As in it's oh-so-bloody-rare when I call things accurately, but guess what? I GOT ONE RIGHT!

Lawyers are preparing themselves for a little of that Class Action bizness against Sony BMG.

Sony rightly came under fire last week from programmers and Internet users for injecting an undetectable copy-prevention utility into Microsoft Windows when certain CDs are inserted.

Now the lawyers are taking aim, too. Robert Green, a partner at the San Francisco firm of Green Welling, says he's readying a class action lawsuit against Sony.

"We're still investigating the case and talking to different people about what happened to them," Green said on Friday. He plans to argue that under California law, if you buy a copy-protected CD from a music store, you should be informed that a spyware-like utility will be implanted on your hard drive.

{...}Still, it may be too late for the entertainment giant to fend off the plaintiff's bar. One recent court case in Illinois, Soleto v. DirectRevenue, sets a nonbinding precedent that lawyers expect to be invoked against Sony.

In that case, DirectRevenue was sued for installing spyware on Windows computers without obtaining proper authorization from a user. U.S. District Judge Robert Gettleman said the company could be sued on trespass, Illinois consumer fraud, negligence, and computer tampering grounds.

Then there's a California spyware-related law that says a company may not "induce" anyone to "install a software component" by claiming installation is necessary to "open, view or play a particular type of content."

Translation: Sony could be in double trouble. Its Windows software is hardly necessary to play music--the disc works just fine on a Macintosh or in an old-fashioned CD player.{...}

But wait, it gets better. It turns out the average joe user might be violating the DMCA (Digital Millenium Copyright Act) when they try to remove Sony's Rootkit from their machine:

{...}In a bizarre twist, though, it's not only Sony that could be facing a legal migraine. So could anyone who tries to rid their computer of Sony's hidden anticopying program.

That's because of Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which bans the "circumvention" of anticopying technology.

"I think it's pretty clear that circumventing Sony's controls violates the DMCA," says Tim Wu, a Columbia University professor who teaches copyright law. {...}

Wu noted that one possible reprieve might come from last year's ruling from a federal appeals court in a case dealing with garage door openers--it said no copyright violations were taking place, so no DMCA violation occurred. Then again, another federal appeals court objected to bypassing anticopying technology used in DVDs, which is probably a closer analogy. {...}

This whole situation, to put it mildly, is fucked up.

You have to love how Sony's spinning it, too.

{...}After taking issue with anyone using the terms "spyware, malware or rootkit," Thomas Hesse, President of Sony's Global Digital Business, literally says: "Most people, I think, don't even know what a rootkit is, so why should they care about it?"{...}

{my emphasis}

I believe the Brits would call that "cheek."

Posted by: Kathy at 11:46 AM | Comments (7) | Add Comment
Post contains 509 words, total size 4 kb.

1 Mark's Sysinternals Blog Found this through WinXP News. What *I* want to know is: is there an easy way for a 'puter 'tard like me to find if this crap is on my system? If so, I want part of this class-action. Damnit.

Posted by: Margi at November 08, 2005 01:42 PM (nwEQH)

2 Crappity crap. I meant: Mark's Sysinternals Blog

Posted by: Margi at November 08, 2005 01:45 PM (nwEQH)

3 I'll make sure the husband sees this, Margi. If anyone knows, he will. And if he doesn't, well, it will present an excuse for him to investigate further I married a curious boy, god help me.

Posted by: Kathy at November 08, 2005 02:01 PM (kZ6IS)

4 Thank you, sweetie. MRN is teh R0x0rs! And you forgot the last part: You married a curious boy -- WHO LOOKS LIKE PATRICK SWAYZE!! *grin*

Posted by: Margi at November 08, 2005 03:15 PM (nwEQH)

5 God, I looked at your original post and thought "aw if only I had the resources" the action would already be filed! Just glad my primary 'puter right now is a Mac - checked with my own curious george & Mac's still safe at this point. Not surprised Margi my love sent in a response - shrinking violet that she is.

Posted by: Cheri at November 08, 2005 03:34 PM (uqOYi)

6 Fasten your seatbelts, boys. It's going to be a bumpy night. First, off, I don't have a good answer yet for how to get the shit off your machine. The best method as of right now is very technical, requireing several dozen steps and a level of comfort messing about with the internals of the operating system that 99% of the computer using public just doesn't have. (Nor should they be required to! just to use equipment and products that they paid money for and have a reasonable expectation of ownership and thereofre control rights to!!!!) If you like, you can try to follow the instructions presented by SonyBMG here. but from what I understand, this doesn't really solve the deeper issues at hand. I'd reccommend against it. One place you could start your search is here. They've got a list (that is growing, frighteningly) of the CD's known to be corrupted with this malicious shit. I will keep Kathy (and by proxy, you, her devoted Cake Eater readers) up to date as I learn more. For the technically minded of you, go read Russinovich's detailed account of his detective work so far. It's a brilliant bit of hacking and the man deserves to be nominated for some sort of prize for unearthing this attempt by a major corporation to control the lives of unsuspecting citizens. We have laws in this country still, don't we?

Posted by: MRN aka "The Husband" at November 08, 2005 06:15 PM (kZ6IS)

7 My apologies. The link to the list of "bad" CD's above is actually a list of known CD's that many people have had trouble ripping for one reason or another. It is not a list of CD's with Sony/first4internet's Rootkit DRM.

Posted by: MRN aka "The Husband" at November 08, 2005 11:42 PM (kZ6IS)

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