The Missing Sony Exhibit
The Canadian Sony rootkit class action settlement heads to court next week amid mounting questions about the deal. The EFF calls attention to a number of missing provisions, including no security reviews and no ongoing obligations to provide uninstallers for the rootkit.
Context & Ripple Effects
Sony's rootkit dispute had already moved from a technical cleanup problem to a challenge to DRM design, as reflected in earlier efforts to clean up the rootkit and criticism that Sony's DRM had gone too far. A prior Sony rootkit settlement approval makes the Canadian court review consequential: the remedy's security terms, not just compensation, are at issue.
First-order effects
- Sony faces court scrutiny of a Canadian class-action settlement that, according to the EFF, contains no security-review requirement or continuing duty to provide rootkit uninstallers.
- Affected Canadian class members are being asked to accept a deal whose remedial obligations may not extend beyond the settlement process.
Second-order effects
- The EFF's intervention shifts the dispute toward whether settlements over harmful software must require ongoing technical remediation, raising the standard against which similar DRM vendors may be judged.
Third-order effects
- If courts accept settlements without continuing security obligations, consumer redress for software harms may focus on closing claims rather than ensuring that affected systems can be safely repaired.
The trend: The Sony case is part of a broader test of whether class-action settlements can set enforceable security standards for consumer software vendors.