Sony Pulls Controversial Anti-Piracy Software 389
An anonymous reader writes "Bowing to public outrage, Sony BMG has temporarily halted the use of its controversial anti-piracy software in all of its music CDs, the company said in a statement today. The move comes just a day after a top Bush administration official chided Sony and the entertainment industry for going too far: according to this story over at Washingtonpost.com, Stewart Baker, the Department of Homeland Security's policy czar warned would-be DRM makers: 'It's very important to remember that it's your intellectual property -- it's not your computer. And in the pursuit of protection of intellectual property, it's important not to defeat or undermine the security measures that people need to adopt in these days.' The Post has the full text and video of his commentary." We've reported on this story previously.
Sony's anti-piracy software in violation of LGPL? (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.webwereld.nl/articles/38285 [webwereld.nl]
Someone in the Netherlands claims to have found certain strings from Lame's source code in Sony's app. Did Sony steal LGPL'd code?
Re:Dept of Homeland Security? (Score:3, Informative)
Homeland Security (Score:5, Informative)
So now, can Sony be pursued for violation of the USA/Patriot act?
Re:They'll still be liable though (Score:5, Informative)
Among other things, Sony is specifically accused of fraud, false advertising, trespass and violation of state and federal statues prohibiting malware, and unauthorized computer tampering,
Re:Dept of Homeland Security? (Score:5, Informative)
"If we have an avian flu outbreak here and it is even half as bad as the 1918 flu epidemic, we will be enormously dependent on being able to get remote access for a large number of people, and keeping the infrastructure functioning is a matter of life and death and we take it very seriously."
Makes reasonable sense to me.
Why DRM won't work (Score:5, Informative)
"DRM punishes honest people!"
Using Sony and Apple as examples of companies that are using DRM to *punish* consumers, he suggests Microsoft use the opportunity to once again champion users' rights. To follow our current path, Cory argues, is to stifle innovation and contradict the purpose of American copyright law: to promote the useful arts and sciences."
I always find it very remarkable that the content industry treats the people who pay for their products -- in other industries also known as customers -- as criminals. People don't buy cd's because they want to screw the people who made them and make a zillion copies. Those people buy the damn things because they do *not* want to wast their time on copying!
And I also don't think the way customers are treated is in the interest of the artists, in whose name this whole mess is being created. Take a look at an excellent article by Janis Ian, a respectable musician:
http://www.janisian.com/article-internet_debacle.
"They told me downloads were "destroying sales", "ruining the music industry", and "costing you money".
Costing me money? I don't pretend to be an expert on intellectual property law, but I do know one thing. If a music industry executive claims I should agree with their agenda because it will make me more money, I put my hand on my wallet...and check it after they leave, just to make sure nothing's missing."
For what it's worth: this is a women who made more then 25 albums and wrote some very well known songs for other artists. One of her most known songs is "At seventeen", which can be downloaded for free, just like some other songs of her:
http://www.individualidade.com.br/janisian/mp3/ja
http://www.janisian.com/mp3_downloads.html [janisian.com]
Re:Sony's anti-piracy software in violation of LGP (Score:5, Informative)
http://dewinter.com/modules.php?name=News&file=ar
"A computerexpert, whose name is known by the redaction, discovered that the cd "Get Right With The Man" by "Van Zant" contains strings from the library version.c of Lame. This can be conluded from the string: "http://www.mp3dev.org/", "0.90", "LAME3.95", "3.95", "3.95 ".
But the expert has more proof. For example, the executable program go.exe contains a so called array largetbl. This is a part used in the module tables.c of libmp3lame."
Wait a minute... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Who will "trust" them next time? (Score:5, Informative)
"The [music] industry will take whatever steps it needs to protect itself and protect its revenue streams. It will not lose that revenue stream, no matter what. Sony is going to take aggressive steps to stop this. We will develop technology that transcends the individual user. We will firewall Napster at source - we will block it at your cable company, we will block it at your phone company, we will block it at your [ISP]. We will firewall it at your PC. These strategies are being aggressively pursued because there is simply too much at stake." --Steve Heckler, Sony senior VP, 2000
Re:Sony's anti-piracy software in violation of LGP (Score:3, Informative)
Re:What about removal? (Score:2, Informative)
yes, they will [sonybmg.com]. but you have to ask and wait on customer service to get the uninstall program, and once you've run it your computer can no longer play the CD (without reinstalling the rootkit).
Re:Wait a minute... (Score:5, Informative)
The old /. article is misleading.
Assuming there is Mac DRM software on the CD, a user still has to (1) explicitly start the installer (no autorun on Mac), and (2) type in a password to authorize the installation of root-priviledged software. Thus, for once Sony is correct and only mildly spinning.
Good to create DRM awareness on everybody (Score:5, Informative)
"We also intend to re-examine all aspects of our content protection initiative to be sure that it continues to meet our goals of security and ease of consumer use," Sony BMG added.
I really can't believe this clown is saying that. Did they ever have a security goal in mind??? Does this statement mean that they continue to do business as usual???
I went back to their FAQs [sonybmg.com], and found a few interesting lines:
- You must log on to your computer with Administrator rights or Power User rights to fully use the disc.
So I must be an admin just to listen to Ricky Martin??? Gimme a break.
- To date, Apple has not been willing to cooperate with our protection vendors to make ripping to iTunes and to the iPod a simple experience.
And hopefully it'll stay that way for a long, long, long time...
- the protection components are never installed without the consumer first accepting the End User License Agreement.
But nowhere in the EULA [sysinternals.com] it is mentioned what the user is in fact installing.
- If at some point you wish to remove the software from your machine simply contact customer service through this link. You will, though, be unable to use the disc on your computer once you uninstall the components.
Now this is another issue. Sony is marketing their discs as CDs [sonymusicstore.com], but their are not campatible with standard CD players??? They can't slap the CD [wikipedia.org] logo anywhere they want and get away with it. They have to follow the standards [wikipedia.org], or call their DRM discs something else and anounce in big bold letters that such disc may not be playable in all devices.
Let's take advantage of this whole mess with Sony. Right now is the perfect time to create some awareness on the average Joe about the implications of DRM and how the insdustry is going way too far with it.
Re:Why can't they go to jail? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Why can't they go to jail? (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/cybercrime/1030_new
Sentences ranging from fines up to 20 years imprisonment.
Re:Keep up the pressure (Score:4, Informative)
I heard Sony might ship the PS3 infected with DRM [playstation.com] that will only allow the games to be played a set number of times before the license expires. I for one will not be upgrading my PS2 to the PS3, the risk is too great.
Re:OMG... Overload!!! (Score:3, Informative)
Hmm.. was that the one where he ordered the missle bombardment of an aspirin factory, or the one where the beaurocratic shackles he had previously placed on the CIA, the FBI and the military caused the information about Bin Laden to arrive so late that we blew up an empty mud hut? Could you refresh my memory?
Re:Why can't they go to jail? (Score:4, Informative)
Perhaps we should consider the actual damage done. Is the damage so severe and widespread that someone needs to (essentially) pay with their life? I believe that many of the felons convicted for computer crimes probably shouldn't have been felony convictions in the first place. Most of these (in the early days, especially) were just kids trying to prove a point (or proof of concept). When caught, they were usually to make an example of by a DA or judge. However, just because it happened to one group of people, making the same thing happen to another group doesn't make it right.
Do you really believe that it's fair to interpret these new laws so broadly and liberally hand out prison sentences?
Is this really a terrible abuse of power? It didn't take long for the information about the rootkit to become publicly available, and those who care decided not to buy any of the Sony CD's. In this case, I don't think that there is some executive sitting in his huge leather chair manicly laughing about owning another PC every time that a user inserts a CD. This sounds more like a company (Sony) made an uninformed decision to purchase a bad technology. Microsoft is just as culpible for their administrator-rights-for-everyone and allowing autorun by default. Further, the end users should know better and turn autorun off, as well as not using superuser level rights for day-to-day use. Should Steve Ballmer be thrown into jail, or the users for making the 'net a less safe place? These could all be constrewed as negligent acts, especially by the standards that you're holding these businesses to.
Before we get into this any further, I'll suggest reading up on Sarbanes Oxley [wikipedia.org]. It was put in place to hold senior management responsible for their financial indiscretions...mostly for financial record keeping, but really -- it was set up so that company officers couldn't claim igorance of their company's misdoings. So to answer your question, what you've asked for has been done. Perhaps you could give the law a chance to work. It does take a while. There will also be class action suits filed against the company. This will hurt management, as well as the shareholders.
Sen. Orrin Hatch's Plan Home to Roost... (Score:1, Informative)
http://anandtech.com/news/shownews.aspx?i=19802 [anandtech.com]
"If that's the only way, then I'm all for destroying their machines"
I guess Sony must have felt they got the green light from Mr. Hatch when they put this genius plot together... A Holes
Hatch 4 President!