CITP Blog is hosted by Princeton University’s Center for Information Technology Policy, a research center that studies digital technologies in public life. Here you’ll find comment and analysis from the digital frontier, written by the Center’s faculty, students, and friends.
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Advocates of DRM (copy protection) have been keeping their heads down lately, while they try to figure out what went wrong in the SonyBMG DRM spyware fiasco. No doubt they’ll…
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Not Just Another Buggy Program
Was anybody surprised at Tuesday’s announcement that the MediaMax copy protection software on Sony CDs had a serious security flaw? I sure wasn’t. The folks at iSEC Partners were clever…
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MediaMax Bug Found; Patch Issued; Patch Suffers from Same Bug
iSEC, EFF, and SonyBMG issued a joint press release yesterday, announcing yet another serious security bug in the SunnComm MediaMax copy protection software that ships on many SonyBMG compact discs.…
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DRM, Incompatibility, and Market Power: A Visit to the Sausage Factory
Yesterday Alex wrote about how SonyBMG’s XCP CD copy protection software includes a feature – apparently built on illegally copied open-source code – to translate music files into the FairPlay…
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Hidden Feature in Sony DRM Uses Open Source Code to Add Apple DRM
For weeks, the blogosphere has been abuzz with tales of intrigue about Sony’s XCP copy protection system. Among the strangest revelations was that XCP itself infringes on the copyrights to…
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The DMCA Should Not Protect Spyware
Yesterday was the deadline to submit requests for limited exemptions from the DMCA’s ban on circumvention of access control technologies. This happens every three years. Alex Halderman and I submitted…
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Sony, First4 Knew About Rootkit Issue in Advance
Security vendor F-Secure contacted SonyBMG and First4Internet about the companies’ rootkit software on October 4 – about four weeks before the issue became public – according to a Business Week…
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MediaMax Permanently Installs and Runs Unwanted Software, Even If User Declines EULA
In an earlier post I described how MediaMax, a CD DRM system used by Sony-BMG and other record labels, behaves like spyware. (MediaMax is not the same as XCP, the…
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What Does MediaMax Accomplish?
I wrote yesterday about the security risks imposed by the SunnComm MediaMax copy protection technology that ships on some Sony CDs. (This is not to be confused with the XCP…
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More Suits Filed; MediaMax Insecurity Remains
Yesterday two lawsuits were filed against Sony, by the Texas Attorney General and the EFF. The Texas suit claims that Sony’s XCP technology violates the state’s spyware law. The EFF…