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Sticky Tape Defeats Sony DRM Copy Protection
cybrpnk2 writes "As reported by InformationWeek, Sony BMG Music's controversial copy-protection scheme can be defeated with a small piece of tape. According to thinktank Gartner analysts Martin Reynolds and Mike McGuire, Sony's XCP technology is stymied by sticking a fingernail-size piece of opaque tape on the outer edge of the CD. 'After more than five years of trying, the recording industry has not yet demonstrated a workable DRM scheme for music CDs. Gartner believes that it will never achieve this goal as long as CDs must be playable by stand-alone CD players.'"
Indeed, these scenarios show just how artificial restrictions on knowledge and information are. It is impossible to try to make such an inherently abundant resource scarce, in order to derive profit.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
That it will be impossible as long as CDs are playable!
What is next will Sony try and outlaw mics and wires?
Dear Sony. I will not steal your music. In fact I will not listen to or buy your music anymore. I am sure that eventualy artists will move to a label that treats it's customers with a bit more respect.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Has there been any Audio CD drm put out that doesn't rely on the auto-run feature of Windows? I remember reading something about one method that would put defects in the disc that would be filtered out by an audio CD player, but I haven't seen any reports if that would affect cd-paranoia.
In other words, since I do all my music work using Linux, do I need to worry about any of the protection methods currently out there?
I'd like to see a list of all the drm methods that are "in the wild" along with their prevalence and effectiveness agains various OS's & tools.
You're right that the tape is a bad idea. If someone does try it though, at least put a balancing slice on the opposite side of the disc. You don't know strange and loud until a CD EXPLODES in your CDROM drive. I've seen the remaining disc after an explosion, and sand almost has bigger pieces than some of what's left.
Also in describing the Sony Rootkit problem it's good to mention that the disks are "infected with DRM". The person won't know what DRM is, but it helps to associate it with a bad word like "infection". And in the case of the Sony CDs, it's not overhyping the facts either, so your conscience can remain clear.
Bottom line is, "these discs are designed to infect a computer with DRM, which breaks Windows, and lets Sony and viruses take over your computer."
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
So you could reformat aol disks instead of buying disks.
Douglas P. Price
Ed Foster provides more information that allows us to make a "behavioral profile of Sony":
... before users can even say yes or no to accepting the Sony EULA,
MediaMax has already installed a dozen files on their hard drive and started
running the copy protection code. The files remain even if the user rejects
the EULA, and the Sony CDs provide no option for uninstalling the files at a
later date.
... an e-commerce revenue generation "feature of dynamic on-line
and off-line banner ads. Generate revenue or added value through the placement
of 3rd party dynamic, interactive ads that can be changed at any time by the
content owner."
Sony has other DRM software. Here are quotes:
MediaMax also "phones home" every time you play a protected CD with a code identifying what music you're listening to.
Ed Foster says Sony management has a "scum" profile. Quote: OK, so let's see what we've got here. A company that seems bent on sneaking files onto unsuspecting users' computers, pretending they've gotten permission to do so from a vaguely-worded EULA, transmitting a constant stream of usage information back to their servers, and using that information for who-knows-what revenue generating opportunities. Does this sound like a familiar profile to you? Of course, it's the profile of all the spyware/adware scum that have come very close to destroying the Internet just to make a few bucks peddling their trash.
Issues that remain concerning Sony's rootkit software and other DRM software:
As is shown by Ed Foster's analysis linked above, attacking customer computers seems to be the kind of thing that is part of the Sony corporate culture. There has been no apology, and Sony management makes statements giving the impression they intend to continue infecting customer computers.
A music retail store spokesman said that Sony's rootkit attack has become public just before Christmas. Customers can easily choose some other gift now that they are scared about computer attacks. Sony's attack has hurt the entire music industry, not just Sony. Also, the damage will continue after Christmas.
Few people are technically knowledgeable. The Sony rootkit CDs will be causing problems for many, many years, as they are traded or borrowed or sold to thrift stores.
The number of computers already corrupted by the Sony rootkit is probably far larger than the 500,000 quoted in articles about the Sony attack. That number is just the number of Domain Name Servers that show evidence that a computer has tried to contact the Sony phone home address. The average server would almost certainly service more than one corrupted computer.
Following Microsoft's lead years ago, some businesses treat all their customers as crooks so that they can stop a few.
I really fail to understand what anyone hopes to achieve by any form of copy protection...
As far as I can tell, the only form of copy protection that can hope to work against any low-level data extraction tool is one that involves partially invalid data or unreadable regions. And even then, you can do a straight 1:1 copy, and whenever it starts having read errors, put a 0 or something in those bytes and skip them. That is easily achieved using a utility like dd. In many cases, you can also read the disc in a virtual PC (e.g. VMware), and save the audio output to a disk file - and then delete the virtual PC in case of malware installed by the CD.
Unless the disc is in a proprietary format which can only be read by a specific player, which has no standard output connections, you can copy anything that you can play, simply by plugging the output of whatever you use to play it into the line-in on your PC. If they somehow prevent that, you can still record anything using a microphone, as long as you can somehow get sound waves out of it.
Also, is it really right to try and stop all copying? I absolutely cannot stand any kind of data being held within a single physical object, especially such a fragile one as a CD. I keep most of my CDs backed up onto two locations, but I steadfastly refuse to play the music on more than one location at a time, or share it with a friend. There can't be very many people in the world who would want to rip the musicians off, and not posess the necessary technical skills to bypass copy protection. The slightest hint of copy protection on a CD in my posession prompts me to try and create a "pure" copy, just because I can't stand my data being defiled by such things.
Certainly, it is stupid to incorporate Windows trojans into the CDs. People trust the music companies; at least, they did. Things like this must really lower people's trust - especially since they try to disuade people from piracy by saying that pirate copies may contain trojans. I will certainly be very reluctant to insert a CD into a Windows computer without the shift key held down in the future.
How do you know the Sony rootkit is not PRE-INSTALLED on your Vaio when you receive it? How do you know that the Sony rootkit is not embedded in hardware on every Sony USB stick, every Sony memory card, every Sony digital camera...?
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PGP Key ID 0xCB8FF658