29
Calgary, AB
kudos:3 Reviews:
·Shaw
| said by mens rea:Furthermore Sony has now put me in a situation where I am exposed to the risks as set out above. But you connected to the internet which is a risk in and of itself(does this mean we can sue Al Gore?), a system which doesn't connect to the internet which has run one of these CDs, is it at risk or are only computers which connect to the internet at risk and is the risk solely Sony's fault or cause or are there other risks and factors which are outside of Sony's control? This is not the angle of attack I would use as its to easy to duck in the courts, in fact trying to sue Sony over this would be difficult (except that Sony wants to bury this whole mess ASAP).
Blake
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Vendor: Firewall Logging Software »www.SonicLogger.com - SonicWall and 3Com »www.LinkLogger.com - Linksys, Netgear and Zyxel |
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phaqu
join:2005-05-26
Marietta, GA | said by Link Logger: a system which doesn't connect to the internet which has run one of these CDs, is it at risk or are only computers which connect to the internet at risk But,wouldnt that limit the use of your computer immensely?
BTW ...Dont you just LOVE how the law works. |
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Link LoggerPremium,MVM
join:2001-03-29
Calgary, AB
kudos:3 Reviews:
·Shaw
| said by phaqu:BTW ...Dont you just LOVE how the law works. Almost as much as I love how patents work ( American inventor patents space-time bending spaceship »www.canada.com/national/national···55b7c8c1 ).
Blake
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Vendor: Firewall Logging Software »www.SonicLogger.com - SonicWall and 3Com »www.LinkLogger.com - Linksys, Netgear and Zyxel |
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 catseyenuAck PfftPremium
join:2001-11-17
Fix East | Heh, if you can't dazzle them with brilliance...
This looks like another tumor with it's roots in... well, you decide.  |
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 jig
join:2001-01-05
Hacienda Heights, CA | reply to K McAleavey
as far as creating a removal tool... wow. think of the pressure.
how many people would do something silly during the removal and cause some problem that "broke" their computer? and what if the removal tool isn't itself absolutely perfect? there is some registry cleaning involved, right?
i think it's doable, and i think kevin could do it right, but i just wanted to take a step back and look at the gravity of the situation where someone tries to clean up after a company like sony instead of the usual suspects, virus writers and spy/adware creeps. there are all types of conflicting contractual click-throughs in there somewhere..
anyway, this puts a new perspective on the future of blu-ray, for me. |
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 John2gQui Tacet ConsentitPremium
join:2001-08-10
England | reply to K McAleavey
More Sony Problems to Be Revealed »blogs.washingtonpost.com/securit···uri.html
Several groups of privacy and security experts are expected to release research later today that points to multiple, serious security flaws present in "XCP," the anti-piracy software used on an undisclosed number of Sony BMG music CDs. (For the record, Security Fix observed that experts were busily searching for such flaws shortly after this whole fiasco began).
According to details provided by prominent security researcher Dan Kaminsky, the resulting public outcry could make Sony feel like the last two weeks of consumer backlash were a walk in the park.
Kaminsky wil be unveiling research that indicates just how many computer networks have Sony's anti-piracy software installed on them. Kaminsky declined to be more specific, but numbers referenced in a class-action lawsuit filed Tuesday in New York against Sony and XCP maker First4Internet indicate that Sony sold approximately 3 million music CDs carrying the software.
"The net effect is that it's not in doubt that Sony has created a major security event on the Net," Kaminsky said in an online chat last night.
But wait, it gets ... er ... better. The researchers discovered a security flaw in XCP (which stands for "extended copyright protection") that could afford attackers a window through which to break into computers running the software and install additional software or viruses.
Kaminsky told me that one of the researchers involved in the investigation is Edward Felten, a professor of computer science and public affairs at Princeton University.
And indeed, Felten's blog -- Freedom to Tinker -- hints as to the research he will release tomorrow along with Alex Halderman, a Ph.D. student at Princeton whose research includes digital rights management technologies, including SunnComm Technologies, a different anti-piracy program used by other Sony titles :
"Alex Halderman and I have confirmed that Sony’s Web-based XCP uninstallation utility exposes users to serious security risk. Under at least some circumstances, running Sony’s Web-based uninstaller opens a huge security hole on your computer. We have a working demonstration exploit. ... In the meantime, we recommend strongly against downloading or running Sony’s Web-based XCP uninstaller."
(The name of Felten's blog is a nod to his prior high-profile legal dust-up with the entertainment industry over alleged violations of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.)
I tried to contact Felten earlier today, and no doubt he was too busy with this research to grab the phone. I contacted Halderman by e-mail, who confirmed that "the uninstaller can create even worse problems than" those created by the anti-piracy software itself. Halderman said further details would be available on Felten's site later today.
One of XCP's most alarming traits for security researchers has been its ability to hide not just its own files on a user's PC but also those of any other files, viruses or worms that follow the program's file-naming rules -- hidden so well that even antivirus programs can't find it.
Last week, about the same time that someone mass-spammed several versions of a virus designed to take advantage of XCP's file-hiding abilities, Sony issued a "patch" to help users remove the file-hiding function. (The patch did not uninstall the program itself, which resists removal so effectively that security researchers have equated it to a "rootkit".)
But according to research to be presented tomorrow, that very same patch Sony issued to help close the security hole exposed by its software actually introduces additional security flaws.
While exposing oblivious users to additional risks when someone or something has already compromised their computer is in itself inexcusable, opening that user's system to backdoor security flaws and then paving the way for attackers to install whatever they please without fear of detection or removal is unconscionable.
Imagine the potential consequences of military personnel or government employees at work on a sensitive government network popping one of these CDs into their computer to listen to their favorite Sony-label music artist. If only half of this research turns out to be supported by the broader security community, Sony is about to find itself in big-league legal trouble.
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Better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt. |
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catseyenuAck PfftPremium
join:2001-11-17
Fix East | said by John2g:Imagine the potential consequences of military personnel or government employees at work on a sensitive government network popping one of these CDs into their computer to listen to their favorite Sony-label music artist. If only half of this research turns out to be supported by the broader security community, Sony is about to find itself in big-league legal trouble. Good grief, the ramifications are becoming overwhelming.
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Using BOClean means never doing a Hijack This log again.»nsclean.com/boclean.html
"Will no one rid us of this troublesome priest?" |
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Reviews:
·Consolidated Com..
| reply to K McAleavey
Re: Microsoft will wipe Sony's 'rootkit' and more After reading John2g's post, it seems to me that if Kevin could provide an uninstaller to the public that would actually work and safely restore people's computers to a pre-SonyBMG state, he might actually be doing Sony a favor. Especially when uninstalling the SonyBMG stuff from people's computers in no way would circumvent Sony's original intent to protect their digital rights.
Perhaps there would be nothing to lose if Kevin or his lawyers were to write a letter to the decision makers at Sony and present to them a thorough and well reasoned argument as to why it would be in their best interests to consent to Kevin making his uninstaller available to those members of the public knowledgeable enough to seek it out. |
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catseyenuAck PfftPremium
join:2001-11-17
Fix East | Heck, that would be the best decision Sony has made in years. |
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| reply to K McAleavey
Another good reason to switch to Macintosh Unless someone has discovered there is a rootkit for the OSX FreeBSD subsystem on these Sony CDs, the question on whether or not removing the rootkit is the same as circumventing it becomes moot. It won't install on a Mac.
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FEMA = Federal Emergency Mismanagement Agency |
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 ZOverLordPremium
join:2003-10-20
Minneapolis, MN
4 edits | reply to K McAleavey
Re: Microsoft will wipe Sony's 'rootkit' and more Both First4Internet and Sony have created the same EXPERIENCE as I have using ANY Airport since 911, but on a Virtual Level and in my own personal space while using my own personal property.
I now have no JOY looking forward to using ANY CD/DVD for any Media experience, on any system I own.
Additionally I now have great trepidation even contemplating inserting any CD/DVD which may or may not require ADMIN privilege.
The Concept of allowing Auto-Run to be enabled on any system I own is now something of a past memory.
Never would I have thought that a respectable international company would be the cause for me to quarantine any and ALL Media devices from my systems.
The risks are too great to presume that any media player that requires Admin privileges to install so that I might somehow enjoy the media it contains, could not somehow expose myself or others using my systems to great personal harm by forcing me to lose my privacy and possibly placing myself and others who use my systems one step closer to Identity Theft by using such software.
In some ways I feel like I have just virtually removed a very large portion of features ("Which was part of how I chose my systems at purchase time") so that I can implement my own personal form of Homeland Security to insure my personal property is safe from companies who feel that "Virtual Terrorism" is justified under the auspices of DRM.
Both of these companies REFUSE to provide a list of clients and/or media this technology is currently being used with.
Both of these companies refuse to admit the Full capabilities of what this software did/does/can do.
Both of these companies have publicly made many statements that have been proved to be false regarding what this software cannot do.
We ALL need to remember that Terrorism does not by definition require a use of violence!
ter·ror·ism
NOUN:
"The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons."
These actions are Nothing short of Virtual Terrorism the possible exposure of our personal data currently retained on both private as well as government systems just by this software being present on any of these systems cannot be called anything less.
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Black, Grey and White Hats Unite here -> »testing.OnlyTheRightAnswers.com |
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Mele20Premium
join:2001-06-05
Hilo, HI
kudos:4 | reply to K McAleavey
It seems crystal clear to me that Microsoft cannot side step this any longer by providing a tool to remove only part of this rootkit. Microsoft is now compelled to step up to the plate, confront Sony and First4Internet head on and protect their code and their customers computers. They can do no less. It is their obvious duty.
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Around 2005 a sudden spark will catalyze a Crisis mood. The very survival of the nation will seem to be at stake.Sometime before 2025, America will pass through a great gate in history. The risk and promise will be very high. The Fourth Turning Wm. Straus |
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BPremium,MVM
join:2000-10-28
1 edit | It is? More so than it's their duty to provide disinfection for any of the other few thousand pieces of malware in the world? Why?
I'm not sure why MS bothers to provide such selective antimalware measures at all ("Malicious Software Removal Tool" with its limited scope, and stuff like this).
-- B
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In a realm outside causality and function |
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