VLC Media Player has been banned in India, but this happened back in February:
One of the most popular media player software and streaming media server VLC media player, developed by VideoLAN project, is banned in India. As per a report by MediaNama, VLC Media Player has been banned in India, but this happened nearly 2 months ago. However, if you have the software installed on your device, it should still be working. Meanwhile, neither the company nor the Indian government revealed any details about the ban.
Some reports suggest that VLC Media Player has been banned in the country because the platform was used by China-backed hacking group Cicada for cyber attacks. Just a few months ago, security experts discovered that Cicada was using VLC Media Player to deploy a malicious malware loader as part of a long-running cyber attack campaign.
[...] In 2020, the Indian government banned hundreds of Chinese apps, including PUBG Mobile, TikTok, Camscanner and more. In fact, the PUBG Mobile Indian version dubbed BGMI has also been banned in India recently and removed from the Google Play store and Apple App store. The reason behind blocking these apps is that the government feared these platforms were sending user data to China. Notably, VLC Media Player is not backed by a Chinese company. It is developed by VideoLAN, a Paris-based firm.
(Score: 2) by mrpg on Tuesday August 16 2022, @03:32AM
Blocked by IP or domain name?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by mrpg on Tuesday August 16 2022, @03:37AM (5 children)
There's another article in the same website, weird.
https://www.indiatoday.in/technology/news/story/vlc-media-player-banned-in-india-website-and-vlc-download-link-blocked-1987361-2022-08-12 [indiatoday.in]
https://www.indiatoday.in/technology/news/story/vlc-media-player-banned-and-blocked-in-india-vlc-doesn-t-know-why-and-govt-doesn-t-explain-full-story-1987783-2022-08-14 [indiatoday.in]
The VideoLAN President has revealed that the media player is working on some ISPs and not for some. In a recent comment, the company president said, “we got banned since a few months, and we don’t know why. (According to my stats, it is since the 13 February 2022). We’ve asked the Indian government and we got no answer. We probably did not ask the right place though. I wish I knew how to ask properly.” “The weirdest is that some ISP are blocking it and some are not. So why is that the case? Are some ISP not listening to the government? VLC and VideoLAN are quite apolitical (we only fight against DRM and for open source) and VLC is a pure tool that can read anything,” he further added.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2022, @04:53AM (2 children)
That's what makes you an enemy of the (corporate) state.
Why is it possible to block them? The internet is supposed to route around the damage
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Immerman on Tuesday August 16 2022, @01:08PM (1 child)
Because, high-minded ideals aside, censorship is NOT damage, and routing around it is often illegal.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2022, @10:28PM
High-minded ideals aside, all interference is damage, even when conducted by the state/corp. As far as circumvention goes, we just need a better way to do it undetected, the law is an ass
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Nobuddy on Thursday August 18 2022, @12:57PM (1 child)
I am guessing it was used in a malware repackaging scam. They do it all the time to free software. Grab the original, roll some malware in to it's new installer, make available for download. A little targeted SEO makes it a popular download.
And just as likely the people in the agency that make the decisions do not understand (or care) about the distinction.
(Score: 2) by wisnoskij on Friday August 19 2022, @01:40PM
It is some sort of side loading attack. You get a virus, it copies a infected .DLL to your VLC folder, and next time you start VLC, bam.
It sounds like they are copying a system .dll to the vlp program directory is some sort of PATH attack.
(Score: 4, Funny) by RS3 on Tuesday August 16 2022, @05:15AM (6 children)
from:
https://www.indiatoday.in/technology/news/story/vlc-media-player-banned-in-india-website-and-vlc-download-link-blocked-1987361-2022-08-12 [indiatoday.in]
Not sure of the mechanism of attack. Maybe some embedded code in a media file that does something evil, or causes some players on some platforms to auto download and install a malicious codec or other plugin?
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2022, @11:57AM (2 children)
VLC has long had a problem with malicious actors taking the code, inserting malware, repackaging and offering it on their own website. And then people download the wrong one. SourceForge put adware in it back in the day, criminals put in viruses. Here is an Indian source talking about this exact scenario a few months ago:
https://www.republicworld.com/technology-news/other-tech-news/vlc-media-player-being-used-as-a-carrier-for-malware-security-research-firm-reveals-articleshow.html [republicworld.com]
(Score: 2) by tizan on Tuesday August 16 2022, @10:15PM (1 child)
But that argument goes for any open source software...including linux OSes
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 17 2022, @10:55PM
Yeah. And now we see India doing a stupid thing.
(Score: 4, Funny) by tangomargarine on Tuesday August 16 2022, @04:21PM (2 children)
That makes it twice as bad as non-malicious malicious software, right? /s
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Tuesday August 16 2022, @04:28PM (1 child)
Yes, I was still clocked in at the Department of Redundancy Department. :)
That's what happens when I'm writing stuff here, further delaying the long-overdue going to sleep.
(Score: 3, Informative) by RS3 on Tuesday August 16 2022, @04:32PM
I take that back- that "malicious malware" is a direct copy-paste from the source. Very likely a translation issue, or non-native English speaking writer. We native English speakers never make spelling nor grammatical errors. :-\ (/s)