Sony's rootkit infringes LAME GPL licence and breaks copyright

Quakester2000

November 19, 2005

DamnedIfIknow, eranros, hyqwn and lanky used our news submit to tell us that on closer inspection of Sony's Audio XCP rootkit it has been found that it infringes copyright. From the inspection it has been found that the LAME Encoder code has been used in the XCP rootkit which is licenced under the Lesser General Public Licence (LGPL). The LGPL licence means that those that change or add things to the code MUST publish some of the code they write so that other people can see the changes made.

Sony has
definetly not done this, and this constitutes a breach of the LGPL
licence. Sony likes to tell consumers and the media a like that they need
to protect their work from infringers and copyright theives. When it comes to
other peoples work that is done for free it doesnt really
matter as it seems the XCP rootkit has clearly violated LAME's
licence.

Close examination of the rootkit that Sony"s audio CDs attack their customers" PCs with has revealed that their malicious software is built on code that infringes on copyright. Indications are that Sony has included the LAME music encoder, which is licensed under the Lesser General Public License (LGPL), which requires that those who use it attribute the original software and publish some of the code they write to use the library.

Sony has done none of this. The evidence against Sony is compelling, and this further reveals the hypocrisy of Sony"s actions. Sony claims that it needs to install dangerous, malicious, underhanded software on its customers" computers to protect its copyrights, but in order to write this malware, it has no compunction about infringing on the copyrights of public-spirited software authors who make their works available under free software licenses like the GPL.

Source: BoingBoing