Yes, but you don't go to jail for a separate offence of 'having a safe' if you lose the key to the safe and they want to know what's inside it. They just brute force the lock off, but doing that for encryption is too hard for the police. This law will be on the books for a long time. If I get searched for some bullshit reason at any point in the future - given the increasingly police state and surveillance society in britain, that gets more likely every day - and have an old encrypted file that I've long since lost the password for, I'm still on the hook for 2 years to provide a key. I have the file on my hard-drive; that's sufficient 'reasonable belief' (the wording) that I have, or had the key. It's now up to me to provide a preponderance of evidence that I don't have key any more. Just saying I don't is not enough. Once I've proved I don't have it, somehow, they then have to prove beyond all reasonable doubt (to legal rather than logical standards of proof) that I do in fact have the key.
The canonical example. You send me an encrypted file with a dodgy subject line - here's the blueprints of a tube station you asked for. The email monitoring they're doing under the same act picks that up, and I get a visit from the plod. I don't know you, didn't ask for the file, but someone sent *me* the email so that's 'reasonable belief' I have the key to it somewhere. I now have to prove I don't have the key, or it's up to 5 years in jail because it's suspicion of involvement in a terrorist act, as the law is written.
Yes, the law will probably only be used against actually bad men. I don't like 'probably' anywhere near my laws, nor do I like widely written laws that can target a lot of people only being selectively enforced against those who float up to attention some other way.
They didn't try to claim actual damages; that would indeed be a few hundred dollars. They went for the punitive damages, which are set massively high as they are a) a big punishment designed to make other people wince and not do the same offence b) written at a time when large scale counterfeiters and print shops were the only ones really capable of doing copyright infringement, and as a business.
I believe this is the first time such punitive damages have been successfully levied against an individual in court, who was sharing non-commercially on the internet. They were used to shut down napster, and sharman networks ended up paying hundreds of millions over kazaa. Fear of such a judgement, along with the extra legal fees, has caused many of course to settle prior to court.
Are the punitive damages excessive for an individual? Yes. Will the US government change the law because of citizen anger, or will they keep it same because of lobbying from the copyright companies? Given the history of such laws as the DMCA, I'm thinking citizens are going to carry on taking it in the shorts again...
This case likely hinged on the 'making available' argument that was changed by the judge in the jury instructions. Originally, he was going to state that just making available the files for download wasn't infringing copyright. After argument from the plaintiffs, he changed it to say that 'making available' of a copyrighted file, even if they couldn't show it had actually been downloaded (which they couldn't with the evidence in hand) was still a breach of copyright law. That change to the jury instructions, which has been ruled different ways by different courts, will likely be the focus of any appeal.
The other morals of this tale? Make sure other have other accounts on your computer, easy access to your wireless internet connection, and use an alias on p2p you've never used for anything in your 'real' life. Oh, and don't download or buy music from the major labels, of course.
"Failing to provide the keys makes you guilty of breaking the law that requires you to do so."
Yes, but you fail to address the basis for that law. Encrypting your files is not illegal. However, it might as well be now. The *purpose* of the law is to make hiding your data an offence, so that you don't hide your data, or if you do they can still nail you for something. The *effect* of the law is that if you encrypt your files, regardless of whether you've done anything wrong - and I emphasise, encryption is still legal - you can face 5 years in jail.
I don't know where morals come into this. I expect the due process of law. I expect to be held innocent until proven guilty of a crime. I expect to be able to exercise my right to privacy. These are fundamental to our society, and our current body of law. Yes, a fascist police state can do what it likes with the law, but I supposedly don't live in one of those. Yes, you can pass a law making 'not giving over all your data when asked' a crime, but then the government could declare 'being left handed' a crime - just because they CAN doesn't mean they SHOULD, nor that it's concommitant with our existing laws.
This law basically makes me guilty and facing prison if I use encryption, regardless of what else I have and haven't done. I don't consider that just, or fair. Putting me in jail for 2 years because I've forgotten my password, with those investigating me gagged by court order, with no other law broken, makes a mockery of the justice the law is supposed to codify.
That's the problem - forgetting the password is not a defence. Failing to hand it over when asked carries up to a 5 year jail sentence, as it's assumed whatever you're 'hiding' would cause you to be imprisoned. The basic premise, if you use encryption, is that you are guilty of something and it's up to *you* to prove otherwise by letting the police rifle through *all* your data looking for something incriminating. Failure to do so is evidence itself of guilt!
This law was passed 7 years ago, and the home office has been quietly waiting for the original outrage to die down to see if they could get away with actually using the powers they were granted before 9/11 or 7/7. Of *course* they'll only use it against terrorists and pedophiles. Nothing to fear citizen, sleep soundly in your bed, safe in the knowledge we're only imprisoning bad men. After all, only bad men use encryption then forget the password...
Of course, if you're a pedophile you're far better off taking the 2 years for failure to hand over your encrypted data, than to take the potentially decades in jail if you have incriminating photos and a sex offender offence that might well get you killed there. I don't think it'll be too long before the maximum sentence gets raised to be in line with the worst crime you might be assumed to have committed and hiding via encryption...
I'm actually in the process of upgrading a windows 2000 image to XP Pro (no, it can't be a clean install, it's a long and dull story), and got bit by this bug. When I searched for the error number associated with the windows update failure on technet, I did come up with technet article explaining how to register the windows update dll's to fix it (as also listed in the linked article). I just assumed it was an odd bug because of all the cruft in the windows 2000 install.
Now I find out it's because of a broken secret mandatory update to the DRM that breaks windows update altogether. Nice one Microsoft!
I had another bug after that windows update, http://support.microsoft.com/kb/883821 That took a lot longer to fix, as none of those listed fixed it. Perhaps that was also related? Lovely.
Well, it's certainly true that if you repeat the same lie often enough, a lot of people will eventually believe it. Take the high percentage that believe Saddam had an active WMD program prior to Gulf War 2, and we already found them. Or that whole swift boat thing that took down John Kerry. Or that Gordon Brown, despite being in charge of vast swathes of the british government for 10 years, had nothing to do with Tony Blair's unpopular decisions now that he's the prime minister instead.
You're not wrong. I had the recent misfortune to compare an expensive sony vaio and small label (NS Optimum) vista laptop out of the box. The sony was superior in specs in every way; twice the RAM, much faster CPU (tho both core2), nvidia 8400 vs onboard intel; well, superior in every way bar memory. The sony was designed as a heavy-duty desktop replacement, the stock laptop was just an entry-level laptop.
The NS Optimum SPANKED the sony. Totally. Boot up times, launching programs, window refresh, just generally 'responsiveness' the sony was bloated, sluggish and slow. The Ns Optimum nippy, and crisp - almost as quick as XP, save network transfers of course! Even after cleaning off all the visible useless 'trial' apps on the sony, and updating every driver known to man, it still felt much more sluggish. It took a complete clean install from proper 'stock' media on the sony to get it to show it's hardware advantage.
OEM 'tweaked' builds with all their crapware and adware to increase their profit can absolutely cripple even a monster of a laptop on vista. There's plenty of reasons to avoid vista; dodgy drivers, especially if you're an x-fi user; the minimum spec; software incompatibility; DRM/activation ; bugs in general - but general speed on a machine with the grunt to run it shouldn't be it. Blame the OEM for that.
Why would I need a licence? There's no ongoing service provided. It's a simple established principle in law that when a copy of a copyrighted work is sold, whether it's printed as words on paper or indentations in a circular piece of plastic, the doctrine of first sale applies and no further restrictions can be applied by the copyright holder post sale, other than those specifically disallowed by copyright and other laws.
I can't distribute copies to other people, I can't make public performances of it, I can't distribute information on how to circumvent the digital restrictions on it. Other than that (and a few other non-relevent moral laws), it's my property to do with as I wish. Unless I live in germany, of course.
If the store employee saw him steal something, they can perform a citizens arrest and hold him until the police arrive. If they get it wrong, they can be sued for a selection of offences, including false imprisonment, so they better be sure he actually stole something.
If they don't see him do anything, then tough luck. They can call the police and let them deal with him. The police don't have the right to arbitrarily search people without cause, why on earth should a fellow citizen, with far less oversight, have that right?
SOME RENT-A-COP JUST ASKS YOU FOR A RECEIPT And to search his bag. Don't forget that bit. Hmm. I think you're a thief. Please take photos of the entire contents of your wallet, including your credit cards, and post them on the internet where I can see them. Or does privacy and protection from unlawful searches only matter when it's *your* privacy?
i know, that's some really wacky fascist thinking on my part, right? Yup, it's blind accession to fake authority lying and pretending they have legal authority to perform searches when in fact it's illegal for them to do so, and support of detainment and the requirement to present ID by a cop who again had no right to do so is indeed fascist thinking. Well done.
Copy protection IS pointless. It's like giving someone a locked box, with the key and the means to put it in the lock. Only legitimate users are supposed to be able to use the three together - but you have to give him the contents of the box to play the game.
DRM only slows down the cracks at best, it simply cannot stop cracks with software. It ONLY hurts legitimate customers. 2K decided stabbing people in the eye was better than just providing a good game that people want to buy. The DRM lost them sales, quite a few going by the 5000 odd (literally) posts about it on the official forum alone.
Crap car analogy, by the way. Driving without a seatbelt is a *little* different than say, INSTALLING A FUCKING GAME TO ACTUALLY PLAY IT. There's no law against installing a game you bloody own! Uninstalling doesn't restore an activation. Reinstalling windows, using another account, or just upgrading hardware costs a non-recoverable activation. You only got 2 to start with, so reinstalling windows once and then trying to use a limited user account wouldn't work as you'd be out of activations! Due to customer outrage, they increased it to 5. Woo hoo. So after reinstalling windows and upgrading, I'll lose access to MY PROPERTY until I track down a digital camera and beg support in a different country and timezone for the privilege, with absolutely nothing I can do to prevent it. It's not uncommon that losing your property means you don't get to enjoy using that property any more. It's NOT common that you'll lose access to your property even though you still have it and did absolutely nothing wrong.
Such low install limits have done nothing to stop the pirates. It ONLY hurts the legitimate customers. There is no mention of this anywhere on the package, in the installer, or even in the EULA, just an after-the-fact post on the forums. There's still no actual mention of the activation being removed anywhere official, they actually removed any such references from the forums by Ken Levine. It's shameful, and I returned the game because of it.
Also, that's a cheap rhetorical trick. Cracking a game does not equate to copyright infringement, or supporting copyright infringement. You might be happy getting a surprise reaming from a game company in the name of screwing over people who are nothing to do with you, but many of us object strongly.
You have 5 installs. Reinstall windows? That's the second of the five 'new computer' activations. Want to install as admin, and play as limited user? That's two more 'new computer' activations. Upgrade your hard-drive or motherboard or too many plug-in cards? That's a 'new computer' activation. Want to dual-boot and play in vista? Oops. You've run out. On one PC. Yes, I could well install something that much in say, 6 months.
The 5 'same computer' installs only apply when it's the same identical computer, the same user account, and the same install of windows. So if you uninstall it, then come back and re-install it a week later without changing anything, then that's your only way of getting the other x5.
Gah, nearly forgot. Document EVERYTHING. Copies of every letter, keep a log of conversations and phonecalls with times and dates and a quick summary of the conversation and any promised response. Make sure you never give away the original receipts. If you bought it on credit, contact your credit provider as they bear liability for the goods also. Visa breathing down a retailers neck often gets a speedy response.
Cheers - I was just about to make the same advice! Saves me typing it all out. UK consumer protections for physical goods are reasonably strong, if you're prepared to fight about it.
I'll just add a couple of things. The Sale of Goods Act (and the Supply of Goods to Consumers Regulation which amends it) are written such that most of your rights of resolution are against the retailer, not the manufacturer. If PC World try to fob you off into talking to the laptop maker, and you start to deal with the manufacturer directly, you may actually weaken your eventual case against PC World against whom you have most of the regulations in your favour.
A laptop hinge failing after 5 months is clearly not of satisfactory quality, or fit for purpose. A hardware fault is not affected by software, so it's certainly not capable of voiding the guarantee - and even if it did, you'd STILL have the right of repair as you did not cause the fault - the retailer is generally on the hook for 6 years for physical goods.
Following through a small claims court action is fairly simple, and they know it (no solicitors required). Talk to the CAB about it. Trading Standards may also be helpful. A formal written complaint to PC World's head office is probably going to be the first step if the manager doesn't back down when you go in armed with your rights under the Sale of Goods Act; be prepared for the long haul, it takes a while for the gears to grind, but if they don't resolve your problems in a reasonable timeframe (usually 6 weeks, iirc) you're entitled to a full refund.
Put up a registration page at the front, put 'you will watch all adverts and allow them to place non-expiring cookies' in the terms and conditions for registration. Have the adverts place cookies and then check for their presence in the content section; redirect to 'YOU THIEF, YOU THIEF, YOU THIEF' page if cookie not present. Or, add 'you must enable javascript' in the terms and use a script to check for the adverts still in the rendered page.
DON'T post something in your shop window for anybody to read, and then get pissed nobody came in to buy something afterwards, mutting 'thieves stealing the electricity of my display in my window and not knowing they're supposed to pay me $20 for the privilege'
Totally agree. What's next, boycotting google image search because it doesn't automatically load all the blinking flash ads on the pages the thumbnails came from?
Top-tip for people using advertising - if you really want to make money from your website, then start charging registration fees. If the content is that compelling, people will surely pay for it. If you're pissed by a drive-by viewer from google not clicking all your ads and buying everything in sight, don't put it out where any public request will hand over copies of the web-page automatically. Just because you stick adverts on something does not mean you have any right to compel me to see them or click on them, especially given how totally irrelevent most advertising is.
Yup, spot on. The scary thing about this botnet - and why it's not been shut down - is it's using the overnet p2p protocol to establish a private P2P command and control network. The updates and additional malware (including a rootkit, spam proxy and mass mailer) are delivered from other compromised machines on the network. Each zombie connects to about 30-50 other computers, thus making shutting it down or even getting a true estimate of its size virtually impossible. The method of infection also uses a number of vectors to try and infect PCs, from script exploits on the hosted pages to the old social engineering.exe file titles.
The storm 'worm' in and of itself is relatively harmless, but it provides the distributed method to spread and control a lot more nasties. What's rather scary is just having an up to date virus scanner check.exe files before execution stops storm entirely, and also removes it's malware service. So all the compromised PCs are simply unprotected windows desktop PCs. (it won't attack windows server 2003)
Why would they stop after one day? The latest attacks have been going on for several days already. The current estimates put between 10 and 50 million computers as part of the storm botnet. They'd need to keep rolling in new ones as they get filtered out, but just 2 million computers involved in a rolling DDOS would be a real headache, especially if they just do normal http requests like a real user; most DDOS attacks only use a few 10's of thousands bots at most, though average numbers required are rising as defences improve.
It is a backdoor trojan, not a worm - largely spread via email.exe attachments, but also installed by at least one other mass mailer worm, W32.Mixor.Q@mm.
It's detected and removed by the usual array of anti-virus software (it installs a malicious device service %System%\wincom32.sys, that joins it to the private distributed P2P control network). However, it does also have capability to download additional malicious software, and has changed form several times.
game0.exe: A downloader + rootkit component - detected as Trojan.Abwiz.F game1.exe: Proxy Mail Relay for spam which opens port TCP 25 on the infected machine - detected as W32.Mixor.Q@mm game2.exe: Mail Harvester which gathers mail addresses on the machine and post them as 1.JPG to a remote server - detected as W32.Mixor.Q@mm game3.exe: W32.Mixor.Q@mm game4.exe: It contacts a C&C server to download some configuration file - detected as W32.Mixor.Q@mm
They can call the police, or they can perform a citizen's arrest. Preventing someone from leaving when it turns out they committed no crime means you yourself can be charged with a variety of offences, including false imprisonment or wrongful arrest, especially if excessive force is used.
You have options about how to stop thieves brazenly walking out the store waving their stolen goods. What you don't have is carte blanche to physically restrain or otherwise search people leaving the store you don't have an extremely good reason to believe are thieves.
The frustrating thing is, this rootkit worry isn't the biggest problem (it's a bit of a stretch). It's that when the game shipped, you only got 2 activations. Yes, you could only install it twice. Ever. Using another user account or install of windows requires another activation. Wipe windows, and try to install a third time? Activation denied. They then proceeded to flat out lie and say uninstalling the game from windows before formatting would give you an activation 'credit' back. It didn't, and according to SecuROM never could.
The outrage over this on the 2K forums made them raise the limit to 5 installs on a given copy of windows, and up to 5 installs on different machines. Ever. Problem solved, right? I mean, who ever installs software they buy more than 5 times, right? Must be pirates. They want to carry on playing in a couple of years, they can go buy a new copy.
Oh, and they'll release a utility at some point in the future that when run, will supposedly uninstall the game and 'deregister' your install with the online securom database, thus giving you the privilege of reinstalling your own game on your own computer one more time. Just hope windows doesn't go belly up before you get to unregister. And I can't wait for the day all games do this, and I have to run round manually deregistering all of them prior to a reinstall with different tools. Then calling support when it doesn't work and won't let me reinstall.
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Yes, but you don't go to jail for a separate offence of 'having a safe' if you lose the key to the safe and they want to know what's inside it. They just brute force the lock off, but doing that for encryption is too hard for the police. This law will be on the books for a long time. If I get searched for some bullshit reason at any point in the future - given the increasingly police state and surveillance society in britain, that gets more likely every day - and have an old encrypted file that I've long since lost the password for, I'm still on the hook for 2 years to provide a key. I have the file on my hard-drive; that's sufficient 'reasonable belief' (the wording) that I have, or had the key. It's now up to me to provide a preponderance of evidence that I don't have key any more. Just saying I don't is not enough. Once I've proved I don't have it, somehow, they then have to prove beyond all reasonable doubt (to legal rather than logical standards of proof) that I do in fact have the key.
The canonical example. You send me an encrypted file with a dodgy subject line - here's the blueprints of a tube station you asked for. The email monitoring they're doing under the same act picks that up, and I get a visit from the plod. I don't know you, didn't ask for the file, but someone sent *me* the email so that's 'reasonable belief' I have the key to it somewhere. I now have to prove I don't have the key, or it's up to 5 years in jail because it's suspicion of involvement in a terrorist act, as the law is written.
Yes, the law will probably only be used against actually bad men. I don't like 'probably' anywhere near my laws, nor do I like widely written laws that can target a lot of people only being selectively enforced against those who float up to attention some other way.
Oops. For punitive damages, read Statutory damages. Can you tell I'm not even close to a US lawyer?
They didn't try to claim actual damages; that would indeed be a few hundred dollars. They went for the punitive damages, which are set massively high as they are
a) a big punishment designed to make other people wince and not do the same offence
b) written at a time when large scale counterfeiters and print shops were the only ones really capable of doing copyright infringement, and as a business.
I believe this is the first time such punitive damages have been successfully levied against an individual in court, who was sharing non-commercially on the internet. They were used to shut down napster, and sharman networks ended up paying hundreds of millions over kazaa. Fear of such a judgement, along with the extra legal fees, has caused many of course to settle prior to court.
Are the punitive damages excessive for an individual? Yes. Will the US government change the law because of citizen anger, or will they keep it same because of lobbying from the copyright companies? Given the history of such laws as the DMCA, I'm thinking citizens are going to carry on taking it in the shorts again...
This case likely hinged on the 'making available' argument that was changed by the judge in the jury instructions. Originally, he was going to state that just making available the files for download wasn't infringing copyright. After argument from the plaintiffs, he changed it to say that 'making available' of a copyrighted file, even if they couldn't show it had actually been downloaded (which they couldn't with the evidence in hand) was still a breach of copyright law. That change to the jury instructions, which has been ruled different ways by different courts, will likely be the focus of any appeal.
The other morals of this tale? Make sure other have other accounts on your computer, easy access to your wireless internet connection, and use an alias on p2p you've never used for anything in your 'real' life. Oh, and don't download or buy music from the major labels, of course.
"Failing to provide the keys makes you guilty of breaking the law that requires you to do so."
Yes, but you fail to address the basis for that law. Encrypting your files is not illegal. However, it might as well be now.
The *purpose* of the law is to make hiding your data an offence, so that you don't hide your data, or if you do they can still nail you for something.
The *effect* of the law is that if you encrypt your files, regardless of whether you've done anything wrong - and I emphasise, encryption is still legal - you can face 5 years in jail.
I don't know where morals come into this. I expect the due process of law. I expect to be held innocent until proven guilty of a crime. I expect to be able to exercise my right to privacy. These are fundamental to our society, and our current body of law. Yes, a fascist police state can do what it likes with the law, but I supposedly don't live in one of those. Yes, you can pass a law making 'not giving over all your data when asked' a crime, but then the government could declare 'being left handed' a crime - just because they CAN doesn't mean they SHOULD, nor that it's concommitant with our existing laws.
This law basically makes me guilty and facing prison if I use encryption, regardless of what else I have and haven't done. I don't consider that just, or fair. Putting me in jail for 2 years because I've forgotten my password, with those investigating me gagged by court order, with no other law broken, makes a mockery of the justice the law is supposed to codify.
That's the problem - forgetting the password is not a defence. Failing to hand it over when asked carries up to a 5 year jail sentence, as it's assumed whatever you're 'hiding' would cause you to be imprisoned. The basic premise, if you use encryption, is that you are guilty of something and it's up to *you* to prove otherwise by letting the police rifle through *all* your data looking for something incriminating. Failure to do so is evidence itself of guilt!
This law was passed 7 years ago, and the home office has been quietly waiting for the original outrage to die down to see if they could get away with actually using the powers they were granted before 9/11 or 7/7. Of *course* they'll only use it against terrorists and pedophiles. Nothing to fear citizen, sleep soundly in your bed, safe in the knowledge we're only imprisoning bad men. After all, only bad men use encryption then forget the password...
Of course, if you're a pedophile you're far better off taking the 2 years for failure to hand over your encrypted data, than to take the potentially decades in jail if you have incriminating photos and a sex offender offence that might well get you killed there. I don't think it'll be too long before the maximum sentence gets raised to be in line with the worst crime you might be assumed to have committed and hiding via encryption...
I'm actually in the process of upgrading a windows 2000 image to XP Pro (no, it can't be a clean install, it's a long and dull story), and got bit by this bug. When I searched for the error number associated with the windows update failure on technet, I did come up with technet article explaining how to register the windows update dll's to fix it (as also listed in the linked article). I just assumed it was an odd bug because of all the cruft in the windows 2000 install.
Now I find out it's because of a broken secret mandatory update to the DRM that breaks windows update altogether. Nice one Microsoft!
I had another bug after that windows update, http://support.microsoft.com/kb/883821
That took a lot longer to fix, as none of those listed fixed it. Perhaps that was also related? Lovely.
And don't forget breakages. Or translation costs from english to english.
Well, it's certainly true that if you repeat the same lie often enough, a lot of people will eventually believe it. Take the high percentage that believe Saddam had an active WMD program prior to Gulf War 2, and we already found them. Or that whole swift boat thing that took down John Kerry. Or that Gordon Brown, despite being in charge of vast swathes of the british government for 10 years, had nothing to do with Tony Blair's unpopular decisions now that he's the prime minister instead.
...superior in every way except battery of course. D'oh.
You're not wrong. I had the recent misfortune to compare an expensive sony vaio and small label (NS Optimum) vista laptop out of the box. The sony was superior in specs in every way; twice the RAM, much faster CPU (tho both core2), nvidia 8400 vs onboard intel; well, superior in every way bar memory. The sony was designed as a heavy-duty desktop replacement, the stock laptop was just an entry-level laptop.
The NS Optimum SPANKED the sony. Totally. Boot up times, launching programs, window refresh, just generally 'responsiveness' the sony was bloated, sluggish and slow. The Ns Optimum nippy, and crisp - almost as quick as XP, save network transfers of course! Even after cleaning off all the visible useless 'trial' apps on the sony, and updating every driver known to man, it still felt much more sluggish. It took a complete clean install from proper 'stock' media on the sony to get it to show it's hardware advantage.
OEM 'tweaked' builds with all their crapware and adware to increase their profit can absolutely cripple even a monster of a laptop on vista. There's plenty of reasons to avoid vista; dodgy drivers, especially if you're an x-fi user; the minimum spec; software incompatibility; DRM/activation ; bugs in general - but general speed on a machine with the grunt to run it shouldn't be it. Blame the OEM for that.
Why would I need a licence? There's no ongoing service provided. It's a simple established principle in law that when a copy of a copyrighted work is sold, whether it's printed as words on paper or indentations in a circular piece of plastic, the doctrine of first sale applies and no further restrictions can be applied by the copyright holder post sale, other than those specifically disallowed by copyright and other laws.
I can't distribute copies to other people, I can't make public performances of it, I can't distribute information on how to circumvent the digital restrictions on it. Other than that (and a few other non-relevent moral laws), it's my property to do with as I wish. Unless I live in germany, of course.
If the store employee saw him steal something, they can perform a citizens arrest and hold him until the police arrive. If they get it wrong, they can be sued for a selection of offences, including false imprisonment, so they better be sure he actually stole something.
If they don't see him do anything, then tough luck. They can call the police and let them deal with him.
The police don't have the right to arbitrarily search people without cause, why on earth should a fellow citizen, with far less oversight, have that right?
SOME RENT-A-COP JUST ASKS YOU FOR A RECEIPT
And to search his bag. Don't forget that bit. Hmm. I think you're a thief. Please take photos of the entire contents of your wallet, including your credit cards, and post them on the internet where I can see them. Or does privacy and protection from unlawful searches only matter when it's *your* privacy?
i know, that's some really wacky fascist thinking on my part, right?
Yup, it's blind accession to fake authority lying and pretending they have legal authority to perform searches when in fact it's illegal for them to do so, and support of detainment and the requirement to present ID by a cop who again had no right to do so is indeed fascist thinking. Well done.
You missed the apt-dist-upgrade comment which would upgrade you from feisty to gutsy then ;)
Copy protection IS pointless. It's like giving someone a locked box, with the key and the means to put it in the lock. Only legitimate users are supposed to be able to use the three together - but you have to give him the contents of the box to play the game.
DRM only slows down the cracks at best, it simply cannot stop cracks with software. It ONLY hurts legitimate customers. 2K decided stabbing people in the eye was better than just providing a good game that people want to buy. The DRM lost them sales, quite a few going by the 5000 odd (literally) posts about it on the official forum alone.
Crap car analogy, by the way. Driving without a seatbelt is a *little* different than say, INSTALLING A FUCKING GAME TO ACTUALLY PLAY IT. There's no law against installing a game you bloody own! Uninstalling doesn't restore an activation. Reinstalling windows, using another account, or just upgrading hardware costs a non-recoverable activation. You only got 2 to start with, so reinstalling windows once and then trying to use a limited user account wouldn't work as you'd be out of activations! Due to customer outrage, they increased it to 5. Woo hoo. So after reinstalling windows and upgrading, I'll lose access to MY PROPERTY until I track down a digital camera and beg support in a different country and timezone for the privilege, with absolutely nothing I can do to prevent it. It's not uncommon that losing your property means you don't get to enjoy using that property any more. It's NOT common that you'll lose access to your property even though you still have it and did absolutely nothing wrong.
Such low install limits have done nothing to stop the pirates. It ONLY hurts the legitimate customers. There is no mention of this anywhere on the package, in the installer, or even in the EULA, just an after-the-fact post on the forums. There's still no actual mention of the activation being removed anywhere official, they actually removed any such references from the forums by Ken Levine. It's shameful, and I returned the game because of it.
Also, that's a cheap rhetorical trick. Cracking a game does not equate to copyright infringement, or supporting copyright infringement. You might be happy getting a surprise reaming from a game company in the name of screwing over people who are nothing to do with you, but many of us object strongly.
You have 5 installs. Reinstall windows? That's the second of the five 'new computer' activations. Want to install as admin, and play as limited user? That's two more 'new computer' activations. Upgrade your hard-drive or motherboard or too many plug-in cards? That's a 'new computer' activation. Want to dual-boot and play in vista? Oops. You've run out. On one PC. Yes, I could well install something that much in say, 6 months.
The 5 'same computer' installs only apply when it's the same identical computer, the same user account, and the same install of windows. So if you uninstall it, then come back and re-install it a week later without changing anything, then that's your only way of getting the other x5.
Gah, nearly forgot. Document EVERYTHING. Copies of every letter, keep a log of conversations and phonecalls with times and dates and a quick summary of the conversation and any promised response. Make sure you never give away the original receipts. If you bought it on credit, contact your credit provider as they bear liability for the goods also. Visa breathing down a retailers neck often gets a speedy response.
Cheers - I was just about to make the same advice! Saves me typing it all out. UK consumer protections for physical goods are reasonably strong, if you're prepared to fight about it.
I'll just add a couple of things. The Sale of Goods Act (and the Supply of Goods to Consumers Regulation which amends it) are written such that most of your rights of resolution are against the retailer, not the manufacturer. If PC World try to fob you off into talking to the laptop maker, and you start to deal with the manufacturer directly, you may actually weaken your eventual case against PC World against whom you have most of the regulations in your favour.
A laptop hinge failing after 5 months is clearly not of satisfactory quality, or fit for purpose. A hardware fault is not affected by software, so it's certainly not capable of voiding the guarantee - and even if it did, you'd STILL have the right of repair as you did not cause the fault - the retailer is generally on the hook for 6 years for physical goods.
Following through a small claims court action is fairly simple, and they know it (no solicitors required). Talk to the CAB about it. Trading Standards may also be helpful. A formal written complaint to PC World's head office is probably going to be the first step if the manager doesn't back down when you go in armed with your rights under the Sale of Goods Act; be prepared for the long haul, it takes a while for the gears to grind, but if they don't resolve your problems in a reasonable timeframe (usually 6 weeks, iirc) you're entitled to a full refund.
Some reference material:
buying goods, your rights - http://www.tradingstandards.gov.uk/cgi-bin/calitem.cgi?file=ADV0050-1011.txt
how to know when the retailer is lying to you - http://www.tradingstandards.gov.uk/cgi-bin/calitem.cgi?file=ADV0050-1011.txt
how your rights still exist even after the guarantee runs out - http://www.tradingstandards.gov.uk/cgi-bin/calitem.cgi?file=ADV0054-1111.txt
run down of the sale of goods act - http://www.dti.gov.uk/consumers/fact-sheets/page38311.html
Good luck, and stick it to em.
Put up a registration page at the front, put 'you will watch all adverts and allow them to place non-expiring cookies' in the terms and conditions for registration. Have the adverts place cookies and then check for their presence in the content section; redirect to 'YOU THIEF, YOU THIEF, YOU THIEF' page if cookie not present. Or, add 'you must enable javascript' in the terms and use a script to check for the adverts still in the rendered page.
DON'T post something in your shop window for anybody to read, and then get pissed nobody came in to buy something afterwards, mutting 'thieves stealing the electricity of my display in my window and not knowing they're supposed to pay me $20 for the privilege'
Totally agree. What's next, boycotting google image search because it doesn't automatically load all the blinking flash ads on the pages the thumbnails came from?
Top-tip for people using advertising - if you really want to make money from your website, then start charging registration fees. If the content is that compelling, people will surely pay for it. If you're pissed by a drive-by viewer from google not clicking all your ads and buying everything in sight, don't put it out where any public request will hand over copies of the web-page automatically. Just because you stick adverts on something does not mean you have any right to compel me to see them or click on them, especially given how totally irrelevent most advertising is.
Yup, spot on. The scary thing about this botnet - and why it's not been shut down - is it's using the overnet p2p protocol to establish a private P2P command and control network. The updates and additional malware (including a rootkit, spam proxy and mass mailer) are delivered from other compromised machines on the network. Each zombie connects to about 30-50 other computers, thus making shutting it down or even getting a true estimate of its size virtually impossible. The method of infection also uses a number of vectors to try and infect PCs, from script exploits on the hosted pages to the old social engineering .exe file titles.
.exe files before execution stops storm entirely, and also removes it's malware service. So all the compromised PCs are simply unprotected windows desktop PCs. (it won't attack windows server 2003)
The storm 'worm' in and of itself is relatively harmless, but it provides the distributed method to spread and control a lot more nasties. What's rather scary is just having an up to date virus scanner check
Why would they stop after one day? The latest attacks have been going on for several days already. The current estimates put between 10 and 50 million computers as part of the storm botnet. They'd need to keep rolling in new ones as they get filtered out, but just 2 million computers involved in a rolling DDOS would be a real headache, especially if they just do normal http requests like a real user; most DDOS attacks only use a few 10's of thousands bots at most, though average numbers required are rising as defences improve.
It is a backdoor trojan, not a worm - largely spread via email .exe attachments, but also installed by at least one other mass mailer worm, W32.Mixor.Q@mm.
. jsp?docid=2007-011917-1403-99&tabid=2
n se/weblog/2007/01/trojanpeacomm_building_a_peert.h tml
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storm_Worm
http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup
It's detected and removed by the usual array of anti-virus software (it installs a malicious device service %System%\wincom32.sys, that joins it to the private distributed P2P control network). However, it does also have capability to download additional malicious software, and has changed form several times.
http://www.symantec.com/enterprise/security_respo
Currently the malware being downloaded is as follows:
game0.exe: A downloader + rootkit component - detected as Trojan.Abwiz.F
game1.exe: Proxy Mail Relay for spam which opens port TCP 25 on the infected machine - detected as W32.Mixor.Q@mm
game2.exe: Mail Harvester which gathers mail addresses on the machine and post them as 1.JPG to a remote server - detected as W32.Mixor.Q@mm
game3.exe: W32.Mixor.Q@mm
game4.exe: It contacts a C&C server to download some configuration file - detected as W32.Mixor.Q@mm
They can call the police, or they can perform a citizen's arrest. Preventing someone from leaving when it turns out they committed no crime means you yourself can be charged with a variety of offences, including false imprisonment or wrongful arrest, especially if excessive force is used.
You have options about how to stop thieves brazenly walking out the store waving their stolen goods. What you don't have is carte blanche to physically restrain or otherwise search people leaving the store you don't have an extremely good reason to believe are thieves.
Whoops! Very sorry, wrong link above. I missed off the '8' from the end of the link.
= 5527= 6628
This is the first thread
http://forums.2kgames.com/forums/showthread.php?t
that started it all,
and this is the official thread
http://forums.2kgames.com/forums/showthread.php?t
My apologies.
The frustrating thing is, this rootkit worry isn't the biggest problem (it's a bit of a stretch). It's that when the game shipped, you only got 2 activations. Yes, you could only install it twice. Ever. Using another user account or install of windows requires another activation. Wipe windows, and try to install a third time? Activation denied. They then proceeded to flat out lie and say uninstalling the game from windows before formatting would give you an activation 'credit' back. It didn't, and according to SecuROM never could.
The outrage over this on the 2K forums made them raise the limit to 5 installs on a given copy of windows, and up to 5 installs on different machines. Ever. Problem solved, right? I mean, who ever installs software they buy more than 5 times, right? Must be pirates. They want to carry on playing in a couple of years, they can go buy a new copy.
Oh, and they'll release a utility at some point in the future that when run, will supposedly uninstall the game and 'deregister' your install with the online securom database, thus giving you the privilege of reinstalling your own game on your own computer one more time. Just hope windows doesn't go belly up before you get to unregister. And I can't wait for the day all games do this, and I have to run round manually deregistering all of them prior to a reinstall with different tools. Then calling support when it doesn't work and won't let me reinstall.