Anti-Piracy Efforts Run Amok
Thursday, November 3rd, 2005 by JeffIt was recently discovered by Mark Russinovich in his SysInternals Blog that Sony Music has been quietly installing a “rootkit” on Windows computers of unsuspecting music buyers. This is a very unwelcome development in the Anti-Piracy Wars.
By doing this, Sony Music has stooped to the same level as the virus writers, and worse, they have made it easier for those same virus writers to “piggyback” on their work and install viruses or other “malware” that can avoid detection by virus scanners.
So what can be done? First of all, I will refuse to buy any music CDs that have any kind of digitial rights management (DRM) software on them. Secondly, I think Sony may be liable for any damage caused to computers by this software, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see them taken to court for this willful abuse.