Ubisoft under fire for exploitable DRM plug-in
updated 07:14 pm EDT, Mon July 30, 2012
Ubisoft games said to pack accidental Trojan
French game maker Ubisoft has come under fire from critics after its Uplay DRM application was revealed to contain a security hole that could leave users' computers open to malicious exploits. The software was bundled along with major Ubisoft PC releases, including Assassin's Creed and others. Ubisoft has released a patch for the security hole, and the company is urging all Uplay users to update the application without a web browser open.
Packaged with games like Call of Juarez: San Francisco, Just Dance 3, and several of Ubisoft's Tom Clancy series, Uplay logs user play information online, allowing them to earn points and rewards for play and to compete against other users. The software also allows Ubisoft some measure of defense against piracy, as only registered copies of legally purchased games are able to log into the system for its multiplayer benefits.
The security flaw was discovered by a Google engineer in the process of installing Assassin's Creed Revelations. The engineer then posted code revealing the exploit. Having patched the security hole, Ubisoft told IGN that the issue stemmed not from DRM, but from a coding error that has now been fixed.
