Tentative Settlement in Sony Rootkit Lawsuits

[Wiz Feinberg]

This is a followup to the two page thread that began on October 31, regarding the discovery of a rootkit being installed on PCs, when the user played a Copy Protected CD from Sony/BMG. The original thread is here.
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<h3>Federal judge tentatively approves Sony BMG tainted CD rootkit settlement</h3>

"A judge Friday tentatively approved a proposed settlement of lawsuits
against Sony BMG Music Entertainment that would give millions of
consumers free music downloads to compensate them for flawed software
on CDs," The Associated Press reports. "U.S. District Judge Naomi
Reice Buchwald gave her approval after a hearing in which lawyers
explained the deal that requires the world's second-largest music
label to stop manufacturing compact discs software that can leave
computers vulnerable to hackers. The settlement pertained to lawsuits
alleging that the vulnerabilities were created by MediaMax software or
with extended copy protection or XCP software."

"According to terms of the settlement, Sony BMG will let consumers who
bought the CDs receive replacement discs without the anti-piracy
technology and will let them choose one of two incentive packages," AP
reports. "The first package lets consumers who bought XCP CDs to
obtain a cash payment of $7.50 and a promotion code allowing them to
download one additional album from a list of more than 200 titles. The
second package permits them to download three additional albums from
the list. The court papers said Sony BMG would try to offer Apple
Computer Inc.'s iTunes as one of the download services available to
the consumers."

Full article here:



------------------
Bob "Wiz" Feinberg
Moderator of the SGF Computers Forum
<small>Visit my Wiztunes Steel Guitar website at: http://www.wiztunes.com/
or my computer troubleshooting website: Wizcrafts Computer Services,
or my Webmaster Services webpage</small>

[b0b]

I would have prefered jail time for the Sony executives that okayed the infection of all those computers. They're getting off pretty easy, if you ask me.

[Bob Martin]

What good is those few measley tunes going to do for the poor folks that lost an operating system and had to take their machine to the shop and pay thru the nose to get it fixed. That's almost a joke no it is a joke.

I'd sure like to see folks get a new computer or at least some sort of compensation that cost Sony some money not just free music that costs them nothing.

Bob

[David L. Donald]

Getting off unconcionably...

You can tell how bad it was
and how culpable they are,
but how fast this was settled.

AMAZINGLY fast....

[John Fabian]

Bet the lawyers made out like bandits. :0