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Lawsuit Against Ubisoft for Starforce
Cyber Akuma writes "Due to Ubisoft's intentional use of the highly controversial copy protection scheme Starforce, despite user protests and purposeful deletion of any forum discussions about the protection, Christopher Spence has filed a 5 Million Dollar lawsuit against the company for use of the crippling DRM in their games. Starforce has been reported to cause system instability, slowdowns, and possible damage to optical drives. As well as questionable business practices when dealing with customers and other companies, which has been reported on Slashdot before."
Wait... we don't like Starforce... go get em Chris!!!
It is often a shame IMO when legal action is the only way to take care of issues such as the wonderful rootkits, spyware and drm on music and video game disks.
Help Brendan pay off his student loans
they better have read the EULA, because I'm sure Ubisoft covered their tracks long, long ago.
The guy can't even spell Starforce, never mind sue them over it. Is he some kind of stalking horse, deliberately doomed to fail to discourage other people with more resources and ability to sue the company??
Meine Schwester ist sehr, sehr reizvoll - Nietzsche
Isn't this just the sort of thing the EFF likes to get involved in? I would think any suit like this would get a lot more traction with their backing (even if it's just adding some whitepapers/briefs in the mix).
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -Albert Einstein
"For example, here's one of the common problems brought by Starforce: under Windows XP, if packets are lost during the reading or writing of a disk, XP interprets this as an error and steps the IDE speed down. Eventually it will revert to 16bit compatibility mode rendering a CD/DVD writer virtually unusable. In some circumstances certain drives cannot cope with this mode and it results in physical hardware failure (Most commonly in multiformat CD/DVD writer drives). A sure sign of this step down occurring is that the burn speeds will get slower and slower (no matter what speed you select to burn at). Starforce, on a regular basis, triggers this silent step down. Until it reaches the latter stages most people do not even realise it is happening."
Proof? Out-of-specs equipment? (remember the problem one of the linux distros had).
Such a fuss...all because he wants to play without the disk.
Just get a crack for it like the rest of us!
...All I can say is that my life is pretty strange...
I for one am glad someone is standing up to Stareforce. You don't know how many Virtus's have destroyed my computer as a result of them!
The server that hosts the lawsuit .pdf is already down. GO TEAM INTERNET!
"they better have read the EULA, because I'm sure Ubisoft covered their tracks long, long ago."''
It says on the outside of the box, before you buy it that you may have problems with some hardware and why. Ubisoft can't be responsable for people not reading what's in front of them.
5M? Ubisoft sold a lot more kit than that. What is the damage going to be - 5$ off Splinter Cell Double Agent for us, 4M to the lawyers? Would be nice to see some of these machine horking protection schemes get held to the same 'criminal' behavior like deleting files or defacing websites...
+++ UGUCAUCGUAUUUCU
that way maybe other companies wont use StarForce anymore, because a lot of companies usually dont listen to customers until it hits them in the pocketbook.
"Such a fuss...all because he wants to play without the disk. Just get a crack for it like the rest of us!"
.EXE files.
I don't think you fully understand what StarForce is. Only a couple StarForce games have ever been cracked - and it isn't just swapping out a couple
You need to physically unhook *all* of your optical drives and run an emulator that seriously hits system performance. UBI has released this with their Splinter Cell series - and for the most part it worked. Troubleshooting costs are way higher than normal but I know a ton of people who don't ever buy games that bought these.
Less lawsuits, more *EFFECTIVE* boycotts. And no, I'm not talking about half-hearted "boycotts," where idiot gamers with no self-control warez the hell out of a title that's supposed to be boycotted, only to serve as proof that publishers need to use copy protection. I'm talking about shutting out all purchases, downloads, and even positive discussion about a boycotted title.
It would certainly not be a trivial effort to organize something like this. But it would be better proof to the publishers that we don't necessarily need what they have to offer us. They provide us with services and products (luxuries, at that) that we can choose to buy. Don't tattle to mommy government so she can slap the publishers on the wrist and leave them looking for different means to screw you. Just starve them straight. If gamers can't do this, that's just proof that publishers can do whatever they want to you.
After all, we are not talking about (sigh) Windows, which someone might actually need for some reason. These are *games*.
This is taken right from Wikipedia:
StarForce has received criticism for installing its own device driver onto computers. Some users claim that the StarForce drivers can cause optical drives to fail, which has been investigated by the popular American magazine Computer Gaming World. CGW states that under certain circumstances StarForce will cause Windows to access optical drives in Programmed input/output mode which causes the drive to be accessed far more slowly, potentially causing problems. StarForce developers responded to these findings, stating "The issue on StarForce is obviously sponsored by our competitors or organized crime groups that run CD/DVD piracy operations. We are now in close cooperation with US and Russian officials investigating the matter and trying to find out who stands behind the boycott campaign". When faced with criticism on the internet, StarForce officials are known to threaten with legal action and contact with the FBI, though the extent to which these threats have been pursued remain doubtful. StarForce's developers claim that their EULA absolves them from any responsibility for problems that their software may cause [3]. Supporters of StarForce argue that the stability problems were exaggerated and have been resolved in newer versions of StarForce.
StarForce copy protection software also forces users to completely wipe and reinstall their partitions if they wish to remove the copy protection software. The protection will also write to any shared network drives that have full read / write access, causing problems for other users on the network.
A large number of gamers have advocated boycotts of games or publishers known to use StarForce. On 30th January 2006 Boing Boing, a popular weblog, labelled Starforce as malware, alleging several problems associated with the protection system, including disk drive performance degradation, weakening of operating system security and stability. A day later on January 31, 2006 Boing Boing received an email from Starforce, threatening legal action and stating that the article was "full of insults, lies, false accusations and rumors". CNET also ran a similar story, and has received similar [email]. However, Protection Technologies have never proven these claims are false.
On 5th March 2006, a StarForce employee posted a link [4] to an illegal download source of Galactic Civilizations 2, a game developed by StarDock which does not use copy protection. Starforce later issued an apology for this act [5], after it received a great deal of attention on the internet.
More info at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starforce
"Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
"What you reap is what you sow".
I hope it stops these practices, I've held off from purchasing quite a few games because I'm not sure starforce is trustworthy and I'm VERY sure that I as a legitimate customer do not tolerate being treated like a criminal. Well, actually the criminals get treated much better since the warez versions usually remove such inconveniences completely. "Here's your reward for purchasing our software instead of downloading: A worse user experience! Isn't that great?"
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
Just because I put a lable on my product saying I am not responsible for damages caused by it, doesn't make it so. Its all up to the court system to see just how far EULAs can go.
I remember seeing a note about this on star-force homepage.
They offered $10,000 reward and all-expenses paid round-trip to moscow to their headquarters, if you could replicate situation where starforce actually did some damage to optical drives.
The competition is over by now, apparently no one tried to prove it right, link here.
There are no atheists when recovering from tape backup.
I know of Ubisoft as a game developer, but what is their relation to the creators of StarForce. It mentioned that they're being used for using it, not developing it... sound really it sounds more like they should be sueing the creators of StarForce or at least have a suit against both. On the other hand, Sony used bought DRM and they're usually the ones held as reponsible for its nasty rootkit, soooo.
I do know that other game developers use StarForce though, to the same effect. Why sue UbiSoft in particular?
Lawsuits such as this are totally justified. It's intentional asshattery. There is nothing frivolous about this.
The only time a lawsuit is stupid is when someone sues over something that is, at worst, an accident. Malpractice, McDonald's hot coffee, etc.
Maybe now they will be forced to release a nocd version of Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory so I can finally put the 4GB image to some use ;)
Let's see... The company is based in Russia, produces harmful software and doesn't acknowledge it. It also posts links to torrents of pirated copies of games, that don't use their copy protection (Galactic Civilisations 2) and generally screws up the whole world, except Russia and other countries, where practically everybody infringes copyright, instead of buying the software. I say that this StarForce thingy is actually sponsored by the Russian government in an attempt to screw up the US and the rest of the world.
And they seem to be doing a mighty fine job at it. I hope they continue to do so - seeing how you lose more and more drives ever so painfully is truly an uplifing sight. So, please buy Splinter Cell.
Let's face it, no one ever reads EULAs just like no guy will ever read the assembly instructions of furniture or how to program the VCR/DVR/TIVO, it is just a fact! Bearing this in mind has anyone ever used this as a defence against a EULA in court? - Namely that it is unreasonable to expect any non-legally trained individual to read and accept an EULA. In fact anything where I have to scroll beyond the bottom of the first page usually loses me!
I guess that this would be called the Homer Simpson defence?
Wouldn't wash with judges I know but it would just show that they don't live on the same plane of existence as the rest of us.
But McDonald's hot coffee was a real problem.
What most people don't know want to admit is that the hot coffe suite wasn't about someoen spilling coffe, it was about a company serving coffe that was too hot for the cups they served it in. Yes, the coffee was so hot it melted the cups and caused the lids to come off. After recieving many complaints about it at that particular (yes it was only one store serving it this hot too) store, a customer suffered third degree burns on thier crotch and leg areas.
MCdonalds offered a free coffee replacment after being told about it. after seeking treatment, MCdonalds offered some small amount of money. Thats when she decided to sue for medical bills and this store offered a settlement of some low amount that wouldn't even pay for the drugs. The lawsuite was originaly for medical bills but when the jurry found that the store has paid medical claims in the past over the exact same complaints that specificaly claimed the lid to the coffee cup melted off and caused the spill, they decided the company was purposley serving a faulty and dangerous product and riased the punitive damages.
Of course on apeal, the judgment was lowered to a number more closly resembling the original requested amount. It wasn't frivilous by anymeans except maybe the jurry's huge sum of money they awarded to punish MCdonalds.
Now, malpractice.. This is a fun subject for several reasons. I specificaly know a person that suffered from malpractice. He had an operation on his heart to fix a valve when he was little (about 10-13 years of age). The breast plate didn't grow back properly and cause the r ibcage to slip under the one side and protrude inot his heart. The fix was to cut the sternum back on both sides do somethign to the bones and re attach them properly. This is were the malpractice comes in. The doctor who decided to scheldule a vacation the next day after open heart surgury,felt rushed by his plans and instead of cutting both side as they explained the operation or e ven performing the operation as the "plan" called for too some shortcuts. First they only cut one side, second instead of trimming out the exccess material that grew form t he first botch repair, they re wired the ribcage under the breastplate in a position that opened the lungs up a little. Then he rewired the sternum shut at an angle that caused inability to stand up straight. Of course claiming the entire poeration had been done as they initialy claimed it was, the coverup causes the therope to work on standing straight wich caused the wires to break and the ribs to seperate again. Now because it was easier to slop the poeration and keep the vacation plans, i have a 26 year old friend who has wires sticking into his lungs causing breathing problems. Ribs abd sternum plates resting directly on his heart and if he moves too suddenly,he has shooting pain that mimics a heart attack two years after the operation. To make things worse, when the wires broke, and when the ribs fell again, and when the sternuum droped onto the heart, the doctors said that it was normal and he would get used to it in time. To make things even worse, knowing this was going on, the doctors saw that the insurance was starting to run past the amount of time aloted for recovery and sent him back to work as an automechanic were he couldn't use his arms above his chest without lots of pain and got laid off because he couldn't perform his job. (now without insurance at all) It is almost as if they tried to make him broke so he didn't have enough money to get a lawer.
If a lawsuite over that malpractice is firvolous, then I say we need more of them. This isn't a surgeon forgeting to remove all his tools. Although i would consider that malpractice too. I have seen people fired for leaving tools at job sites. This isn't some mild mistake either, it is a surgeon who deliberatly changed the operation so he didn't miss the flight to cancoon.
I don't buy games with starforce on. There are a LOT of games out there, I don't feel like I'm missing anything.
Still, it's good the suit is happening. Not buying a product doesn't send such a clear message to a publisher as having a bunch of lawyers turn up and telling them formally that they're dickheads.
For an alternate view see overlawyered.com's rebuttal of this "it's an urban legend" position. Don't have the URL handy, but search "mcdonald coffee" on overlawyered. (Turns out McD's coffee then was 10-20 degrees cooler than Starbuck's is served right now. And was well within the norm for coffee temperatures at the time.)
Then again, the whole post above sounds a bit like a trial lawyer soundbite, so not sure how much good my statement will do.
Boys from the City. Not yet caught by the Whirlwind of Progress. Feed soda pop to the thirsty pigs.
1) Finding out ahead of time which game has which copy protection is difficult.
2) A large number of games are sold to people who have no online contact with such groups.
This isn't a dire enough issue for a boycott to even enter the vicinity of reality. A game company would have to be harming children or supporting international terrorism to incite an "effective boycott." Boycotting in general is just not an effective means of making change. Lawsuits, on the other hand, are highly effective... I'm all for alternatives to litigation, but let's look at new methods of protest that might work and let's avoid looking back at methods that have historically failed. Repeatedly.
-If
Run a pencil-and-paper RPG campaign with your far-off friends: Gametable!
under win XP, if packets are lost during the reading or writing of a disk, XP interprets this as an error and steps the IDE speed down. Eventually it will revert to 16bit compatibility mode rendering a CD/DVD writer unusable. In some circumstances certain drives cannot cope with this mode and it results in physical hardware failure (Most commonly in multiformat CD/DVD writer drives). A sure sign of this step down occurring is that the burn speeds will get slower and slower. Starforce, on a regular basis, triggers this silent step down. Until it reaches the latter stages most people do not even realise it is happening. Moreover, the Starforce drivers, installed on your system, grant ring 0 to any code under the ring 3. any virus or trojan can get OS privileges and totally control your system. Since win 2000, security and stability got enhanced by separating those privileges, but with the Starforce drivers, the old system holes and instabilities are back.
That was the most unreadable /. comment I've ever seen.
And learn to spell.
SEriuslee. Iiv taekn poopees thet kin spill BEttr thin postar.
takns fir yoor commnt. mush apppprecaded.
Slow down sparky, this isn't a fucking race. You must type at least this legibly to ride the Internet.
"Applying a crack to a legally purchased game is not illegal."
Unfortunately, if you live in the USA, this logical argument is actually incorrect. Thanks to a nice piece of legislation entitled the Digital Millenium Copyright Act, it is a federal crime to circumvent a copy-prevention scheme. That's right, when you forked over $50 for a copy of Morrowind, and after a few days of near-constant crashes, found out that much stability could be regained by installing a simple no-CD patch (and did so)... yep, you technically belong in Federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison. Nice, eh?
In case it wasn't crystal clear, it may be *illegal*, but that in and of itself does not make it *wrong*.
I've heard that line about starbucks coffee being hotter before. It is trivial because the merrits of the "winnings" rest on the coffee beeing too hot for the container it was placed in and the store knowing about it while continuing to serve it that way. Also this particular store had been recieving comlaints from customers about the lids comming off becuase of the hot coffee and injuries resulting from it. The important thing here isn't neccesarily this McDonalds compared to starbuck but this McDonalds compared to other McDonalds. It was hotter then other stores at that time.(probably a limit set by the containers it was served in)
And if it sounds like a trial lawer soundbite, it is purley by accident or because I somewhat support actions simular to this. Not in sueing for hot coffee but sueing for an unsafe product being distributed even after knowing it was unsafe.