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Asus Ships Cracking Software On Recovery DVD
Barence writes "Asus is accidentally shipping software crackers and confidential documents on the recovery DVDs that come with its laptops. The startling discovery was made by a PC Pro reader whose antivirus software was triggered by a key cracker for the WinRAR compression software, which was located on the recovery DVD for his Asus laptop. Along with the key cracker the disc also contained confidential Asus documents including a PowerPoint presentation that details 'major problems' identified by the company, including application compatibility issues. The UK reader is not alone, either — several users in the US and Australia have also found suspicious files on Asus discs."
Someone is getting fired, and Asus is going to be getting sued.
Do they come with cheese?
Attention all planets of the Solar Federation! We have assumed control! - Neil Peart
Asus, however accidentally / carelessly, have just made themselves the obvious target of a lawsuit for distribution of tools for copyright infringement...
I have been a user for about 10 years. This ends Feb 2014. The site's been ruined. I'm off. Dice, FU
If only they'd used 7zip instead! Oh, you fools!
End of lesson. You may press the button.
To that person: If your goal was to get your resume noticed, MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!
WinRAR is free to use, last time I checked it only asked you to buy it through a brief, unintrusive nag window. Cracking it is really damn lame.
Putting the CEO's dim-witted nephew Steve in charge of disc duplication seemed like such a good idea. I mean, how could anyone screw something THAT simple up, right?
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
How the cracking software got onto the restore DVD as well as why it was even present at Asus in the first place.
I can't imagine why a company like Asus would even "need" to crack software keys when they can, most likely, get it at a discount. I mean, it's not like Asus is a barely-scraping-by company that is unable to afford even simple tools.
Sig Follows: "Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself." -- Mark Twain
I would think that this would be of much more interest than some cracking tool one can download. Even the Asus source code should be of more interest as it could be used to improve FLOSS support.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
Who needs WinRAR when you have 7-Zip?
Sam ty sig.
If you can't keep it off your distribution CDs, you just have WAAAAAAY too much of it around.
A guy burns a master CD while smoking a joint in Taiwan... Somewhere in Redmond, a large office chair is hurtled through a pane of glass.
Rich And Stupid is not so bad as Working For Rich And Stupid.
Because if it's on a recovery CD which is duplicated a thousand times then it's worthless to the company you want to blackmail as they're screwed anyway so why pay for your extortion.
Which, for the benefit of those who have never used 7-Zip, fully supports unpacking RAR archives out of the box without having to have unrar or WinRAR at all.
Now if you want to make RAR files, then you'll need rar or WinRAR. But also you should note that 7-Zip's native 7z format gets rather better compression than RAR. ;)
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My guess would be to get rid of the nag screen? That said,I thought all the PC makers loved to put trialware on the machines to help lower their cost. Someone at Asus needs to have their resume up to date,and I hope Asus has plenty of cash on hand,because this will probably get ugly real fast. Talk about a slam dunk lawsuit.
Does anyone know if the crack is carrying a trojan? The fact that it is setting off virus scanners tells me that it might,which means if it was used on the original Asus install image there is a lot of infected machines out there. Of course simply having a folder called cracks on the CD is bad enough,but if it is also trojaned it could be REALLY costly for Asus. But as always this is my 02c,YMMV
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Imagine my surprise when an immediate restart after driver installation off of an asus cd booted my computer into a broken version of freedos. An explanation written 4 years ago of what happened to me is here: http://www.freedos.org/freedos/news/technote/211.html
It's on a Windows DVD.
Asus is just saving its users some time. No point delaying the inevitable.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
But also you should note that 7-Zip's native 7z format gets rather better compression than RAR. ;)
Not in my experience. Also, 7zip's software is horrid compared to WinRAR. Also, there is a fully functional version of WinRAR available for free. They released it in a 1 day giveaway sometime last year I believe.
Several years ago I worked in a very large and respectable company that shall remain unnamed (but whose name rhymes with, say, "Nokia"...) and we just shipped our turnkey system with our software AND with the source code. And the company wasn't (and still isn't, AFAIK, but don't work for them since a long time) an open-source company :o) It was a screwup by the consultant guys in India.
I'm surprised this doesn't happen more often, knowing the level of QC that happens in India and China.
oh, right, I forgot that it does indeed happen. Even nowadays (de javu).
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
7zip has a good UI *if* you mainly use the shell integration features (enabled by default.)
7zip is also FSF-Free minus unrar.dll, whereas WinRAR has very restrictive licensing terms.
If you read TFA, you will find that this is more than a case of a hard disk someone forgot to erase before selling an old computer.
This time, the wayward data are on a recovery DVD that comes with new ASUS computers, and presumably hundreds or thousands have been shipped. Which makes the following two differences:
1) Trying to keep this secret is probably futile, there are too many copies floating around.
2) Distributing stuff by accident in this way is an epic, newsworthy blunder. Much worse than forgetting to erase a single harddisk.
C - the footgun of programming languages
i'm not completely sure, but i believe that anti-virus makers often classify keygens and cracks as viruses. it's a way of posturing to scare the public away from using these programs despite their innocuous nature.
problem is, there are some warez downloads that genuinely do contain trojans/viruses, so if your AV program is set off by a download it's difficult to know if it's a legitimate threat or simply the AV makers trying to manipulate the public.
i imagine a lot of security analysis tools (which can be used for both white hat and black hat purposes) probably set off AV programs as well.
i can see how AV software detecting warez programs might be a useful feature to businesses who want to protect themselves from lawsuits, but it should at least make a distinction between viruses/trojans/malware and warez/hacking programs which aren't harmful to the user's computer. it's not really the place of AV makers to tell users that they can't use a keygen, crack, or security tool. that's not why most people run AV programs.
Especially in international, multi-cultural enterprises.
When the executives said they wanted "Cracking software" on the CD, they meant it in the same way that Wallace does when he compliments Gromit on breakfast: "Cracking toast, Gromit!"
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Because, you know, after MSI threw in those free moviez, ASUS had to up the ante a little :)
And for those of us who want an alternative to 7-zip with a user-interface that doesn't make you want to gouge your eyes out with spoons, then there is IZArc.
(free in beer, not speech - but I don't really care)
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And apparently they were kind enough to include both English and Chinese versions of it, too!
Cheers,
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
Sounds like a release notes ^_^
"Does anyone know if the crack is carrying a trojan?"
No. It claims it can't "feel anything" unless it goes in bareback.
"But this one goes to 11!"
Sounds like a good way to frame somebody too though...
I know you're joking, but for anyone who doesn't get the joke, Microsoft is a BSA member.
They only terrorize small businesses.
Sorry to burst your bubble,but I have actually watched keygens and cracks infect a machine. It is usually either a downloader or one of the W series viruses. From what I've seen working PC repair it isn't the cracking bunches that are infecting the machines,it is the sites that the folks get them from that are wrapping them in trojans and downloaders. But I can verify that it was the actual keygen/cracks,as I used a spare box we used for testing files and filemon and diskmon from system internals. Sure enough as the crack was activated while it did crack the program it also began writing tons of little files into system32. Those files when scanned were one of the W32 trojans. That is why I tell my users to just buy the stupid programs,as it is a lot cheaper than having to pay me to debone their box. But as always this is my 02c,YMMV
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.