[ThirteenthHouR]

Originally Posted by Gizzmoe

I never really cared about the Ring 0 situation. The vast majority of gamers log in with admin rights, that alone makes their systems 100% attackable, also on a hardware level. Even in a company environment there sometimes are many Windows installations that don´t use restricted user rights. A virus writer who plans to kill a huge amount of 2000/XP-based PC´s doesn´t need the help of SF and I guess you know that, right?

Yes I fully agree that a lot of people do run with full admin, however they also tend to run with Anti-virus, Firewalls and Anti spyware apps. (Before you jump on me I know some peeps don't have the technical realisation of the dangers to their system if they don't run some sort of protection, that is why XP SP2's firewall defaults to the on position when SP2 is installed and it will keep nagging you if its turned off and you do not go in an set it to a firewall that you will monitor yourself. If you do that without any form of firewall then basically you would not care even if starforce allowed 100,000,000 systems to be killed. So basically your argument is fundementally flawed in its example.

I will say in reply, yes any one with malicious intent can gain access , but why give them a helping hand?

I am really trying to understand your uncooperative attitude?

Do you have vested interest in DRM's?

If not why are you on the defensive?

I ask this because at any time have I forced anything upon you, like "You must boycott starforce"?

In fact I have not!

False information was being posted and by the request of another member I came hear to post the facts. So that those who want to have their systems secure can at least be aware of a security issue.

Your afforementioned response is as much as saying, "Gamers are too stupid so why bother". Personally I think they will be quite offended by such an insinuation.

People are naive if they think that the things you´ve described can´t happen just because SF is no longer on their system. The real danger to a PC are those people who open every suspicious email attachment, who don´t install security updates, who allow all standard XP services to run and so on...

Excuse me did anybody at anytime say, removing Starforce will secure your system 100% in fact did anyone even pose that question in the first place?

Well in fact no they did not, btw how long have you been a clairvoyant? I am just asking as you seem to know what everybody is thinking without actually asking them...

As Mustang has already pointed out, you are spreading panic! You should really try to put things into perspective. Again, once you use admin rights your system is, generally speaking, wide open. Even with restricted user rights and without SF a piece of malware can do very nasty things. There’s no such thing as a risk-free PC.

Spreading panic is only normally referred in such sistuations if such comments are made without processes of correcting the situation being put firmly in place.

Read this thread again.

DMA step down: Howto on correcting this problem is posted.

(Code 41) error: Howto on correcting this problem is posted.

Ring 0: A howto remove Starforce is posted. Due to Copyright Protection laws we cannot legally post a Starforce patch even if we had one. So until SF get off their backsides this is the only cure for that issue.


Now if you had cared to research the information relating to myself you would that I am a Software developer, an online journalist and that I own and run a number of tech support sites. As an example http://www.n-gage-help.com if you look in the forums their, you will see that recently we have added pro and anti Starforce sections. This is so that both sides have equal footing on the arguments that they may want to present. (Which is considerably more responsible than the falsified news report on CDfreaks that this thread refers to)

I have a reputation of being fair and honest in my responses. I would not endorse anything such as a boycott without fully researching possible fixes for the scenario's that have presented themselves.

There is more to this SF situation than is being declared but I will not go public upon that until I have the full documented evidence to support it.

The only thing I can legally state at the moment is look up Carnivore (and I do not mean meat eaters) you can draw your own conclusions from what you find.

Getting back to what can be declared. If SF had come forward and said even off the record, “we are having problems, give us a few weeks to sort this”. Then those of us who understand how the system works would have taken a step back, or as in my case I would have volunteered the technical data to help resolve these problems.

Instead they ignore the issues, release bogus sales spiel in new reports and create a joke of a challenge. In which if you do understand the processes. It’s nothing more than very bad Hacker style PR 'stacked in their favour'.

Let me ask you something, do you not know who Starforce really are?

Do you not remember their black hat days in the 1980's?

Don't get me wrong most of us where black hats in them days, all I am saying is nobody trusted them as far as they could throw them when they where black hats. So it would be crazy to trust them as White hats.

Anyway I have no argument with you, I don’t totally understand your negative stance on peeps trying to help fellow gamers out of ridiculous situation that they never should have been put in, but that negative stance is your choice and in no way am I going to force my opinions upon you.

Again if you choose to run SF with all the risks involved then that is also your choice.

All we are doing is supplying the information so that others who may not know about SF. also have that choice.

As the Games companies and Starforce Technologies never gave them a choice as to if SF is installed on their systems or not.

Please don’t try quoting the EULA, as EULA’s cannot cover security issues, even if they are unintentional, if SF had been above board about this then yes they could have used the EULA as a defence. However that defence went out the window when they resorted to bad pressing and flaming peeps who tried to help other with the SF issues.

You may notice that despite me being extremely high profile. SF has not yet dared to issue such comments about me.