Sony's Rootkit Still Causing Problems For Users

from the great-move dept

Wed, Sep 13th 2006 9:07pm — Mike Masnick

It's been a little under a year since Sony BMG's infamous rootkit became a big story -- costing Sony a tremendous amount of bad publicity and money in lawsuit settlements and recalls. Turns out that the XCP copy protection they used is still causing problems. Since the rootkit was discovered, plenty of security software products have added it to their list of things to protect against. There's just one problem: some security products from AOL and CA apparently have trouble removing XCP properly -- often causing a computer's CD-ROM drive to stop working. Of course, many users may not use the CD drive right away, and so they won't even know why it stopped working. A patch has now been issued, but it shows how long these types of things continue to cause problems.

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18 Comments

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Mac (L)user, 13 Sep 2006 @ 11:06pm

Freaking Sony
You know, first it was the rootkit and now it is their batteries. One is an anomaly, two can be construed as a coincidence, but if Sony pulls any more crap, three is without a doubt a pattern.

Stupid Sony, what did they ever do for anyone anyway?
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Daniel, 14 Sep 2006 @ 1:02am

Marketing Plot!
That's just a very intelligent ploy to create hype about the PS3!
Everyone is talking about Sony and their rootkit and then BAM! They release the PS3 with a game bundled and you guessed it ... Rootkit!

Rootkit, created by Rockstar Games, its a GTA spinoff but insted of stealing cars and beating drugs dealers, you steal the consumers and beat the crap out of them*!
Its fun guaranteed for all the family.

* Baseball bat not included.
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?, 14 Sep 2006 @ 3:03am

Re: Marketing Plot!
I put in my preorder this morning as soon as I read this.
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Big #1, 14 Sep 2006 @ 3:30am

Sony
It's a darn shame.
Sony used to make great products and that was how they made money.
When did they start worrying about what was going on in my hard drive?
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Sanguine Dream, 14 Sep 2006 @ 6:00am

What scares me...
is the PS3. If did decide to buy one and it has the ability to connect to the PSP, PC, TV and especially the internet I'd be damned if I'd use that connectivity. Imagine that thing running "updates" and "upgrades" in the background without you knowing it.
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Christine, 14 Sep 2006 @ 6:12am

Re: Freaking Sony
Mac (L)user: Stupid Sony, what did they ever do for anyone anyway?

Betamax!!! lol Seriously though, their record labels are as screwed up as the rest of the company... [not a sony fan here]
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Overcast, 14 Sep 2006 @ 6:23am

Real question is now, why would anyone buy anything from Sony anymore?

The only obvious thing the produce in mass quantity is lack of consumer trust.

Screw the PS3, I wanted one, but god only knows what information it'll be sending back to Sony. I think I'll go with the Xbox this time around.
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Hehe, 14 Sep 2006 @ 6:26am

How funny would it be if, in typical Sony fashion, the rootkit installs on the PS3 and totally disables the BluRay drive after a patch.
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Boris Jacobsen, 14 Sep 2006 @ 6:31am

Three is a pattern....
Sony also announced they are delaying European release of the PS3 from November until March, thus missing the vital Christmas sales. What a shame!
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h4xor66, 14 Sep 2006 @ 8:05am

boycott sony
i stopped using or buying anything that had the sony name on it the day i heard about the root kit .... i cant believe all the sony products i had , but i had a garage sale and got rid of it all ........... as long as i live i will never give sony one single cent of my money ....... if they offered to give me completely free equipment for life i would tell them to get screwed ...... i only feel bad for all of the musical artists that are on the sony label , who wont be selling as many records because of sony's arrogance towards the end user ............... BOYCOTT SONY FOREVER
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Monarch, 14 Sep 2006 @ 8:42am

Re: boycott sony
You know I thought about your statement "if they offered to give me completely free equipment for life i would tell them to get screwed "
Well I thought, I'd take a Sony Vaio notebook for free. I could reformat the hard drive and install software from scratch, but..,
Then I remembered 2 things:
1) A Friend bought one back in 2000, He didn't want to run ME on it, and Sony wouldn't provide him with the drivers for Windows 2000. Why, because he didn't purchase the Windows 2000 model (Which was almost $200 more, same machine just different OS). Needless to say, he still reformated and installed 98se
2) Who knows what garabe Sony could have hardcoded into the chips on the motherboard
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riaa, 14 Sep 2006 @ 8:50am

let us not forget . . .
sony is one of the leading companies in the RIAA
who knows what crazy sh*t the PS3 will be doing
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Anonymous Coward, 14 Sep 2006 @ 9:01am

Re: Sony
Because it is now obvious that the more you control a consumers hard drive the more you control their lives.

Pretty pathetic reallly.
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greenzrx, 14 Sep 2006 @ 9:37am

Big surprise...
Why am i not surprised that the two companies mentioned that have difficulty removing the rootkit from your hard drive are AOL and Computer Associates.
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Sofia, 14 Sep 2006 @ 9:58am

Vaio notebook
D.MN SONY....

I got a VAIO notebook little more than a year ago and it has crashed on me 2x. first in December 2005 and last month... both crashed were the same the notebook just stop working... it would not turn on or anything...
the first time it was covered by the warranty and now it is not...
I just can not undestand what is going with SONY.......
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Paul, 14 Sep 2006 @ 10:19am

sony has always been..
way overpriced shoddy craftsmanship.
In almost every field of hardware they have ventured into there is a cheaper, better quality brand that is just plain better.
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BoltnJoe, 14 Sep 2006 @ 1:14pm

Stolen
There was a time when you could steal music or buy it. Then came this type of DRM crap. Now the only option is to steal it.

Ironic?
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Europe better at some things, 14 Sep 2006 @ 1:18pm

Re: Vaio notebook
Minimum warranty for laptops in Europe is 2 years.
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