Anti-Pirating Tech My Cat Could Break

Posted on October 7, 2003 by glasscastle

A new
technology that’s supposed to help music companies fend off illegal file
swappers can be defeated literally by the touch of a button, according
to a Princeton University researcher.

The technology is designed to work only with computers using Microsoft
Corp.’s Windows operating systems. Users of Apple Macintosh or Linux
computers can copy the disks without restriction.

And so can Windows users, if they disable a standard feature of Windows
called "autorun." This feature causes a disk to start up as
soon as it’s inserted into the computer’s CD-ROM drive. The MediaMax
software is installed when that happens. If autorun is switched off,
MediaMax will not be activated. If users want to leave autorun switched
on, they can bypass it when running a MediaMax disk simply by holding
down the shift key for a few seconds after inserting it. This prevents
the MediaMax software from loading.

by Hiawatha
Bray in the Boston Globe
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One Response to Anti-Pirating Tech My Cat Could Break

  1. Bruce Hayden says:
    October 8, 2003 at 11:13 am

    I guess I am a bit old fashioned. I don’t like anything on my computer doing anything that I am
    not aware of. As a result, one of the first things
    that I always do is turn off autorun. Unfortunately most people are going to let Microsoft and others
    such as MediaMax make their decisions for them,
    and apparently, will continue to suffer for it.

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