M$ && Sending files back? [was: SOT: w2k alters mbr]

[dlapointe at attbi.com]

Wasn't there an incident with Kazaa recently where 
a bogus update was sent out which disabled a competitor's
software?

David
> Chuck,
> 
> I'm not sure about John's statement, but I do know that the EULA that you
> sign when you download Microsoft Media Player has the following paragraph in
> it:
> 
> *	Digital Rights Management (Security).  You agree that in order to
> protect the integrity of content and software protected by digital rights
> management ("Secure Content"), Microsoft may provide security related
> updates to the OS Components that will be automatically downloaded onto your
> computer.  These security related updates may disable your ability to copy
> and/or play Secure Content and use other software on your computer.  If we
> provide such a security update, we will use reasonable efforts to post
> notices on a web site explaining the update.
> 
> After reading this Gem of legalese, I take it to mean that microsoft can at
> its own discretion decide what you can or can not run on your machine.  If
> it feels that "Tim's magical music ripper" is being used to rip cd's into a
> format that lacks some form of Digital Rights Management built into it, they
> could send down an update that would inhibit it from running.
> 
> Thanks,
> Tim.
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Chuck Young [mailto:chy at genuity.com]
> Sent: Monday, June 17, 2002 11:18 AM
> To: John Chambers
> Cc: discuss at blu.org
> Subject: RE: M$ && Sending files back? [was: SOT: w2k alters mbr]
> 
> 
> Of course I've never read all of the EULA, but is the statement:
> 
> "by booting W2K you've also given them permission to send any of your files
> back
> to headquarters, to use as they wish."
> 
> really true?  Just askin' for a rundown on where that came from.  I'm not an
> advocate of MS, but I'd like to know if this is the real deal or if you are
> just taking poetic liberties here.  I mean, I like poetry too...
> 
> ---------------
> Chuck Young
> Security Consulting
> Genuity E-Services
> --------------------
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: discuss-admin at blu.org [mailto:discuss-admin at blu.org]On Behalf Of
> John Chambers
> Sent: Monday, June 17, 2002 10:58 AM
> To: discuss at blu.org
> Subject: Re: SOT: w2k alters mbr
> 
> 
> | Buying a new computer, (o joy, (note lowercase)),
> | I get w2k with it.
> |
> | Being a curious sort I install it, everything
> | works okay except that w2k sets itself (hda3)
> | active, stealing the next boot.
> |
> | Is there any way to stop w2k from doing this,
> | or to have grub fix it?
> 
> So they're still doing  this.   A  couple  years  ago,  I  found  the
> paragraph  in  one  of MS's pages of fine print where they state that
> Windows will check all the partitions during  a  boot,  and  any  not
> containing a valid MS OS may be marked non-bootable.  This is to help
> you,  of  course,  since  you  wouldn't  want  to  be   confused   by
> accidentally booting a partition that doesn't contain a valid OS.
> 
> I also found another paragraph which states that by  running  the  MS
> OS,  you  give  them permission to do as they wish to any file on the
> disk.  So you should be glad  they  only  modified  the  master  boot
> record.   By  running  W2K,  you've given them permission to wipe the
> linux partition clean.  You might also make sure that you don't  have
> anything on your disk that you don't want MS to use, since by booting
> W2K you've also given them permission to send any of your files  back
> to headquarters, to use as they wish.
> 
> Of course, if you  wanted  to  challenge  this  in  court,  it  would
> probably be declared illegal. But you first make sure that you have a
> couple million $ in your legal fund ...
> 
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