Very Surprised Sony Would Go This Far...
Ok. Now this is some crazy stuff... Apparently Sony will install a rootkit on your computer (without asking and without notification in their EULA), if you insert some of their music CDs in your computer.
Mark Russinovich of Sysinternals figured this one out. Here is what happened in a nutshell: He bought a Van Zant CD that had some copy protection built in. What he did not know at first was that when the CD was inserted it automatically installed a rootkit on his computer without prompting.
Later as Mark was testing some of his software he was surprised to find a rootkit on his computer. Now there are few people around that rival Mark's technical skills in windows. And being the uber techie he methodically isolatedthe infection and traced this back to Sony and a company called First4Internet. Apparently, the rootkit was also not well written and could potentially have a negative impact on the users system. And uninstallation attempts will render your CD ROM useless.
For a very interesting read check out this article that Mark wrote about his discovery process. Also, here is an eWeek opinion article about it. And here is an informative Infoworld article.
It seems that this software may have been shipping on Sony CD's since early in 2005.
I like iTunes. There is some DRM built in to the service, however, it uses reasonable restrictions (that they disclose) and you can get just about any music through their service for a very fair price ($.99/song). Interestingly the music industry is not happy about Apples success, however. Check out John Dvorak's opinion article about the matter. It is an eye opener.
I haven't blogged in a while, but I could not let this one slip by without saying something...
Mark Russinovich of Sysinternals figured this one out. Here is what happened in a nutshell: He bought a Van Zant CD that had some copy protection built in. What he did not know at first was that when the CD was inserted it automatically installed a rootkit on his computer without prompting.
Later as Mark was testing some of his software he was surprised to find a rootkit on his computer. Now there are few people around that rival Mark's technical skills in windows. And being the uber techie he methodically isolatedthe infection and traced this back to Sony and a company called First4Internet. Apparently, the rootkit was also not well written and could potentially have a negative impact on the users system. And uninstallation attempts will render your CD ROM useless.
For a very interesting read check out this article that Mark wrote about his discovery process. Also, here is an eWeek opinion article about it. And here is an informative Infoworld article.
It seems that this software may have been shipping on Sony CD's since early in 2005.
- Here is a link to the Sony site that publishes a utility to unhide the software
- Here is a link to a site that is compiling a list of the CDs containing this malware
I like iTunes. There is some DRM built in to the service, however, it uses reasonable restrictions (that they disclose) and you can get just about any music through their service for a very fair price ($.99/song). Interestingly the music industry is not happy about Apples success, however. Check out John Dvorak's opinion article about the matter. It is an eye opener.
I haven't blogged in a while, but I could not let this one slip by without saying something...
Steve, you are so right on about this one. Thanks for the heads up and the links to more info. I think that destroying property (the cd rom) when you try to uninstall should be illegal. ~pmjj
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9:17 AM