MASSIVE SECURITY HAZARD in Spore!

[nil]

that sounds there's been a lot of funs as EAxis turned into manipulating every aspect of sharing... cool... I'm waiting to see people start to share funwares through their secure system...

Anyway, the addiction of the customers by means of their imaginations and/or the success or charisma of the product VS the complains and disappoinment and frustration of the customers.
If the latter becomes strong enough statistically, most people quit and the sale line will be enervated.  Penalty back on the company administration.
If the former remains stronger, the company administration can get around it with ease for sale boom remains regardless of further poor quality and unpleasing acts.

This trading rule is pretty obvious and simple. Can the crowd just learn to control themselves instead of getting hooked up to be a slave? Let's see.

[J. M. Pescado]

There is another way.

Viva Los Gatos!

[Drakron]

.... And some may argue that the Sony BMG DRM and Sony DADC SecuROM are not the same, but the similarities are striking and frightening.
...

That is because THEY ARE NOT THE SAME DUMBASS.

Sony BMG used Extended Copy Protection, that is from First 4 Internet/Fortium Technologies Ltd and MediaMax CD-3 that is from SunnComm International Inc as SecuROM is a Sony product.

And I am not even going to the FUNCTIONS of each..

[Drakron]

Sony BMG is a major record label, one of the "Big Four" ... in the DRM case they are as guilty as EA since they used 3rd party software.

Of course we are talking about music CDs in that case, as someone said in Wikipedia talk page about that case

"The underlying problem is that CD standards were created before people had computers or the internet and do not cater for copy protection, and existing stand-alone players are not capable of being modified to facilitate changed CD standards. Consequently, all attempts to prevent copying CD's on pc's have to involve either (a) contriving a CD which will play on a standalone player, but is malformed in such a way as a pc cannot play it, or (b) making a CD with software on it as well as the music contect, where the software interferes with the use of the computer.

The problem with (a) is that increasingly, computer type cd drives are being used in stand-alone players and you end up with CD's that won't play in some players (eg some car CD players), and with (b) is that interfering with how the user has proper access to their computer also interferes with computer security."

SecuROM is a different matter ...

First its not a Rootkit, its gives a false positive because it adds null byte registry entry that raises the suspicious flag but its not one (at least nobody is saying that it is (besides idiots).

But that is not real issue with SecuROM, the issue is how EA decided to use some optional checks ... like the every 10 day online validation and the only 3 activations that were in Mass Effect (Bioshock also had the 3 activations but it seems Take2 at least knows what the hell they are doing).

The only similarity is they run as a program but SecuROM runs as ring 3 (least privilaged) as XCP runs as ring 0 (Kernel, meaning the most privileged).

Look I am FINE with roasting their asses but at least I am to be sure of why I am roasting their asses ... I know some people reported awful things with SecuROM as destroying their computers and all that but I am by nature suspicious, especially when there is a convenient target and that is what SecuROM became with BioShock.

I am not part of Sony fanclub, I am PAL and so I have been screwed over by Sony too many times to have any love for then but in this case, I am assured the blame lies with EA (after all, they were the ones that created the stupidity that Pescado found).

[edalbformat]

"Better Locks make Better Burglars"

It is really ridiculous when companies lose most of their time inventing better ways to protect their products. In games case, they are becoming everytime cheaper, for no other reason than that Data products (the whole Electronics business in general) are branches where things develop faster than one can register in the account books and normally become obsolete before reaching the market. The companies that are more worried about losing income are exactly the ones that are alone in market and have power to threaten the concurrence with psycho terror. In the case of TS for example, when I first bought TS1 I had to pay about 100 USdollars per unit (and I have 23 legal copies of the crap). TS2 is being sold for the half of the price (at present exchange that is much lower). Stuff packs are very low priced (though they are not worth more than this too). I would not dirty my name for so low amount and have never used piracy. The case is that the situation makes the criminal and I would probably also look for piracy if too many hamperances are made for my access.
I hate to be dealt as a criminal in spite of all my concious and wish to be "on the right side of the road". The practical result is that "if I'm judged as a criminal before I really become one, then we are on the same holed boat and we can join the devil if we cannot fight him. 
The consumer is the most important part of deal, but most of the time it is classified just as the useful "idiot". No wonder. Most of the consumers don't care to be more than the useful idiot.
And I do not believe that so big weapons are necessary against the normal user. Just as test, I've been teasing most of the active users that are involved in modding and none of them seems to be capable to take actions against the power. To say the truth, the majority of the users don't know how to make more than some recolors or some very simple modifications.
Who are really the big dangerous ones? To spread something you need, first MONEY, second ACCESS to sophisticated equipment and programs.
None of us have none of both.

[Liz]

Game players are developping the same relation as the whore to the pimp. You destroy me but what am I without you?
-x-x-x-x-x-
90% of the people in this planet, should use the brain outside the cranium.  It is only decorative anyway!

Who needs Gali?

The companies that are more worried about losing income are exactly the ones that are alone in market and have power to threaten the concurrence with psycho terror... The practical result is that "if I'm judged as a criminal before I really become one, then we are on the same holed boat and we can join the devil if we cannot fight him.

Gali Jr. is full of truth and win.

.... And some may argue that the Sony BMG DRM and Sony DADC SecuROM are not the same...

That is because THEY ARE NOT THE SAME DUMBASS.

They are SEPARATE DUMBASSES! So sayeth the Drakron.

[IAmTheRad]

Oh, I never use my real name for anything besides only 2 email accounts. That's it. My computer name is completely different than my real name, and I doubt that anybody will even try to use my fake computer name for any malicious purposes.

I'm smarter than most of the sheeple who actually use their names for their logins. Usually I'm the only person who uses my computer, and if anyone else does, they use my username. So I'm in no threat of being attacked by a malicious person finding out my Spore login name then managing to get my ip address to hack my computer. I know it's possible, but I don't keep anything important of value on my computer anyways.

It's the stupid people that will be effected by this. These stupid people are also the ones who have 'default' as their wireless network SSID and also have no password or MAC address filtering.

Not to mention that I actually got into someone's wireless who did this and also could have made his network my own if I wanted.

[J. M. Pescado]

Some people deliberately maintain unsecured wireless either because they want to provide public Internets, or because they want the plausible deniability of being able to blame some random person for anything they get accused of.

[Hegelian]

FWIW, I have no intention of installing Spore on my computer. Nonetheless, I am curious about exactly which user name is being used, and possibly exposed to unauthorized viewers, in this instance (it is not entirely clear from this discussion).

Basically, my question is, if my user name is 'Hegelian' and I use the User Account function to change it to 'Justinian', the associated folder in the "Documents and Settings" directory is still 'Hegelian'. Is the Spore software using the user name I can change, or the name of the user folder, which is a system folder cannot be changed by any normal means?

It is possible to move all the data for an existing administrator-level account to a new one and then delete the original account, but it's a bit of a PITA.

[Milhouse Trixibelle Saltfucker III]

So, now that the splotchen are overtaking torrent sites and the world at large, did anyone ever figure out how to excise the data from Splotchcritter image files?
(For the record, my computer username is not my own name or even something remotely dangerous in the hands of others, but I like mah privacy.)

[antechinus]

Is that all correct so far?  Anything I missed?

I think you missed the fact that EA sucks.

Hypothetical question: if person1 borrowed person2's game and wanted to load it onto another computer, but without loading SECUROM, or using one of the 3 activations, or allowing it to phone home- how would they go about doing this? Is there an equivalent of a no CD exe?
Assume person1 is ignorant, but can follow simple instructions.

[Zazazu]

There is a crack, yes. It's in the torrent, and it's also linked at GameCopyWorld. It's not hosted on GameCopyWorld though.

[antechinus]

Does the crack require arring the whole game, or is it some kind of replacement .exe?

[jsalemi]

Does the crack require arring the whole game, or is it some kind of replacement .exe?

If it's like pretty much every other crack, it just replaces the .exe, regardless of how you got the game.

[MaximilianPS]

but my username on vista is "max"... did you think i'm in danger ? 
it's a realy common name 

[Zazazu]

Yes! They are out to get you!


Shouldn't be an issue. The problem arises with people who use their whole name as their computer account name. Mine is only my first name, which isn't too uncommon. I am, as far as I can tell, the only person with my first and last name combination in the world.

[Ryslin]

My habit of various nicknames started at a young age pays off once again!
Oh Mea Someoneelse, I hardly knew ye.

[jsalemi]

If I'm reading the info correctly, the arrgh version doesn't support connecting online anyway, right?  You pretty much just play as a stand-alone game.

Is the same also true for the no-cd.exe?  Or can you get online with that one while avoiding suckrot?

[Jess Maree]

I used to have Jess as my account name, but now I have Jess Maree. It sounds a whole lot nicer than plain ol' Jess.

[MaximilianPS]

If I'm reading the info correctly, the arrgh version doesn't support connecting online anyway, right?  You pretty much just play as a stand-alone game.

Is the same also true for the no-cd.exe?  Or can you get online with that one while avoiding suckrot?

actually i'm playing with arrrgh version of the exe 'cause i hate to play with cd, but i'vent tryed to register/download anything, to be honest i didn't feel the need 

[sirnh]

Does anyone have any idea, when game tries to do an 'online activation'? I mean does it 'activate' when the game is intalling or does it 'activate' the first time you play the game? (I want to prevent it from activating, since the computer I use for gaming is not connected to the internet...at all. The internet is on another computer).

So if it activates when you first start the game, I have no problem (see gamecopyworld  ), otherwise...
(Yes, I want a copy I can legally hold in my hand)

[Drakron]

3 activations ... I guess even after the Mass FAILure they still have not learned.

I cannot wait for Sims 3 were a EA representative goes to your house in order to install the game.

[J. M. Pescado]

I used to have Jess as my account name, but now I have Jess Maree. It sounds a whole lot nicer than plain ol' Jess.

I suggest going with "Pedobait", so that it isn't identifying at all.

Does anyone have any idea, when game tries to do an 'online activation'? I mean does it 'activate' when the game is intalling or does it 'activate' the first time you play the game? (I want to prevent it from activating, since the computer I use for gaming is not connected to the internet...at all. The internet is on another computer).

It activates everytime time it goes on the Internet, which is, normally, every time you play the game.

(Yes, I want a copy I can legally hold in my hand)

Get off my site!

[Liz]

What news, exactly, do you want him/us to spread? The security hazard? The torrent-ability? Neither is really new news.

[EntropyGuardian]

I haven't even played Apartment Life. Spore just owns too much. My actual copy arrives today and it will be grand.