Sony’s even sleazier than I thought

In the comments to my earlier post on the sleazy DRM software that Sony is pushing, Charles Arthur (who has a very cool new job) points out that I was mistaken to accuse Sony of installing this crap “without any notification or any attempt to obtain your consent.” Fair enough. As Charles points out, the original post from Mark Russinovich at Sysinternals.com includes a reference to the end-user license agreement (EULA) for the Sony DRM software that does indeed refer to a software installation and could be construed to be a notification. In fact, Russinovich’s post is unclear on this issue. He has posted a copy of the EULA for the DRM software (with a key clause highlighted in yellow), but that license agreement is not the one that pops up when you first insert the CD. To see that license agreement, read the F-Secure write-up. (I’ve posted a copy of the screen shot here.)

This is how the makers of spyware work. See anything in the first screen that says you’re about to install a hidden file-system filter driver that will run at all times and cannot be uninstalled? See the scroll box (the small handle in the scroll bar) on the right of the dialog box? Judging by the size of the box, I estimate that you would need to scroll through approximately 25 screens to read the entire license agreement, and way down at the end it includes this line: “The SONY BMG PARTIES may from time to time provide you with updates of the SOFTWARE in a manner that the SONY BMG PARTIES deem to be appropriate.”

Folks, this is how spyware makers work. They provide misleading end-user license agreements that they count on users ignoring. They fail to disclose the true purpose or impact of their product. They fail to provide removal tools. They reserve the right to update their sleazy software at any time without any further notice or consent.

It’s even worse than I thought.