Extended Copy Protection
In November 2005, it was revealed that Sony BMG was distributing albums with Extended Copy Protection or XCP, a controversial feature that automatically installed rootkit software on any Microsoft Windows machine upon insertion of the disc. In addition to preventing the CD's contents from being copied, it was also revealed that the software reported the users' listening habits back to Sony and also exposed the computer to malicious attacks that exploited insecure features of the rootkit software. Though Sony refused to release a list of the affected CDs, the Electronic Frontier Foundation identified 12 Songs as one of the discs with the invasive software.
Rubin says that he and Diamond were not aware of XCP, and both were infuriated about it.
By December 2005, Sony BMG had remastered and repressed 12 Songs and all other albums released with the XCP software as standard, non-copy-protected CDs.
Read more about this topic: 12 Songs (Neil Diamond Album)
Famous quotes containing the words extended, copy and/or protection:
“Only very slowly and late have men come to realize that unless freedom is universal it is only extended privilege.”
—Christopher Hill (b. 1912)
“Matisse makes a drawing, then he makes a copy of it. He recopies it five times, ten times, always clarifying the line. He’s convinced that the last, the most stripped down, is the best, the purest, the definitive one; and in fact, most of the time, it was the first. In drawing, nothing is better than the first attempt.”
—Pablo Picasso (1881–1973)
“We all cry out that the world is corrupt,—and I fear too justly,—but we never reflect, what we have to thank for it, and that it is our open countenance of vice, which gives the lye to our private censures of it, which is its chief protection and encouragement.”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)