Free rootkit, while supplies last!

[Ominous Gamer]

All you have to do is buy a Sony music CD.

http://www.sysinternals.com/blog/2005/10/sony-rootkits-and-digital-rights.html

"SysInternals.com guru Mark Russinovich has a detailed investigation of a rootkit from Sony Music. It's installed with a DRM-encumbered music CD, Van Zant's "Get Right with the Man". (Mmmm, delicious irony!) The rootkit introduces several security holes into the system that could be exploited by others, such as hiding any executable file that starts with '$sys$'. Russinovich also identifies several programming bugs in the method it uses to hook system calls, and chronicles the painful steps he had to take to 'exorcise the daemon' from his system." This house is clear
-Slashdot

removing it might result in an inaccessible CD drive letter.
-F-Secure (http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/#00000691)

Combine this with the new Analog Hole legislation....
Is there no limit for how low these companies will go? Here Sony is blaming pirates on why people don't buy music CDs :rolleyes:

[Stone Fox]

What made matters worse, was that using a root kit remover to disable it can junk your system!

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/11/01/sony_rootkit_drm/

[Ominous Gamer]

Looks like this story spread pretty fast. I'm glad this isn't one of those "lost in the cracks" sort of things.

http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/05/11/02/1421250.shtml?tid=233&tid=17
A couple of days ago we posted a story about Sony DRM installing a rootkit. Since then we have seen many more stories on the subject that I thought were worth sharing. manno gave us a link to the inquirer and salemnic sent us a page from the washington post. smallfries gave us one from PC Pro. It's nice to see this story not getting lost in the cracks since the implications are gigantic.

http://blogs.washingtonpost.com/securityfix/2005/11/sony_raids_hack.html
Russinovich also discovered that the Sony program drivers are configured to load themselves in "Safe Mode" (a diagnostic mode of Windows that is useful for fixing problems with the operating system), which he said could make system recovery extremely difficult if any of the program drivers has a bug that prevents the system from booting.

The folks over at Finnish anti-virus company F-Secure also spent several weeks trying to unravel the mysteries posed by a user of the company's anti-rootkit software -- Blacklight -- who found suspicious files that were later determined to be installed by the Sony antipiracy program (their detailed analysis of the rootkit program is here.)

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/79450/sony-drm-burrows-into-rootkit-code.html
Sony has made available instructions on how to remove the code, but has yet to respond to our requests for comment.

[Ominous Gamer]

Looks like TheInq wasn't happy with just one article on this, so they wrote two. :p

http://www.theinq.com/?article=27349
http://www.theinq.com/?article=27351

[Nova]

sweet, i'm soo glad i dont buy cd's. too rich for my blood.

[Ominous Gamer]

Another slashdot article
" It's not evil, but just in case... gmr2048 writes "Sony seems to have heard the commotion. They have offered a "Service Pack" to uninstall the DRM Rootkit. From the announcement: 'This Service Pack removes the cloaking technology component that has been recently discussed in a number of articles published regarding the XCP Technology used on SONY BMG content protected CDs. This component is not malicious and does not compromise security. However to alleviate any concerns that users may have about the program posing potential security vulnerabilities, this update has been released to enable users to remove this component from their computers.'"

Sony finally gave out the software needed to uninstall the crap, no more needing to contact their support. To bad it requires an activeX install :rolleyes:
http://cp.sonybmg.com/xcp/english/updates.html

[Ominous Gamer]

What do you get when you combine a program that scans and reads every program you have open, every url in your history, and every program installed on your company; with a program that does all that and hides DRM software?

A way for people to cheat in WoW
http://www.securityfocus.com/brief/34

People are using the rootkits ability to hide files and folders and they are installing their cheat programs with it.


Battle of the privacy invading programs has begun!

[Nova]

sweet, yet another reason to switch to linux. by the time vista hits the shelves we'll all be arguing which version of linux is better :p

[Stone Fox]

That news article is not actually true. The patch sony have released removes the cloaking - not the rootkit itself! It's still there and running, and removing it still cripples your windows install.

[Ominous Gamer]

As this continues to unfold...

http://www.infoworld.com/article/05/11/04/HNsonydrm_1.html
The patch can now crash your machine, who was surprised by that? :rolleyes:

Plus the article covers how the copy protection software actually communicates with Sony's server, with the ability to send how often you play the CD and your IP.

[Nova]

well that sucks and all but imagine what M$ might be doing.

[gokusimpson]

well that sucks and all but imagine what M$ might be doing.

Maybe they will make everyone buy new speakers as well as monitors.

[Stone Fox]

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b280/Abaddon001/bumposaur.jpg
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4424254.stm

Hahaha. Sony? Owned. :)

[Rudegar]

:(
rootkits are not on cd's we buy here unless they are importet
guess i have to buy one online before i can start making my own
rootbeer or what ever those kits are for ;)



p.s. vista will now include behaviour alternator software which have to be
Injected by the rectum it will be required before you can use vista without
it screaming with a nasal voice and sounding like a clock radio
and the monitor will be CGA
and it will make you hate free software anything else ms don’t care for this is including Sony so don’t worry about those kits ms will sort it out ;)

[Stone Fox]

:(
rootkits are not on cd's we buy here unless they are importet
guess i have to buy one online before i can start making my own
rootbeer or what ever those kits are for ;)



p.s. vista will now include behaviour alternator software which have to be
Injected by the rectum it will be required before you can use vista without
it screaming with a nasal voice and sounding like a clock radio
and the monitor will be CGA
and it will make you hate free software anything else ms don’t care for this is including Sony so don’t worry about those kits ms will sort it out ;)

Dude, have you been drinking? :)

No I'm serious!
this got DIY plasma written all over it
plasma is of cause boiling gas
and should you fart into your case then with 4 GPU's like that
and maybe along with an intel presscot
you got plasma :P

sure hope selling that plasma will fill the bottomless pit called ones wallet after
buying 2 of those dual gpu video cards ;)

Hmmm....

[Rudegar]

yeah i drank once

[Ominous Gamer]

This just keeps getting stranger.
http://dewinter.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=215

So Sony invades our privacy, claiming its to protect their copyright, but in doing so...its ok to steal code from others?

http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/05/11/15/1856213.shtml?tid=233&tid=158&tid=172&tid=185

Removal kit from Sony causes more problems.
Sony pulls all rootkit CDs.