WARNING: Sony music CDs may install rootkits on Mac

I don't normally care one way or the other about this sort of thing: nine times out of ten a copy-protected disc runs just fine in iTunes on Mac (unless the copy protection makes the disc unusual [a few years ago there was one which had to be circumvented with a permanent marker]).

But this is ridiculous, and I just need to rant. Sony has been whining for years about the problems they're experiencing financially. Their solution is to lock the paying customers out of the full use of their disc in a way that opens them up to attack from viruses and Trojans (technically it IS a Trojan itself). This solution costs a whole bunch of money, too, mind you. They've had to employ a DRM manufacturer to make this technology. Then, as if paying for the DRM support for PCs wasn't enough, they also commissioned the Kernel Extensions to OS X! THESE EXTENSIONS AREN'T INSTALLED UNTIL YOU RUN THE INSTALLER. What a waste of money.

If they want to stop file-sharing, make CDs cheaper, and better. If people can get good music for a reasonable price, they'll gladly pay for it: look at iTMS. And that's DRMed! If they sold CDs in stores for half the price they currently do, they'd sell a heck of a lot more units (but they're kidding themselves if they think people will stop pirating. Often it's a case of not being able to FIND the music you want, either because of cultural or proximity divisions, but the more people leave the File sharing networks, the less people are there sharing music, and therefore the less music there is there to share. When there ends up being like one person sharing the latest such-and-such album at 128kbps VBR MP3, who wants to sit there downloading 20 songs, if they can spend five minutes and get a full-quality CD version for a pittance?
 
According to Slashdot's roundup today, Sony has recalled all its XCP music CDs from stores. A spyware removal company is reporting that the rootkit has infected at least 500,000 Windows computers. And Microsoft have classified it as spyware and are including it in their anti-spyware definitions.

Lets hope Sony learns a lesson from this, and doesn't try it again.

However, they have also just filed for a patent for a new copy protection system (apparently for the PlayStation 3) which will lock each game to a specific console, making it impossible for users to rent out games, play games on a friend's console, trade used games or replace your console if it fails or is stolen (without losing all your games, that is).

I think we'll have to wait and see if Sony are foolish enough to do this.

EDIT: Sony has denied that this patent is to be used to allow PS3 games to be locked to a particular console. Source: http://www.playfuls.com/news_3827.html
 
Why? Why does Sony think this is a worthwhile expense to incur? Was the Playstation 2 not profitable enough? How does Sony expect that treating its customers like criminals will regain them the market share Microsoft has been taking from them recently?
 
Well to me it looks like Sony came out of this with egg on their face. Something that I only saw once(on the net) is creeping into my head, if Sony music has done this, what about the new Blue-Ray technology? The promised other side of optical media is not looking so good now. Food for thought.
 
Apparently someone (I forget who) is trying to get certain DRM mechanisms built into the Blu-Ray standard. However, I think these particular mechanisms are exactly the same ones used in the competing HD-DVD standard. So I'm still pulling for Blu-Ray here.

Correct me if my understanding is outdated.
 
I can understand that -- I highly doubt that Blu-Ray would implement the same kind of auto-installing rootkit that these audio CDs used, though. Since the Blu-Ray spec isn't finalized (or is it?), I would assume that the DRM would eventually be something along the lines of data encryption (like Macrovision on steroids) rather than the disk containing unencrypted data along with an auto-installing rootkit (like with Sony's Audio CDs).
 
IIRC, it's Sun that's behind the Blu-Ray DRM. I think the connection that's being attempted to be made is that if Sony Music/BMG will do this to their music CD customers, then they'd do it with the Blu-Ray disks.

Personally... I totally disagree with that assumption.
 
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