Talk:StarForce/Archive 1

Ad copy
Let's please keep the cut-and-paste jobs out of this article. Wikipedia is not a place where you can just paste in ad copy from a company's website. Rhobite 05:04, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

Hello all - I just wanted to respond to the statement that "The criticism StarForce received is only due to frustrated users unable to pirate a title" - I am not a software pirate - I legitimately downloaded the Heroes of Might & Magic 5 beta demo, which covertly installed Starforce, and my burner immediately began failing repeatedly and then had it's speed reduced by Windows until it ultimately just stopped working. There are numerous accounts of this behavior online from people who are clearly not pirates (boing boing, news.com, are just the tip of the iceberg) and who have detailed analysis of Starforce in action. Enough, I would argue, that the criticism section should be expanded here on Wikipedia. I also think it warrants a list of Starforce protected games - I am certain that could be phrased without being POV. The Glop.org link has an up-to-date list of Starforce - I want to say 'afflicted' - protected games. - LDB

In reply to Rhobite: This was not a cut and paste job; I rather was speaking out of experience (you may search www.star-force.com, and you will not fing a matching sentence). You should be aware that the amount of compromised StarForce protected titles is much lower than with competing products. Yet, you saw fit to add a negative remark about this line of products (about the device driver). So, FYI: the  complaints about StarForce driver all over the web are *completely* baseless, since each and every CD/DVD copy protection has to install a device driver in order to work with the CD-ROM drive, plus some other ring0 stuff (As a programmer, I trust you understand what all that means). The criticism StarForce received is only due to frustrated users unable to pirate a title, or give a copy to their friends. Furthermore, as I wrote in the article: StarForce is NOT the only copy protection installing a driver. SafeDisc installs a driver as well (secdrv.sys), and SecuROM v7 even installs a perpetual user access service. Yet, you chose to present it as the fact that a certain copy protection system installs a driver is exceptional - while this is not the case at all. I find this disturbing.

While there were some bugs concerning USB HD access and such - they were immediately fixed by the vendor. There is no need to disqualify this nice product - after all, we're just giving a definition to the notion here; not a personal opinion, right? - And StarForce being an industry leader is a well and long proven fact.


 * Please read What Wikipedia is not. This is not a forum to promote your software. Rhobite 05:29, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)


 * "And StarForce being an industry leader is a well and long proven fact" - please supply data for this.


 * Please supply data that crack for every StarForce game is avilable at g***world.com. Robust Physique 03:04, 13 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Again, you may check my IP address, it's NOT sourced in the Russian Federation. I am merely interested in copy protection techniques, not associated with Protection Technology in any way.


 * You are at it again, are not you Rhobite? Do you check this page every 10 minutes? why do you add false lies to the article, and call it a corporate advertisement when I edit them out (or rather whitewashing vandalism) while I said I do not have any connection to Protection Technology? Why remove the fact that other products install drivers too?


 * Why do you come in from a different IP address in Eastern Europe or Israel every time you edit the article? Vandalize the article again and you'll be blocked from editing. Rhobite 19:38, Mar 21, 2005 (UTC)


 * Well, in fact, the last edit was not mine - you are welcome to #cracking4newbies, EFNet (IRC) to discuss the issue.


 * You're the vandal here - it's not my issue to discuss. Rhobite 19:48, Mar 21, 2005 (UTC)


 * Vandal? how am I a vandal? While I have no longer added superlatives about SF to this article, how am I a vandal for correcting your mistakes? and when someone disagrees with you, you lock him from editing the value?


 * Mr. Physique is clearly a corporate shill. Every time someone adds a valid mention that there are cracks for every single starforce protected game out there, he removes them as lies. Gamec***world.com is a place where this is easily verifyable. Nobody, except maybe a corporate operative, would jump through the hoops of checking the page daily from different, obfuscated IPSpaces around the world to make sure it is PR consistent. He has been removing the "criticism" part of the page as well as the * fact * that there are cracks for every starforce protected game out there, despite it being difficult to crack, again and again and again as "lies". He also keeps readding the claim about the developers of Starforce monitoring the internet and other clearly PR oriented text.


 * Find me a crack for Prince of Persia: Two Thrones, and mabey i'll believe your BS. Robust Physique 03:29, 13 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Unlike certain companies, i.e. the makers of StarForce (see criticism section that you try to rewrite all the time), I will not post links to cracked games on the internet, it hurts the developer of those games. There is a crack available for it however on a popular page supplying users with "fixed" executables so they do not have to have their CDs in drive.


 * And i'm the king of England. Robust Physique 03:42, 13 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Very funny. Given the exorbitant number of edits you have made to this article, you are working for StarForce. Obviously it's your companies policy to request links to stolen software on internet boards and wikis, but I won't do you that favour. As for your edits in regards to pirated software - the information that pirated (read: not necessarily cracked) versions of software protected with StarForce is available only hours after release is useful for readers of this article and balanced within the context of this article. It would be wrong to withhold the information that it doesn't matter for pirates whether or not you use starforce from people potentially interested in this software. The article lists the software as "copy prevention software", so it is important to know for readers that pirated copies are in fact available shortly after release, so they can get an idea whether or not the whole thing makes sense. It might not make the software appeal to potential buyers, but that's what the friendly faces on your companies website are for, not wikipedia.


 * Proof of Prince Of Persia The 2 Thrones crack 17:32, 08 April 2006 (GMT)

Bullying tactics?
I see much more bickering than actual debate here, although I do not understand how my computer rebooting due to unwelcome DRM is debatable. I cannot add technical knowledge to this discussion.

What I do have to add however is that for any game company to use StarForce's protection scheme is foolish. Users unaware of the DRM may attribute any instability to poor game design and refuse to buy from that company. Power users will most likely avoid any company that has had anything to do with StarForce. Hackers will target all StarForce protected games to make a mockery of them.

The public's reaction I am basing off of comments posted on Engadget and CD Freaks, journalistic opinions and the countless guides for removal. http://www.engadget.com/2006/03/21/starforce-drm-said-to-force-reboots/ http://www.cdfreaks.com/news/13212 http://www.glop.org/starforce/ http://www.similarities.org/starforce.html

Also no one has referenced SF's bullying tactics. Why is this? Surely letters threatening to sue for criticizing a company's software fall under the realm of revelancy for this article. http://www.boingboing.net/2006/01/31/starforce_threatens_.html

As to the countless, "suing won't work" references, they have an office in California. In the interview note the PR game face and the use of "disclosures" of "weaknesses" strategically placed to give an impression of strength and near infallability.

http://www.firingsquad.com/features/starforce_interview/

Also I have to add that since this is so highly contested and the links I have provided seem to be in jeopardy I will check back periodically. I really wish that it had not come to this.

Criticism
This statement is unsupported in the "Criticism" section: The StarForce drivers are reason for system instability and computer crashes (as it has been proven in many cases). Have you got any links to where this is "proven"? Tale 11:16, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
 * In the meantime I have changed this to "Some users have blamed the StarForce drivers for system instability and computer crashes." Tale 01:15, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

Bias. Utter bias. That is what I read from the article. The complaints are legimitate; StarForce also exposes old security holes. A paste from the http://www.glop.com/starforce, which may be biased as well, also states the facts:

Quoting: "Starforce has received criticism for installing its own device driver onto computers. The Starforce drivers are often linked to system instability and computer crashes. If these problems occur, the end-user would be unware as to the cause of the problem, and would be helpless to solve the problem.

''Moreover, the Starforce drivers, installed on your system, grant ring 0 (system level) privileges to any code under the ring 3 (user level) privileges. Thus, any virus or trojan can get OS privileges and totally control your system. Since Windows 2000, the Windows line security and stability got enhanced by separating those privileges, but with the Starforce drivers, the old system holes and instabilities are back and any program (or virus) can reach the core of your system by using the Starforce drivers as a backdoor."''

It won't take long before virus and trojan writers take an advantage of this. That is why we don't want to have StarForce on our systems.


 * Are these similar reasons to why there was so much consumer outrage about the recent copy protection sony put on it's music cd's? Perhaps sony went a bit over the top. But the security issues you mention were one of the major reasons the security companies called it bad, and they labelled it spyware. Sony's definitely went furthur, it would connect a server every bootup. There seems to be a limit to how invasive a copy protection people will tolerate. 220.253.55.87 13:24, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

A few things:
 * 1. When an exploit is found, trojan/worm/virus writers tend to release an attack very quickly. The ring 0 security issue with StarForce has been well known for quite some time, and yet, I haven't heard of any attacks on StarForce installed systems, though I am not doubting the possibility of one.
 * You have to realise that saying "no one did it yet" does not qualify as proof that it can't be done. I could be that making a backdoor this way isn't the best choice since it isn't as widespread as other security problems. This problem does not help delivering a payload to a computer, only helps escalading the privileges of a delivered payload. It does have it's limitation as a backdoor.


 * 2. The problems StarForce causes are well documented and range from disabled DVD playback to broken optical drives to corrupted operating systems, this is not a subject for debate anymore than the benefits of CoolWebSearch are. StarForce is malware.
 * -69.118.247.101 15:52, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Is there any support for the claim "StarForce has dramatically decreased piracy of computer games using such protection system"? That doesn't seem to be the case from what I've read (though admittedly, I haven't looked too far into the matter), and there's no source cited to support it.


 * Look, according to a post over at the "Boycott Starforce" about Ubi Soft's newest game, "Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Lockdown," the StarForce protection for it has already been hacked, and it's only been out for less than three days. As a result, I am going to assume that the part about StarForce games taking months to hack is false and goes against the neutrality standards set by Wikipedia. I am going to just remove it with no replacement, since it would be difficult to cite a source for either side of the argument. CaptainConq 22:23, 19 February 2006 (UTC)


 * I added the part about starforce often taking months to hack, and I can vouch that this is true. This supposed statement by them was my source: http://news.com.com/5208-7349-0.html?forumID=1&threadID=11535&messageID=86618&start=-184. If you want to research it yourself (and counter the rainbow six example) look for a crack for trackmania sunrise - you won't find one because it was never truly cracked, thanks to starforce. This is very rare in the warez world. I said that games "often" aren't cracked, not always, so a single counterexample proves nothing. I added the statements to offer the POV of the developers of starforce, a POV that is sorely lacking from an article about them. If you really want to delete these statements, PLEASE try to find something to replace it along the same lines, because it is the main argument that the developers and the software developers use to justify it. Not mentioning that argument is terrible IMO. 70.93.249.46 09:07, 2 March 2006 (UTC)


 * You cannot use a statement from a self-interested party like this to prove that point. Furthermore, that statement contains contradictions (they "haven't heard" of problems, they later admit they have heard of a percentage of people with problems).  And Trackmania Sunrise cracks have been available since at least the first half of 2005, on Game Copy World and other such sites.  --Yamla 15:35, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I do not know where to cite for this, but Trackmania has been cracked, I put this up for other users to research, as I have no idea where to find it. Anyone who knows, please verify my claim.


 * Instructions to crack trackmania from gamecopyworld:
 * Install the game - Full Installation.
 * Disable any CD-ROM/Writers and/or DVD-ROM/Writers using StarForce Nightmare.
 * Mount the TMSUNRISE.MDS CD-Image in Daemon Tools v3.47 or the latest Alcohol 120%.
 * Play the Game!
 * That's not a *real* crack because it involves disabling hardware. I hate starforce as much as the next person here, but I am trying really hard to present the view of the creators of starforce and the several game makers who use it, something lacking from this article. I tried my best and I think my statements are not only true, but inbiased. If you can do better replace it with something presenting the same POV, but don't just erase it...

70.93.249.46 03:58, 3 March 2006 (UTC)


 * My opinion (and this is just opinion) is that these steps aren't that bad. You just need to disable the drives while you are playing the game and can do so using software.  However, I do understand where you are coming from.  My problem is that StarForce claims games remain uncracked for months while it seems to me (though I have not done any studies) that the games are almost always cracked within the three month time period.  The problem furthermore is that it seems like we have StarForce making self-serving statements on the one side and everyone else claiming StarForce doesn't work and it causes problems, etc., on the other side.  It's very hard to find positive but unbiased statements in support of StarForce.  You are obviously editing in good faith, though, and are going out of your way to try to improve the article.  For the moment, I'll let your edits stand and see if I can find any pro-StarForce statements that we could use that do not come from a particularly biased ("marketing") source.  How does that sound? --Yamla 16:18, 3 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Sounds good to me. I agree that it would be better to come up with a more objective defense of starforce (but good luck finding it). Perhaps a statement from a game developer explaining why they subject their users to starforce? I do not like the way my addition to the article is now: "The games protected by it are sometimes not cracked for several days or more." That is almost a vacuous statement - it's not a defense of starforce to say it is cracked within a day, it's an insult like the rest of the article. Rm999 07:59, 4 March 2006 (UTC) (used to be at 70.93.249.46)

Hi, im changing the months to days as months was two years ago, these days two well known groups crack SF in a matter of days without fail for about the last year, for more info see http://www.theisonews.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=2, as you'll see EVERY game is listed in there in crack and/or clone format and all games were released within 1 week. Lets get the article straight guys, because theres some very wrong info in there at the moment.

That section has no substantiated claims and has unverifiable information which is forbidden to have on Wikipedia. No claims have ever been made about Starforce having to be removed via formatting the partition it is installed on because it can be removed via the official removal tool. Therefore I am putting the warning back up. 12.219.74.52 15:31, 29 March 2006 (UTC)


 * That section has sources and nothing there was unverifiable (unverified, sure). I agree that the uninstall portion was false, but it makes more sense to remove or mark that instead of claiming the entire section is bollocks. kotepho 17:02, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

I'd just like to point out that the following is inaccurate or incomplete in the main article (I'm too polite to go in there and edit it!) "StarForce copy protection software also forces users to completely wipe and reinstall their partitions if they wish to remove the copy protection software. The protection will also write to any shared network drives that have full read / write access, causing problems for other users on the network.". The Starforce Removal Tool actually does seem to do the job. If there's proof somewhere that it doesn't, let's see it, please! Also, Starforce has never "spread" accross my home network, nor accross the partitioned OS's I've set up to isolate it. I've heard tale of it doing so on SATA drives, but not on an IDE one, so I feel that paragraph could use some clarifying, and some evidential support. (For the record I don't like Starforce - I'd just rather we bashed it with known facts!) 82.27.21.17 02:28, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Stolen from CD COPS?
Reverted the "stolen from CD COPS" claim. Seems like biased crap to me. 147.69.111.74 07:58, 9 January 2006 (UTC)


 * Having spoken to an trustworthy industry insider, I can say with absolute certainty that this is a fact, not "biased crap". I'll let some other wikipedian with more patience than myself bother with the inevitable edit war of trying to reinstate this paragraph.. 83.88.94.242 20:38, 14 April 2006 (UTC)


 * We need some sources for this, other than an 'industry insider'. I'm no friend of starforce and I'm ready to believe this, but Wikipedia isn't about beliefs, it's about facts. Get some reference-able sources, and we'll include the paragraph. Edward Grefenstette 18:00, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Dramatically decreasing piracy
Considering it only takes about 40 seconds to bypass Starforce protection, I doubt this is true. Sources?
 * Do you have sources for *your* claim ? If so, please cite them. I'm very interested in showing that copy-protection is useless and I boycott anything that employs such "methods". 217.84.41.107 19:09, 31 January 2006 (UTC)
 * Retorting with "I'd like to see your sources!" when a person asks for sources is not a valid argument. It is a very poor one. If you think that a person's point is untrue, and they ask for sources, provide sources. If you're sure you're right, than you should also be plenty sure that there are sources proving you right. - VirgilOrion

List of programs using StarForce
Would it be possible to start a list of programs known to use StarForce or expand on the list of developers known to use it? -Ross Taben 5:29 pm PST 1.31.06
 * Absolutely, as long as you provide credible references. Rhobite 01:46, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I'd do it myself, but I don't know where to find the info. -Ross Taben 7:50 PST 2.2.06
 * A list of games can be found [here. [[User:Fosnez|Fosnez]] 18:32, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
 * That list is incomplete. Does anyone have a more complete list? Does StarForce have an official list? --Optichan 18:13, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Protected, dispute
Okay, there's an edit war going on and so I have protected the page. I initially disagreed with the anonymous user, particularly because the user was not bothering to cite the information. However, given the entry above noting how quickly these games are getting cracked in 2005 and 2006, I must say I'm leaning more toward supporting that side. My opinions, though, are unimportant. There's a dispute and we should try to come to a consensus here. I'll try to get both sides to state their points. --Yamla 22:54, 3 March 2006 (UTC)


 * My apologies about not reading your messages earlier it was totally my mistake but I failed (somehow) to see them. I find it furstrating that people cite so much false information about starforce and saying months is far beyond a joke (like I previously said though, two years ago this was 100% correct), As far as I know there are only two uncracked SF games, these are Splinter Cell Chaos theory (but IS however available in Clone format and doesnt require any hardware modification, just the running of daemon tools and the image) and Trackmania Sunrise (which is also playable by using daemon tools 4.03 and in most cases doesnt even require unplugging an optical drive). There is also another CD emulator on the market (virtual drive pro) which will not only mount a SF image, but has NO need to unplug anything or touch any hardware, this works with every StarForce game to date. Saying that SF doesnt get cracked is also a half lie, the point of the copy protection is to stop it being able to be copied, correct? well cloneCD images are released on the same day as the games hit the shelves, cracks will usually follow shortly after (A matter of days). So saying in the article that games are "not cracked" is very misleading because clonecd games are counted as pirate games as well as cracked games.


 * My intention on editing this article was to bring it up to date and contain accurate information therein, I have much experiance with SF as the forum I previously mentioned is not only the oldest and largest site about piracy (while remaining legal) but I also happen to be a moderator there so I honestly do have to read up on these things.


 * If the dispute isnt closable in a simple way im more than happy to change months to weeks as a compromise but I dont see this as being accurate and my opinion of wikipedia is that it should be just that, accurate as possible. -- The annoying guy who keeps causing trouble but is really quite a nice guy. 172.181.245.96


 * I don't think this compromise is good. If the games are cracked in days, the article should say days.  I think a lot of the confusion came from editors not realising that things may have changed since two years ago.  I know for me, for example, the counterexamples given on this discussion page were enough to convince me that some games weren't cracked for months.  If this turns out no longer to be the case, we should update the article and cite the information if possible so we can keep things verifiable.  I would, of course, like to hear from the other party in the dispute (and the other editors for this page!).  --Yamla 23:13, 3 March 2006 (UTC)


 * cracked means the removal of protection, so a clone (a SF clone is not really a clone, since one often needs to modify hardware to make it work) does not count as a crack.
 * Here are some uncracked starforce protected games


 * Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones
 * Splinter Cell Choas Theory
 * Toca Race Driver 3
 * Peter Jackson's King Kong
 * Trackmania Sunrise
 * Chrome Specforce
 * World Racing 2
 * The Suffering: Ties That Bind
 * Codename: Panzers Phase Two
 * X3: Reunion
 * LA Rush
 * Cold War


 * this list is most likely incomplete. There are a few SF protected games that were cracked quickly, mainly because bad implementation by the game programmers.
 * One of the recently cracked SF protected game is Worms 4, which took approximately 5 months. Splinter Cell: Choas Theory is still uncracked, it's almost a year since its release.
 * Robust Physique 01:31, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Splinter Cell Chaos Theory was cracked by Reloaded. It can be found on the site thesomethingbay.org


 * "Your honor, I clearly can't be guilty of breaking and entering as windows in the photos of the alleged crime scene are clearly intact!" "While it's true no windows were broken, the security footage shows you picking the lock on the front door.". This is a distinction without a difference. While they may not be 'cracked' in the traditional sense, the 'copy prevention' part of the copy prevention system is clearly not doing it's job. If it can be illegally downloaded off the net and played, then the system has failed, period. Technicalities and linguistic gymnastics serve only to decieve people and obscure the truth, and that is the antithesis of what wikipedia stands for. Fdgfds 04:54, 5 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Newsflash PR Shill - Splinter Cell: CT executable cracks are availabe for quite some time now on pages such as g****world.com. So stop lying.

Whoops, didn't notice there was disucssion of my "months" comment down here. I didn't mean to start an edit war :(

I'll explain my reasoning. I personally do not support starforce, in fact i hate it. But I think this article, as it stands, does a terrible job of explaining why so many game developers choose to use it. It's obviously not to throw away money so their games can be cracked in a few days. Starforce's stated goal is to keep a game uncracked in the wild for a few months. After a few months almost every game has a huge falloff in sales because everyone who wanted it got it. This is actually a valid point, IMO. So it does not suffice to say a game that came out a year ago is cracked *now*, we need to see how long it took for a game to be cracked. According to the anonymous editor above who claims to have a lot of experience with starforce, *currently* starforce games are cracked within days. This may be true, I don't have much experience with starforce. My only experience was with trackmania sunrise, which was the first of many, many games that I have seen that was not adaquetly cracked in the first two weeks of it coming out. In fact, it wasn't adaquetly cracked as of a few months ago, when the best they could do was get you to burn a cd and hope it works in your player.

I agree that the length of time it takes to crack current games is the most important factor in all this, but we need to keep in mind sample size. Perhaps the current version of starforce got cracked so *all* the games were cracked or something. But historically (and we aren't talking about 2 years - this is less than a year) starforce3 games were not cracked within "weeks". And I'd say thats a pretty good argument for starforce. Rm999 08:16, 4 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Just found an interesting article from 2003 that states starforce games are cracked within days, or before the game even comes out. I'm really confused now becuase I thought two years ago "months" was true. My theory it has to do with people cracking the technology, not specific games (which would cause starforce pretection to go up and down in waves). Could someone with more technical knowledge confirm or reject that theory?
 * http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/03/06/games_copy_protection_cracked/ Rm999 08:23, 4 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Dude, read the article carefully, the article talks about a StarForce developers opinion on some other protection systems such as SafeDisc 2, C-Dilla 2 and SecuROM.
 * Out of six games protected by Safedisc 2, one game stayed uncracked during two days after the official release. The other five were cracked before they even came out.
 * For four games using C-Dilla 2.x the record was three days.
 * SecuROM seems have achieved a staggering six days uncracked.
 * And then the article talks about how StarForce is promoting its own protection system.
 * This article does not talk about the crackin of Starforce, it talks about how alternative protections have failed.
 * Robust Physique 08:55, 4 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Haha, nevermind, I totally misread that article. Rm999 09:11, 4 March 2006 (UTC)