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Sony's EULA Worse Than Its Rootkit?

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the quite-possibly dept.

jaaron writes "If you think the Sony rootkit is bad, check out the accompanying EULA! From the EFF's summary: 'If your house gets burgled, you have to delete all your music from your laptop when you get home. ... Sony-BMG can install and use backdoors in the copy protection software or media player to "enforce their rights" against you, at any time, without notice. ... Forget about using the music as a soundtrack for your latest family photo slideshow, or mash-ups, or sampling.'"

8 of 521 comments (clear)

  1. Screw their license and software: use Linux by acroyear · · Score: 5, Informative

    I realize this comment is now making /. violate the DMCA, so if they feel like deleting it for legal reasons, fine.

    The CDs "protected" by this scheme are very easy to copy and have no "skip-gap" style protections that break normal cd-copy mechanisms and theoretically work "fine" on normal cd players (experience has shown otherwise).

    cdrdao can read the cds just fine (I used it on the G3 Live in Tokyo release that just came out last week), and quickly identifies the data/file-system tracks from the main. rip with cdrdao, edit the toc file to remove the data tracks, and burn away. the resultant cdrom can load anywhere and is easily ripped into mp3s for your *legal* right to listen to music you purchase your way.

    in fact, the most rediculous thing about their "protection" of the G3 cds is that for the 2-cd set, the second cd isn't even "protected" with that filesystem. protecting the 2nd disk relies directly on the root-kit hack that detects and analysis when sony cds are inserted, that SONY expects you would have installed by sticking the cd-1 in first.

    --
    "But remember, most lynch mobs aren't this nice." (H.Simpson)
    -- Joe
  2. It gets worse... by LiquidCoooled · · Score: 5, Informative

    The Sony uninstaller is an ActiveX object marked safe for scripting (which means any website can use it in their code)

    Its got some wonderful entries which still leave holes in your system (like rebooting your computer, and a method called "ExecuteCode")
    The guys has only just started work, but has an expliotable test together which will reboot your machine.

    Look here for more info about Sony uninstallation fun.

    --
    liqbase :: faster than paper
  3. Re:Misleading Artical by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative
    To me, it seems that if your CD is really stolen, you can still use the back-up you have. That's part of fair use, isn't it?


    That IS part of fair use and thats why there is a problem. The EULA stating that you lose rights to the "digital content" means that if you don't have the physical CD, then you're not allowed to have the music it contained. The original authors statement is an extreme case, but his interpretation of the license agreement is correct.
  4. Re:SONY's modest proposal by Fafnir43 · · Score: 5, Informative
    Or else you'll be stuck playing Pikachu's.

    Or perhaps RPGs (e.g. Final Fantasy, Baten Kaitos, Harvest Moon), FPSes (Metroid Prime comes to mind), or survival horror games (like Resident Evil and Eternal Darkness). I'm really getting tired of people bashing Nintendo for being 'kiddy' when it is now blatantly false.

    --
    To know recursion, you must first know recursion.
  5. Information about Sony by gone.fishing · · Score: 3, Informative

    From their Web Site "Contact Us" page:

    General SONY BMG: 212-833-8000
    Arista Records: 646-840-5600
    SONY BMG U.S. Latin: 305-695-3600
    J Records: 646-840-5600
    Jive Records: 212-727-0016
    RCA Label Group Nashville: 615-301-4300
    RCA Records: 212-930-4000
    SONY BMG Corporate Press: 212-833-5047

    WHOIS INFORMATION:
    Registrant:
    Sony Music Entertainment Corporation
    Sony Music Entertainment Corporation
    550 Madison Avenue, Sixth Floor .
    New York, NY 10022
    US
    Email: mis_online@SONYMUSIC.COM

    Registrar Name....: REGISTER.COM, INC.
    Registrar Whois...: whois.register.com
    Registrar Homepage: www.register.com

    Domain Name: sonybmg.com

    Created on..............: Tue, Jan 25, 2000
    Expires on..............: Sun, Jan 25, 2009
    Record last updated on..: Fri, Aug 19, 2005

    Administrative Contact:
    Sony Music Entertainment Corporation
    Sony Music Entertainment Corporation
    550 Madison Avenue, Sixth Floor .
    New York, NY 10022
    US
    Phone: +1.2128337305
    Email: mis_online@SONYMUSIC.COM

    Technical Contact:
    Sony Music Entertainment Corporation
    Sony Music Entertainment Corporation
    550 Madison Avenue, Sixth Floor .
    New York, NY 10022
    GB
    Phone: +1.2128337305
    Email: mis_online@SONYMUSIC.COM

    DNS Servers:

    udns1.ultradns.net
    udns2.ultradns.net

    Execuitives:

    ANDREW LACK
    CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER
    SONY BMG MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT

    Andrew Lack is the founding Chief Executive Officer of Sony BMG Music Entertainment, a post he assumed in August of 2004. Sony BMG Music Entertainment is a joint venture between Sony Corporation of America and Bertelsmann AG, comprising the recorded music businesses of both companies. From January of 2003 to August of 2004, Mr. Lack served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Sony Music Entertainment.

    As CEO of Sony BMG Mr. Lack oversees all operations of the global recorded music company, which is a leading producer and marketer of pre-recorded music and video.

    Previously, Andrew Lack served as President and Chief Operating Officer for NBC since June of 2001. During his tenure with NBC he oversaw the operations of most of NBC's divisions, including Entertainment, News and MSNBC, Network, Stations, CNBC, Sales, and Broadcast & Network Operations

    From 1993 to 2001 Mr. Lack was the president of NBC News, where he transformed the News division into the most-watched news organization in the world. Today, NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw, and Meet the Press are each No. 1 in their time periods, and the primetime franchise Dateline NBC is the top newsmagazine in key sales demographic categories and a significant part of NBC's primetime program

  6. it runs but does not install on close by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative


    When you run the application that shows the EULA, it also runs the copy protection. If you accept the EULA the software is installed, otherwise it only remains running until you reboot.

    Reboot and it will be gone.

    Please mod this up. It doesn't install unless you say yes. I would never have implemented it if it worked the way the parent post describes.

    --
    ex sunncomm developer

    1. Re:it runs but does not install on close by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative


      you are an EX-employee. where is the guarantee that the current employees did not, uhm, 'improve' upon your work?

      The company was going in that direction. That's when I quit.

      I don't have a garantee, but I know FooFighters was released with mediamax, rev 3, (the same described in the halderman document). There is no 'download/update' code in rev 3, so if you have that CD, rev 3 is all you have.

  7. Re:Ironic but true.. by Scarletdown · · Score: 3, Informative
    An EULA for CD audio?!


    And for years, I was under the impression that this... http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/us c_sup_01_17.html was the EULA for music and other copyrighted works.

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