Intel Goes for Display Encryption

StormChaser wrote to us about a new form of encryption that Intel wants to put between the system and digital display. They are calling it High-bandwidth Digital Copy Protection, and it would encrypt each pixel as it moved from the main box to a digital display - interesting stuff.

Comments

As long as quality isnt affected

[cide1]

I am for it, as long as quality isnt affected

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[MrHat]

I've been trying to keep my /. posting addiction under control, but I have to reply here -

Why are you in favor of this encryption "as long as the quality isn't affected"? Normally, engineers create products on silicon that solve problems - you buy these products because you have one of these problems and are looking to solve it. Okay, maybe Quake 3 doesn't qualify as a "problem" per se, but I think this is still a pretty valid generalization. :-)

Now, an engineering team and large company add cost to your components to implement on-the-fly encryption of your video signal. Does this help solve the problems you originally bought your machine for? No. Are you paying more money for a limitation on what *you* can do with *your* hardware that *you* paid for? You bet. Not only a limitation on your rights, but other companies rights. Suddenly, there could be a DVD-like licensing fee to design and sell a monitor. Want to hack around on your monitor/video adapter in the privacy of your own home? You're probably SOL. It'd be great if the standard would be open, but from what I've seen out of Intel, I don't see that happening. Please correct me if I'm wrong - I'll be happy.




43rd Law of Computing: Anything that can go wr

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[Phil-14]

I'm worried about this too, both from the possible DeCSS-struggle-like angle and the fact that this is yet another way to soak up CPU cycles (which I think explains a lot of what Intel does; I think they came up with USB 2.0 because Firewire wasn't going to use enough CPU cycles).

I know of no people who have said they need this. This looks like yet another product big companies have said they wanted but ordinary people will get screwed into buying.

That's precisely what historically aggravated me about Windows, BTW.

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[Oblio]

I'm playing devils advocate here, but it could be argued that the price of information content is artificially higher due to pricing considerations of piracy. If this technology could somehow knock that piracy out, we could see drops in content prices that could offset the increased costs of hardware.

This is a metric buttload of conjecture, but still economicly possible.

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[Nick I]

As a point of information, from what I can tell, the encryption and decryption is done in hardware. This being said, there would be absolutely *no* CPU cycle loss due to this process. Nonetheless, I see absolutely no purpose of this. Why in the hell do they want to encrypt the video signal? Anyone have any good reasons or are you all as bewildered as me?

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[qazwsx]

No, it's not.
Piracy makes the producer be reasonable when defining prices. Without this constrain, probably the price would go up.

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[Anonymous Coward]

They want to encrypt it so that nobody can write a fake video driver and copy digital movies. Can I be the first one to call for a boycott?

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[slashdot-terminal]

As a point of information, from what I can tell, the encryption and decryption is done in hardware. This being said, there would be absolutely *no* CPU cycle loss due to this
process. Nonetheless, I see absolutely no purpose of this. Why in the hell do they want to encrypt the video signal? Anyone have any good reasons or are you all as bewildered as
me?

Very simple to "prevent piracy" in their minds. This is because they want tight restricted control of content. Basically if you are a content author you should take the "secure" intel solution over your competitor's solution. That screws you if say you want to run anything other than Intel at all. Don't believe me just look at the DVD situation.

This is essentially just another means of control and appeasement of various veto groups nothing more.

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[slashdot-terminal]

No I really don't think so. Why raise prices to combat or prevent piracy? Most figures that are seen are projected analysis of possible revenue and nothing more at all. What should be said is that preventing piracy will encourage people to raise prices even further because there then isn't any other possible way to get what you are offering unless you or someone you want to sell that thing is offering it.

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[Boone^]

Is there such thing as 'open' encryption? That's just a waste of clock cycles. You might as well have a straight pass-through if everyone knows what it's doing anyway..

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[Tim C]

Really? So how come PGP works? Last time I saw (about 30 seconds ago :-) ), you could get the source to compile it yourself (it is, in fact, the prefered method of distribution).

You know exactly what it does, but it's secure, because the algorithm is good.

"Security through obscurity is no security at all."

Cheers,

Tim

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[Erik Fish]

And if you believe that, I've got a bridge reserved just for you.

The only thing this encryption does is give more control to Intel. Control over the monitor market and control over what you do with your computer. Don't think for a minute that this is about piracy -- the industry continues to grow and prosper despite the terrors supposedly inflicted on it by piracy.

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[nuance]

Is there such thing as 'open' encryption? There most certainly is such a thing as 'open encryption', any encryption can only be reasonably expected to be secure when it has been "peer reviewed" by the finest minds in encryption science. Anything else is "security through obscurity" and thats just rubbish. A prime example of this is CSS, although their main problem was key size (their key sizes were nowhere near large enough to protect their data), they relied on no-one knowing the encryptin method and once it was known it was easy to crack. Contrast this with GPG or PGP encryption where the algorithms are totally open yet the content is extreemly secure.

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[jms]

They want to encrypt it to prevent you from recording it.

The real purpose of the DMCA is to eliminate the fair use provisions of copyright law by technological means.

Fair use doctrine says that you can record a video broadcast, so you can watch it later, or skip the commercials.

The purpose of this technology is to ensure that there is no place in the video chain where the video signal is available in an unencrypted code, so there is no place where you can insert a VCR.

The DMCA will make it illegal to bypass the video encryption, so no one will be able to legally manufacture an HDTV video recorder without the permission of the encryption cartel, and you can be sure that all "authorized" recorders include content management codes, so that you can only record when the broadcaster turns on the record-enable bits.

- John

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[um... Lucas]

I don't think this technology is even meant for computers... Probably more for digital TV's and DVD players. It's a content protection tool... One of the ways that a DVD could be copied would be just to hook the DVD player to a VCR, press play and record, and there you go... A lower quality movie... but a copy none the less.

If you try it with an encrypted signal, you can't record movies that way. You only get an encrypted stream. The DVD player would just send encrypted data) to the TV which would decode there, rather than how currently, the DVD does the decoding itself.

That's the only feasible use for this technology... It's useless for computer users... How many of use care than the signal going from the video card to monitor isn't encryped? How many of us would care if it were? It wouldn't stop coworkers from looking over shoulders, people with binoculars peering through windows, hidden cameras, etc...

Just because it's from Intel does not mean it's meant for the PC world... IMO, at least.

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[um... Lucas]

Don't be so conspiratory... or at least think of more plausible conspiracies... Intel opted out of firewire in favor of USB because it allowed them to own their entire platform rather than licensing a very important element of it from an outside company.

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok go ahead and make the argument--you haven't yet. Please bring some numbers.
None of these large media players or their partners are interested in lower prices for content or hardware.

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[JonesBoy]

Not meant for computers!?!?! Are you nuts! This is specifically for computers! This is the whole DVD DeCSS thing moving up one step. Say a DVD is made with double encryption. The DVD drive ONLY outputs a signal with one level of decryption removed. The signal is then sent to the monitor, which removes the second layer of encryption. You can no longer make a copy of the CD because you no longer have access to the signal. If the keys are large enough, you won't be able to decrypt it, and send it to your friends over the internet. This is obviously one of the fears of the MPAA.

You are probably wondering how this all factors ino your TV. Look at all of the media centers and internet appliances we hear sony and micro$oft coming out with. 2+2=4. Your TV will soon (probably) be digital, and this system would work.

Copying through a DVD burner is slower to distribute, harder and more expensive to do, and easier to prosecute. Not a big worry for the MPAA, or at least, not as big as movie distribution over the internet. Little do they know, when you make something more idiot proof, mother nature will just make a better idiot. :)

And for the whole TEMPEST proofing thing, do you REALLY think there wouldn't be a special door for the boys upstairs to use?

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[um... Lucas]

I assume you're thinking that Intel's going to block the market from receiving utilities that capture what's displayed on your screen? No they aren't, and that'd be the easiest way to circumvent this scheme...

From my angle i'd think that we're going to see a "new" DVD player soon. One that stores it's data in a different format than today's DVDs, encrypted stronger with two ciphers, and without any way to interface it to a computer.

There are too many wild cards in a PC to effectively block copying, the MPAA just discovered. IF they start selling boxes where you slip the disk in, it decodes the first layer (to circumvent DVD writers), and sends a still encoded signal to a digital television, which decodes it and displays it... Unless the TV has video out ports, there's not going to be a clear way to catch the signal in a clear form... Hence, no more copying.

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[Anonymous Coward]

So, you would willingly pay an extra $200 for your computer for a feature that provides absolutely no value to you whatsoever just somebody like Bill Gates can sleep easier at night knowing you haven't made an unauthorized copy of one of the pictures from his extensive digital archives?

Man, I'm shocked to discover that somebody that mind-numbingly stupid is still breathing. Shouldn't the "excessively gullible" gene have been weeded out of the gene pool years ago?

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[Anonymous Coward]

Who would buy such a thing. In article above, a DVD free zone player is sold in UK, so the whole thing is futile. Besides requiring more technology higher price, is sufficent detractor for hardware manufacturers from even starting to sell that crap.

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[sallen]

Why do they want to encrypt the video signal? It's the next step in the process of access control. (Or if you believe the MPAA, to prevent copying.) It's true intent, IMHO, is that it's further progress in the MPAA and other organizations to circumvent the fair use as interpreted by the Supreme Court. They simply wish TOTAL control, no matter if you paid for a product of not. Fair use, as we know it, would go out the window. The intent, more toward HDTV than PC's, but they'll merge in some respects, is to control access not just to your cable box or HDTV, but all the way to the video. The intent is to encrypt so that today's 'vcr time shifting' becomes moot, they will NOT premit taping (or digitizing) for later viewing. This is an area that's been getting attention in the HDTV area. As it stands now, there's a conflict in the consumer electronics area on encryption means, the most pervasive being the one promoted by Sony and others which also has the abililty to remotely 'revoke' access. But in any case, they mean to encrypt not just to your door step, but between your cable box and hdtv, or any 'vcr' type device which may also be available once this stuff comes out. (Sony has already included their encryption scheme in some of their new models.) The particularly gruesome aspect is that 'it can be revoked by satellite'. (And that also means through your cable box of over the air broadcast.) This is big brother to the extreme, making the uproar over the cipher chip for few years ago a folly. In this case, there's no key repository, no requirement for a court order to match a key to shut you off, they simply do it. If you combine the impact of the UCITA, DMCA, and now this, is an attempt, that so far seems to be suceeding, to tell the supreme court where they can go. (This should also make the courts stand up and take notice, however. With the ability to control content..and folks, this isn't just cable or dbs, they mean to include it in free over the air digital tv, it causes one to think carefully of the ability to control news and the freedom of the press. What happens the first time the gov't decides to prevent distribution of a story. Today, we generally lean about it anyway. In the future, the government wouldn't have to attempt to coerce the press, protected by the 1st amendment, to supress information. They could simply go to the neighborhood repository of 'commercial access' keys with a court order and say 'shut 'em all down'. They wouldn't be the 'press'. So what do you think they're going to do?) We are treading in VERY dangerous territory.
(off soapbox mode)

Re:As long as quality isnt affected

[Oblio]

Ya, I think I agree. I was thinking about it as a decision maker trying to maximize profits, not trying to prevent piracy.

What I decided is that you really can't price for piracy, but piracy is in fact a hidden cost. Presumably, some of those pirates would have actually purchased. In this situation, what you would see is some kind of method for content to be limited to devices which are encrypted all the way along the pipe.

What I don't see is how intel would plan to leverage this tech. They aren't content producers, they can't charge the content producers licence fees. They would end up having to sell their devices for a higher price to offset the additional devel cost.

Ah well...it looks like a few people didn't agree with me. :)

Encryption?

[darylp]

Does this mean I need to get a Public Key for my pr0n?

Gives a whole new meaning to 'Secure Socket Layer'...

Would this be good against eavesdropping?

[fialar]

I have heard that the FBI can tell what you have on your computer screen by scanning your house. Perhaps this would only work for actual CRT monitors?

In any case, this sounds like what SSH over an X connection would do.

NJV

Re:Would this be good against eavesdropping?

[Anonymous Coward]

No. The problematic radiation comes from the CRT, and that can not be encrypted, because you would only see noise on your screen. IMHO this is just another-bad-idea(tm), like the DVD encryption. BTW you can protect against eavesdrooping on your screen with very good results by adding a some small noise to the graphics, which is visually almost invisible, but screews up the picture that the eavesdropper is seeing. There are even drivers for MAC and WIN that do this transparently !

Re:Would this be good against eavesdropping?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm assuming that's what this is for.. to prevent eavesdropping. The technology you mentioned as something the FBI uses is called TEMPEST. It basically listens to the electromagnetic radiation your CRT produces when it displays pictures on the screen. It then converts those signals, much in the way your car radio reproduces sound from radio waves, (another, lower frequency form of electromagnetic radiation.) The reason TEMPEST works is that there isn't enough sheilding on cables and monitor enclosures to prevent all of the radiant energy from escaping. It only keeps enough of it from getting out so that there will be minimal interference with other common devices such as radios and televisions.
Having said all that,.. even if Intel encrypts the data with a 56-bit key, do you really think Monitor manufacturers are going to go to the extent of designing electromagnetically sealed devices? No, I don't think so. So basically you've got the same problem. The signal is going to be leaking out of the monitor cable enough to where you could probably pick it up from 10 -20 feet away. If it's a CRT, maybe more. So now it's encypted.. so what? It's ony using 56-bit encryption, and if that is on a chip that's going to work with lots of other monitors it's going to have to be compatible. Basically, everyone who would want to gain access to your monitor's emissions would be able to, and with little more effort than is required now. This is most likely a ploy Intel will use to build proprietary video technology. It has no real value and anyone who thinks it will give them an ounce of security/privacy is living in a dream world.

Re:Would this be good against eavesdropping?

[Anonymous Coward]

This can't prevent against tempest attacks, as the data is eventually decrypted on your monitor which outputs high amounts of radiation. It would only protect you if somebody spliced the video cable to your monitor, and that would be both obvious and near pointless. Unless we also have to by decrytping glasses, there is no point to the encryption, at least on the consumer end.

Re:Would this be good against eavesdropping?

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone have a link to the driver?

Re:Would this be good against eavesdropping?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, I don't believe it is legal to manufacture a fully shielded computer system.

Quoting FCC regulations, section 15.5, General Conditions Of Operation, paragraph (b):
Operation of an intentional, unintentional, or incidental radiator is subject to the conditions that no harmful interference is caused and that interference must be accepted that may be caused by the operation of an authorized radio station, by another intentional or unintentional radiator, by industrial, scientific and medical (ISM) equipment, or by an incidental radiator.

Further quoting FCC Regulations, Section 15.3, Definitions, Paragraph (k):
Digital Device. (previously defined as a computing device). An unintentional radiator (device or system) that generates and uses timing signals or pulses at a rate in excess of 9,000 pulses (cycles) per second and uses digital techniques; inclusive of telephone equipment that uses digital techniques or any device or system that generates and uses radio frequency energy for the purpose of performing data processing functions, such as electronic computations, operations, transformations, recording, filing, sorting, storage, retrieval, or transfer. A radio frequency device that is specifically subject to an emanation requirement in any other FCC Rule part or an intentional radiator subject to subpart C of this part that contains a digital device is not subject to the standards for digital devices, provided the digital device is used only to enable operation of the radio frequency device and the digital device does not control additional functions or capabilities. NOTE: Computer terminals and peripherals that are intended to be connected to a computer are digital devices.

What this implies is that a device so well shielded that its own RF emanations were undetectable would also be so well shielded that it would reject interference of devices 'that may be caused by the operation of an authorized radio station, by another intentional or unintentional radiator, by industrial, scientific and medical (ISM) equipment, or by an incidental radiator,' and would be in violation of FCC regs. This is why you don't see a big market for fully shielded systems outside the military.

I would speculate that since Tempest is not, technically , subject to wiretapping laws, as it detects 'unintentional radiation' rather than an intentional telecommunications signal, this FCC reg is a legal loophole to ensure such surveillance capabilities.

Of course, the FCC doesn't say anything about turning your apartment or office into a really big Faraday Cage as a do-it-yourself endeavor.

Re:Would this be good against eavesdropping?

[lingenfr]

It should be good. TEMPEST is the program that DoD and some of other agencies follow for issues dealing with EMF. People have been aware that CRTs could be monitored for quite some time. About 20 years ago, a researcher named Wim Van Eck demonstrated that CRTs could be monitored with a $50 device from 100s of meters. He was able to recreate the screen because the ratio of horizontal to vertical frequency is constant. Mr. Van Eck recommended encrypting the signal so that the screen was drawn in a random fashion. He said that it could be done without raising the price of the monitor more than $20. Having multiple monitors as the other fellow suggested would not work. Van Eck phreaks have shown that each device has a unique signature. Just my .02. There is alot of information on the web about Van Eck and the phenomenon. There are some interesting stories about other folks using similar technology such as the BBC and Microsoft.

Sad.

[Kamelion@home]

Yet another unneeded encrypted media.

Now if we write a driver to read these encrypted signals on a Linux display will we get our pants sued off again?

Re:Sad.

[yoyoboy]

Yes, You Will...

Have I heard this somewhere before?

[luckykaa]

HDCP uses a 56-bit key, with individual keys distributed to the various vendors. A violated key could be tracked down and revoked

I'm sure this was what was claimed for DVD's. One was found, and the rest were crackable.

Re:Have I heard this somewhere before?

[Anonymous Coward]

Even better, if they are stupid enough to start selling this equipment, someone will figure out how to generate the 'revocation code' that makes your TV stop working. A few unscrupulous people on the internet will release it and suddenly millions of peoples monitors and TVs are worthless.

The public backlash would prevent them from ever trying anything like this again.

Might be fun...

[nakedman]

...for when you get frustrated with the encryption, to try and "reverse engineer" your monitor with a sledgehammer :)

So this is why they're pushing digital TV

[Grog6]

This has got to be the stupidest thing i've seen yet. The only use for this is to 'protect' copyright holders' interests at the expense of our pockets. Why encrypt a display unless you work on nukes? This makes the DVD issue small somehow...

Re:So this is why they're pushing digital TV

[JohnMilton]

Actually, they already have a way of preventing eavesdropping of the display signal. I believe it's called tempesting, but I'm not quite sure, that could be something totally different :-).

What it seems to me is that really the sole purpose of this encryption technique, is to prevent sort of middle-man copying...like putting a vcr or something between the output and the display. Remember, this isn't just from computer's to monitors...it's also from "set-top boxes" i.e. cable boxes. This looks like some sort of scheme to prevent people from doing what a lot of us do now...run your cable line through the vcr, and copy movies from TV.

More and more companies realize that information is money. I wouldn't doubt that we're going to see many more zany encryption schemes, protecting everything. Companies will continue to try to trample on consumer's rights, because the fewer rights that we have, the more money that they can make off of us.

Re:So this is why they're pushing digital TV

[Anonymous Coward]

information is money

Information is freedom! you can't buy or sell freedom!

Re:So this is why they're pushing digital TV

[Stary]

Information is freedom! you can't buy or sell freedom!

No, but it can be stolen...

Re:So this is why they're pushing digital TV

[Mr_Ceebs]

Why encrypt a display unless you work on nukes?Well just about any industry has competition.
Apart from that, digital TV allows them to cram more channels into less bandwidth, with the effect that the regulators can sell more bandwidth to mobile phone companies.

Re:So this is why they're pushing digital TV

[Anonymous Coward]

How do you eat soup in the matrix...? How do you know what the soup tastes like? Maybe they got it wrong and it actually tastes like TROLL FECES? WAAAAAAAAAAAAZZZZZZZZZAAAAAAAa

Re:So this is why they're pushing digital TV

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps you're talking about tempest shielding, which is the brute force trick of sticking enough radiation absorbtive material between the electronics and potential eavesdroppers.

Quantico is supposed to tbe shielded like this, using leaded glass and air-tight conductive metal shielding in the walls. The idea is, reduce the signal to where its too faint to be read, and you should be safe.

Also, note that tempest/van-eck is also theoretically possible against more than just your monitor. Anything that carries current at a fixed frequency produces a telltale RF signature. It is theoretically possible to devise hardware, that could analyze that signature.

Another viable defense against this snooping is ensuring that multiple machines in the same lab are running at the same freqencies. This should make it more difficult to differentiate the various signals.

Re:So this is why they're pushing digital TV

[plague3106]

That is legal tho isn't it? Or maybe not, i dunno. But if taping a tv show for private use is, i don't see why a movie would be any different.

Why?

[theCoder]

My question is why do this at all? What's the point? Make people by all new monitors? Prevent people from tapping your video cable?

I, for one, have this neat little switch, which allows me to have 1 monitor on 3 computers. Will this new encryption thing prevent this in the future?

I guess they mightbe worried about people hooking their VCRs up to video stream and recording their DVDs, or something. It doesn't seem like it's worth trying to break something that already works. (can you imagine all the tech support problems something like this will generate?)

Can anyone think of a useful application of this sort of thing?

Re:Why?

[Thiarna]

My guess is its for set top boxes(pay per view television, internet etc), wasnt DVD cracked because of some unencrypted link in the chain? I doubt its for desk-top computers, unless they are being used as a set top box, surely its easier to tap into the signal from the screen itself than through a few feet of cable. I dont know of a situation where the screen is far from the machine doing the displaying.

Re:Why?

[pidhead]

I can tell you why, but it is stupid. When movie studios and other people feel like they have a secure medium, that will open a whole new world of offerings that we haven't even dreamt of yet. Theater movies in your living room for instance. Simply because these guys are SOOOOOO afraid of one guy and his VHS deck, they'll hold out until the last little bit of risk is gone. That's what DVD was supposed to do for them, but we know how that turned out. There is an untapped wealth of consumer offerings that are waiting for a secure medium to protect them.

Re:Why?

[Skinny Rob]

The useful application (from a corporate viewpoint) is, as you suggest, to stop you from recording the decrypted content en-route to the monitor and getting round copy protection that way. I suppose that in principle it could hamper a remote eavesdropper (but not foil them completely?). And as a side effect you'd have a buy new CopyProtect monitor if you want to watch even a single video carrying this protection. Oh well, I suppose that's "progress"...

Re:Why?

[Bad Mojo]

Assuming your switchbox doesn't alter the signal, I don't see any reason why a signal encrypted at the card and decrypted at the monitor would suffer from the use of a switchbox.

I have to ask if this will cause the regioning of video cards and monitors (like DVD). Now monitors made for the US can cost less/more than monitors made for EU consumption, or something similar. It would also mean (probably) more types of video cards and even more kinds of drivers. Blah. This is unwarranted complexities. And it won't keep people from reading your monitor with an antenae. If they want to do something security related, design a way to make monitors not give off any more radiation. It might save some life, too.

Bad Mojo

Re:Why?

[thimo]

From the article:

"At the Intel Developer Forum here, Intel Corp. unveiled a copy protection scheme that will add a layer of encryption between the system and the digital display."

If "copy protection scheme" doesn't ring a bell, I don't know what would... :-) Seems as if Intel is looking for new friends, like the MPAA.

Thimo
--

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ownership of the viewer's subliminal programming channel. Maybe the viewer can tire them of waiting for it.

Re:Why?

[theCoder]

Assuming your switchbox doesn't alter the signal, I don't see any reason why a signal encrypted at the card and decrypted at the monitor would suffer from the use of a switchbox

I don't think it would have a problem, until I try to switch to a different computer. There would have to be an authentication process and a key switch, and the monitor may not know to do that. So basically, I'll be avoiding anything like this for a long time to come. If enough people do the same, this will go the way of DIVX.

How soon until they start "protecting" our keyboard connections? You know, so we don't type anything that's copy protected? :)

Re:Why?

[Darth Yoshi]

Right now, almost all computer monitors have analog inputs. I think I'm safe in guessing you have one of those simple A-B-C-D KVM (keyboard/video monitor) switchboxes (like I have), or maybe one of those cool electronic switchboxes from Belkin or Linksys.

This encryption is based on the new DVI (digital video interface) standard being developed which, I understand, is all digital between the computer and monitor instead of analog.

So, as I understand it, not only can't you use your switchbox with encrypted DVI video, you can't use it with any DVI video.

How much of an improvement DVI is over standard analog video is argueable. I believe it does offer an improvement for LCD displays, but less of an improvement for vacuum tube displays. Remember that Intel is in business to sell chips, so one point of view is that they're basically feeding on movie industry paranoia.

Re:Why?

[mattcasters]

The evolution is to combine home tv/dvd/video/computer/stereo/... in a single home network. It allows you to transfer your TV program to your computer on the fly and vice versa.
"Computer: transfer this signal to my office"

Extend this to larger organisations and networks and you might want to encrypt video signals and the lot.

(Or... It's just another sort of copy protection like DVD uses)

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

If they only sell them through companies in states which have passed UCITA, with the EULA in small print on the inside of the box, there will be no tech-support problems. After all, under UCITA it's not their problem if their product sterilizes your children and burns down your house.

Re:Why?

[jonathanclark]

I've got to agree with this point. While I think Intel has a good idea here (from the producers standpoint), I don't see the consumer willing to pay extra money for these screens that don't add any value from their perspective - unless a new DVD-like standard comes around that requires it.

Most people in america probably have el-cheapo 13-15" monitor that cost ~$100. A digital screen with the processing power needed to decrypt DES at a screen fill rate isn't going to compete with this anytime soon. In the end it's all about the dollars. Content with good copy protection is going to have a small market and make much less money than content with bad copy protection (DVD) that is available to more people. It's not aobut how many people pirate your stuff, it's about how many people buy (or rent) it.

Re:Why?

[sjames]

When movie studios and other people feel like they have a secure medium, that will open a whole new world of offerings that we haven't even dreamt of yet.

Some sort of thing where you just press a button on your remote and you get to see the movie? And they just charge $3.00 on your credit card? Believe it or not, it's available now and it's called pay per view. On a DSS system it looks pretty good, and on DSS w/ HDTV it will look great.

We will be offered those things one way or the other, because there's a ton of money to be made by offering it. All end to end encryption will get the consumer is ripped off.

Re:Why?

[Abigail-II]

Can anyone think of a useful application of this sort of thing?

Privacy. The signal between the computer and monitor is another signal that can be tapped. Perhaps not relevant if you typing a letter to your grandma at home, using a cable between the box and the monitor, but for some cooperations it is a concern, specially if they are using wireless communication between the computer and the display.

I don't understand why the /. crowd is so eager to protect privacy when it comes to sending data over the Internet, but this is dismissed as "we don't need this".

-- Abigail

Re:Why?

[Ixnorp]

Why? Because it is written in the sacred scrolls.

Actually we're being paranoid because of the 'obvious' use for this. Certainly there are fair uses and intended uses for all products but some uses seem more obvious to certain crowds. Compare the /. people being paranoid about this all the way encryption and other measures that we feel deprive us of rights to the MPAA/RIAA people being paranoid about DeCSS/MP3/Napster depriving them of their what they feel is their property and their rights to it. The corporate management is saying "Those damn kids are trying to steal our music/movies!" and the slashdot people are saying "Those damn corporations are trying to steal our rights!"

I'm not trying to defend the MPAA/RIAA but in any arguement there are at least 2 points of view after all.

Re:Why?

[Fyndo]

I don't understand why the /. crowd is so eager to protect privacy when it comes to sending data over the Internet, but this is dismissed as "we don't need this".

Because the computer is under my control, the monitor is under my control, and almost everything in-between. With a wireless scheme, where the signal is being broadcast into places I don't have control, I would agree that encryption is a brilliant idea, but personally, I'd do it at the transmitter and reciever, and just make sure any radio data I transmit is encrypted, why make a special scheme for video? But encrypting things for a 3' travel from one point in my home, to another point in my home, that does not at any point leave my home, it strikes me at least, that the culprit that they're trying to defend that signal from is already in my home. Me.

So the fear is, it's yet another paranoid scheme to "protect intellectual property"

Now the internet, suddenly I'm broadcasting my data outside my home, over dozens of systems I have no control whatsoever on. The risk of my data being intercepted is much greater.

Basically, I'm willing to walk naked on my way to the shower, or in a revealing bathrobe, but not willing to on the street, as I already have appropriate privacy protections in place.

So the reasons are:

1. The risk to us of someone intercepting the data over the cable in our home is small (especially compared to the TEMPEST emisions of our current monitors)
2. The risk to us of someone intercepting data on the internet is large (even compared to aforementioned TEMPEST emissions)
3. We don't trust the Copyright Association, and this sounds like the kind of thing they'd like to make mandatory on all flat-screen displays

Re:Why?

[detritus.]

I think so. Have you heard of TEMPEST? Remote monitoring... Here is a great amount of info on it.

Can anyone elaborate if this encryption scheme could possibly prevent Tempest attacks? From what I can gather this is what they are trying to do. However, I am weary of Intel actually being concerned for user privacy (P3 Processor ID).

And why such weak cypher strength? This surely will be crackable, and i'm sure that companies aren't going to do a total recall on their monitors because a key was cracked. This seems fishy to me - if it's not creating a false sense of security it's gotta be something not to a person concerned about privacy. It has to please corporate giants in some way.

- Detritus

"I never really liked computers, but then the server went down on me"

Re:Why?

[scrytch]

> Privacy

Not when you don't own the keys, friend...

What is the benefit

[Anonymous Coward]

What is the benefit of this technology? I have heard that Microsoft wanted to encode the license code of its applications into their signal to the monitor so that they could scan houses/businesses for illegal copies of their software.

I wonder what came of it... Maybe it is already happening.

I suppose it is possible that certain high-security sites would require something like this.

It in particular would be handy in wearable monitors/visors that only the wearer can see the screen. That way, they would be additionally secure.

Not Effective.

[Anonymous Sniper]

Gee, I know plenty of windows users who know what the "Print Screen" button does.

Yay. Yet another move to remove all consumer rights. You know, here in .au, we little people still have rights. Or at least thats what we're told.

I find it disgusting that corporations will arbitrarily coorperate with each other to put the collective consumer over a barrel. Pathetic.

Meantime, What is the supposed justification for encrypting signals i am sending to my monitor? Am i not supposed to be able to access them? Oh, whait, intel wants to be able to control who makes displays, who does not. Who makes video cards, who does not. Perhaps it might be against those in power (obviously the MPAA and RIAA in .us) ?

A violated key could be tracked down and revoked over a satellite broadcast network, for example

Doesnt that scare anyone? that they can arbitrarily shut down _my_ hardware because some norweigian pissed off a multibillion-dollar-american-corporation ? Scares me. Lots.

My 2.2c (inc GST). No Refunds.

Re:Not Effective.

[nuprin24]

If you are going to include GST, it should be 2.14c CDN.

Re:Not Effective.

[Ralph Wiggam]

A violated key could be tracked down and revoked over a satellite broadcast network, for example
My friends that have cracked DSS systems just don't plug the unit into the phone jack. The system works perfectly (every pay per view channel 24/7) but they stay off RCA's radar.

Would a satellite hookup be required for the operation of this Intel system or is it just a way of them keeping tabs on you? It seems like a lot of cost and trouble if it adds nothing for the consumer.

Besides all that, I don't see any real market for this stuff outside of the DOD or DOE. You can pick out the target market because they have aluminium foil around their heads to keep out the alien mind control.

-B

Re:Not Effective.

[DeadSea]

This kind of scheme would in effect disable the "Print Screen" button. Print screen works by looking at the contents of your video buffer. With this scheme the video buffer would be encrypted. Only the monitor would be able to unencrypt, and the monitor, would not be programmed to give you back the unencrypted data in digital format.

It seems like this scheme would be quite effective against that.

Re:Not Effective.

[Glytch]

There's a GST down under, too. And in the Maritimes, that 2.14 is actually 2.30. Damned blended sales tax...

Re:Not Effective.

[Skinka]

"Gee, I know plenty of windows users who know what the "Print Screen" button does."

Hmm, lets see how easy it is to copy a 90 minute movie with print screen: 90 mins = 5400s. At 24 frames per second were talking about 129600 individual frames. printscrn - save screenshot - advance one frame - printsrcn - save screenshot - advance one frame... Are you willing to do that 129600 times?

Re:Not Effective.

[psionic]

Yay. Yet another move to remove all consumer rights. You know, here in .au, we little people still have rights. Or at least thats what we're told.

oh yeah, Australians have all the rights they want--unless it involves firearms. <snicker>

Re:Not Effective.

[Tower]

and if you actually printed them out (aside from the bulk and the cost of the paper/toner) that would be one hell of a flipbook...

Or even better - really neat wallpaper!

Re:Not Effective.

[delmoi]

Gee, I know plenty of windows users who know what the "Print Screen" button does.

This is actually the way that some of the earlier DVD-rip programs worked. Capturing video memory for every frame. However, it's not a Guarantied way to do things. For one thing, you have the issue of video ports, witch are a special way to reallocate a block of screen space in a different memory aria. With my old TV-Tuner Card, trying to do a print-screen of the TV would get me a big purple square. (Of course, my TV tuner card had raw input anyway, so this wasn't a problem)

Think about it this way, if there had been no DeCSS, there would be no (encrypted, not all DVDs are encrypted) DVD's on Linux. Presumably, this isn't being done to prevent people from saving the state of their computer monitor, but rather to prevent people from recording copyrighted material. Its possible that there might be a DVDCCA style license for this stuff, so Microsoft could just disable the Print-screen, or something (even going so far as to put the video-port aria into protected memory). They could also allow no open source players at all.

Of course, if you really want to record this stuff, all you need is a cam-corder. A bright LCD screen will probably record pretty well...

[ c h a d o k e r e ]

Re:Not Effective.

[delmoi]

With this scheme the video buffer would be encrypted.

I'm not sure the video buffer itself would be encrypted, that would break a lot Of programs that need to read and write to it... I think they would just encrypt before it gets to the card.

[ c h a d o k e r e ]

Re:Not Effective.

[delmoi]

Or internet porn.

[ c h a d o k e r e ]

Re:Not Effective.

[Maurice]

If nothing else works, is it possible to capture the data from the spot where the monitor has already decoded it? I mean, if the monitor is going to decrypt, there will be some Intel chip in it that would do it. Just hook up on its output and you're set. OK, this will probably be hard to do in practice, but we should not underestimate the abilities of the creative hacker. Like another poster said, if you can see it, you can copy it. And if it's digital, you can make a perfect copy. Also, if the screen area being encrypted is say 640x480x24bit then it's about 1MB of data. Even though the movie refreshes 24frames/second, the screen refreshes at 75 (or more) Hz, so you need to decrypt like 75 Megs/second. If your decrypt key is large, this will require a lot of processing power. Of course depending on the algorithm used.

Re:Not Effective.

[Gary Franczyk]

I agree... This smacks of the same type of control that the CSS encryption has on DVD players.

Personally, I think encryption should be totally open and in the public domain. Otherwise, it lends itself to abuse by those with control over the scheme.

Never trust a company to do the right thing. They are there just to make money.

Even RedHat has a hard time joining in the Linux standards teams. Making a linux standard has a lot of potential to take away market share from Redhat... They have a lot to loose in the short term.

Re:Not Effective.

[Anonymous Coward]

How would OpenGL work then? With OpenGL you are supposed to be able to examine the contents of the frame buffer.

Does this mean I have to buy new games too?

Re:Not Effective.

[barleyguy]

Besides all that, I don't see any real market for this stuff outside of the DOD or DOE. You can pick out the target market because they have aluminium foil around their heads to keep out the alien mind control.

The market for this is people who aren't aware that they even have it. All they know is that they bought a computer with a kickass movie player (It was only 599.00 at Sam's Club...) and there's this funny looking cable between the monitor and computer. This keeps their friend the techie from buying the same cheap computer and copying movies.

I think this whole thing is a completely stupid idea. If you can watch it with your eyes, you can copy it. Period. They transfer old films to videotape that way, and then you can digitally remaster them and make them look really good. So what's the point? There really is none, other than keeping low level Joe-Bob-Suzy consumer copying to a minimum.

Re:Not Effective.

[~MegamanX~]

If we could "Print Screen", it would mean that the data is not encrypted in video memory. Since we got computers(!), i believe it would be a bit simpler to read the video memory (emulate a keypress on "print screen" if you wish) between every frame. And this would be no problem.

But if they are smart, data will be encrypted all the time up to when it reaches the chip in the monitor.

phobos% cat .sig

Re:Not Effective.

[Pascal Q. Porcupine]

In OpenGL, there's a few functions for copying the framebuffer from one place to another (such as glReadPixels() and glCopyPixels()). There's no guarantee that the framebuffer as displayed on the screen will be available in a screencapture, and the framebuffer is typically only available to the process which owns the OpenGL context (though, as usual, this is implementation-specific).
---
"'Is not a quine' is not a quine" is a quine.

Re:Not Effective.

[sjames]

Presumably, this isn't being done to prevent people from saving the state of their computer monitor, but rather to prevent people from recording copyrighted material.

The problem is, it won't stop with movies. Next will come the new 'improved' acrobat reader that sends the encrypted pdf directly to the screen. Eventually, some software producer will decide that their tradmarked, patented, and 'protected by hired goons' (TM) look and feel should be further protected by sending the UI in encrypted form.

The companies who create all of this expensive crap and then force the consumer to pay for it all are the very same companies who will gladly cut the life of a product in half or make it impossable to repair in order to save $0.05 worth of parts because "the consumer demands lower prices".

As usual, this technology will harm the typical consumer while the big time bootleggers will still be in business because they can afford the time and energy needed to tap the LCD electronics and read off the unencrypted image.

How to prevent eavesdropping?

[luckykaa]

The easy way to prevent this would be to have a lot of monitors with the same frequency and resolution and slightly different information on each of them. Just Keep the signal to noise ratio low enough and you should be okay.

Re:How to prevent eavesdropping?

[hattig]

Tempest works on both CRT and LCD screens, to answer to first poster.

The easiest way to foil Tempest is to cut the top 30% out of the picture - it doesn't affect image quality that much, although everything is a little more blurred than normal. The great thing is, you can put other information in the top 30% of the signal without affecting what the monitor shows to you - but to those monitoring you all they see is the top 30%. So run a simple screensaver type program that only writes to the top 30% of the signal, and plan your bomb making in the bottom 70% in perfect secrecy.

See more here: Ross Anderson's Page at Cambridge University. Includes special fonts designed for Tempest fooling.

~~

Re:How to prevent eavesdropping?

[slashdot-terminal]

Tempest works on both CRT and LCD screens, to answer to first poster.

pretty grim

The easiest way to foil Tempest is to cut the top 30% out of the picture - it doesn't affect image quality that much, although everything is a little more blurred than normal. The
great thing is, you can put other information in the top 30% of the signal without affecting what the monitor shows to you - but to those monitoring you all they see is the top
30%. So run a simple screensaver type program that only writes to the top 30% of the signal, and plan your bomb making in the bottom 70% in perfect secrecy.


I think a great many people already do something to foil tempest monitoring now. I looked at the official military documentation on creation of tempest proof structures and constructs. If you have a shielded enough location you can get away with it.

Since most people are in fact (not all) work out of basements which usually are below ground and surrounded by high density concrete you can be pretty sure that unless the FBI is behind the door to your basement that you are safe.

Re:How to prevent eavesdropping?

[RightSaidFred]

You seem to be mistaking picture for signal. In the Ross Anderson paper on eavesdropping, he says that only the top 30% of the *frequencies* emitted are received, but never mentions the top 30% of the *picture*. He has screenshots of the captured image, and the whole picture is there. The fonts work by cutting off the high frequency information out of the horizontal.

Re:How to prevent eavesdropping?

[tech_imp]

Yeah ... the power need to do this is pretty impressive. If you get a chance to read Peter Wright's book _Spy_Catcher_ it has some pretty good info on how and what it takes to boost signals so you can tap them.

The Brits had a C-130 specialy modified to be able to boost the transmission signals for listening devices -- unfortunalty it played hell with comon things like the UK cabbies radios in the 60's - 70's.

Copy Protection?

[MadMorf]

Other than as a defense against against Van Eck phreaking, how is this related to copy protection?
Are crackers/phreakers currently recording the signals coming out of your video cards and posting them on the 'Net?
This seems like a solution looking for a problem.

Re:Copy Protection?

[Foogle]

How is this even a defense against Van Eck phreaking? The pixels are encrypted on their way *to* your monitor, but they're still displayed in the same manner as before, otherwise you wouldn't be able to see what was on your screen. Of course, that doesn't apply to flatscreens, but we're not quite at the point where everyone is buying those yet.

-----------

"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."

Sale of pictures

[EnglishTim]

I'd imagine that this would be useful for selling pictures over the internet - if you've got a system where the only place the unencrypted image appears is inside the display device, then you can sell pictures to people using the full quality image rather than a thumbnail or apicture with 'preview only' stamped all over it. The customer can view the encrypted version and then buy an non-encrypted version if they like it for their own use.

Re:Sale of pictures

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes. There are already companies selling technology that locks this out, and their only vulnerability is the card drivers and the digital I/O from your card.
Intel is removing this "problem", by wasting YOUR money (paid when you buy a monitor) on protection for Hollywood.
Basically, any hardware which supports this is a Media Industry Subsidy, if you wouldn't give James Cameron $1M for begging on a street corner, don't buy these monitors.

Media companies need to learn that WE are in charge here. WE are the customers, THEY are not god.

Re:Sale of pictures

[MrHat]

Umm... How about (at least on Windoze) Alt+PrintScrn. Presto - the image is on the clipboard. For *nix, just use a screen-grabbing utility for X.

The rule still remains - anything you can see or hear *can* be copied. The closer the decryption chip gets to our brains, the less relevent this rule will be. ;-)


43rd Law of Computing: Anything that can go wr

Re:Sale of pictures

[QuMa]

Printscreen? Not likely. The data in your video card's ram is encrypted. This is send (digitally) to the monitor. The monitor then decrypts it in hardware....

Re:Sale of pictures

[Anonymous Coward]

Hrm... I guess all those screen grabs on themes.org are going away real soon...

Re:Sale of pictures

[Anonymous Coward]

Only if the authors protect their themes with Intel's content encryption system.

Re:Sale of pictures

[QuMa]

I think getting content providers to use it won't be the problem. But I sure as hell ain't buying one!

Re:First Comment!

[Anonymous Coward]

point is data can be intercepted from the display

Not if you read the Cryptonomicon

[Saint Mitchell]

Anyone remember VanEck Phreaking? I think that was how it was spelled. I actually did a search on the web trying to see if this was true or not, I found nothing. But if it is possible to see what is on your screen by reading the signal coming from your processor then I doubt this would help much. You could probably get the key just by watching how the processor behaves.

Re:Not if you read the Cryptonomicon

[noxious420]

Many people seemed to have missed that Cryptonomicon was fiction. Next people will be using examples from Necromancer....

Re:Not if you read the Cryptonomicon

[Anonymous Coward]

I imagine you're probably referring to "Neuromancer"?

Re:Not if you read the Cryptonomicon

[matman]

That sounds something like tempest. tempest is a system by which you can monitor the electromagnetic output from a device and reconstruct its data - thus you can sorta 'watch' a monitor from a few hundred feet away. There are actually tempest shielded computers that prevent 'leaks' of EM radiation

Re:Not if you read the Cryptonomicon

[Saint Mitchell]

I am aware that it was a fictional work. Let's not go around insulting intelligence.

Everything scientific WAS fiction at some point in time though. The cryptonomicon was one of the only techie books I've ever read that was very acurate. Yes, they called Linux FINUX, but we all knew what it was refering to. I actaully think that it is feasible to do what they talked about in the book. Yes, possibly fiction [thus why I added that I found nothing in my search] now...maybe not later.

Re:Not if you read the Cryptonomicon

[Eraser_]

You could probably get the key just by watching how the processor behaves.

You may be able to get the public key from the cpu (im assuming asymetric encryption), however this wont give you much, just more garbage when run through the (encryption algo)^-1. All of the decryption would take place in some IC in the monitor, which would contain the private key needed to decrypt the pixel. Thus the computer would never know what the acual decryption key was. Makes me wonder how this will affect 3d games. Will this encryption be done via software? forcing my Spiffy3DCard to send back the rendered frames for encrytion, or will it be an intermediate card, it just _has_ to be the last on the chain and the monitor is plugged into that. As though im going to buy a new monitor anytime soon.

Eraser_

Re:Not if you read the Cryptonomicon

[delmoi]

Many people seemed to have missed that Cryptonomicon was fiction

Many people seemed to have missed the fact that Proccessors, and all computer equipment give of EM waves based on what there doing. Well, you at least

Monitors, especialy, give of there signal very strongly. it is posible to see what's up on them.

[ c h a d o k e r e ]

Re:Not if you read the Cryptonomicon

[Anonymous Coward]

Back when I had an old 8-bitter with a video frequency monitor, I was tuning a TV and the computer was on in the next room. On the right frequency, you could see a fuzzy but readable rendition of the monitor picture on the TV!

I have no doubt that the same principle could be used with modern monitors. All you need is a TV-like device that can work at the higher refresh frequencies of today's monitors.

han

Re:Not if you read the Cryptonomicon

[Anonymous Coward]

Not neccessarly, IIRC Necromancer was a book by Brian Lumley about spies using things like remote viewing and speaking to the dead (necromancy), hence is probably more relevant to this sort of thing than neuromancer.

Re:Not if you read the Cryptonomicon

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, that was Necroscope.

Aside from that off-topic correction, I'm going to ask the same question that everyone else is: what the hell is the point to this technology? From what I can see, it's just a reiteration of the PIII serial number scheme: come up with a useless piece of tech (with or without neat doodads) that will presumably take the market by storm (or not), and screw your competitors with it because all of this nifty hardware is proprietary. Any guesses that this video tech will have "inexplicable" problems with non-Intel hardware?

Re:Not if you read the Cryptonomicon

[Saint Mitchell]

I apologize, I should have said that better. What I meant was: even if there is a processor in the monitor decrypting the data you could, in theory, still monitor that processor to get the key.

Hmm?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just what does this mean? Why would I WANT to encrypt a connection between my box and my monitor? Of what use it this?

Replacement for Tempest?

[348]

While the Digital Transmission Content Protection approach provides encryption for digital content as it moves over a 1394 interface, the HDCP is complementary.

I wonder if the motivation behind this was for the Government market. The military has been looking for a better Tempest style system for a couple of years now. The effort to design and implement this only for HDTV and Flat panels doesn't seem to have a big enough payoff, does it? I don't see the value in the commercial market, especially when the vendors will have to port the standards to accept HDCP.

Re:Replacement for Tempest?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is all well and good but how would you compile a Java program that would take advantage of this technology?

Re:Replacement for Tempest?

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe there's some sort of command-line in *nix systems that you could use. You might want to check out the sun website http://sun.java.com and see if they have any reference materials available for you. I know that if you use Microsoft (ugh) visual J++ you might other options as well. Various encryption schemes inevitably appear from time to time, yet vendors seem to delay their integration of those improvements (?) for some time. Open Source tends to be a little quicker on the ball. But to answer your question, yes, check the sun site.

Re:Replacement for Tempest?

[Gary Franczyk]

One way this technology could be "abused" is by companies like Cable companies and DirectTV that would now make it impossible for you view their signal with more than one TV (even if it were the same channel)
Currently, even with direct tv, you can split a signal _after_ the descrambler and send it to two TVs....
This way people cant set up sports bars without paying a larger licenseing fee...etc.

Re:Replacement for Tempest?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the better question would be:

How do you make a Beowolf cluster out of them?

Re:Replacement for Tempest?

[Anonymous Coward]

OK, Maybe I just dont get it, but can someone please explain WHY it would change anything or improve the way you would compile? I read the article and all I got, at a lymans level was that it merely encrypts the way the data is transmitted to the screen. This should't have any impact on the processing of the computer at all, just a different display algorythm. Right?

Re:Replacement for Tempest?

[Detritus]

It isn't going to be very useful in reducing compromising emanations. That requires a shielded cable, shielded case and a well filtered power supply.

What Algorithm?

[Anonymous Coward]

The whole thing sounds nice, and i think there is a need for it (e.g. connecting a flat panel to your server in the lower floor), but what algorithm are they using? 56 bit sounds like des, but over a 5gbaud conn? insane...

Why? What are they trying to acheive?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why are they doing this? What are they trying to achieve? Is this some sick way of making it possible to charge a license fee to display my computer to my monitor? Are they trying to keep people from pirating my video signal? Could some other geek explain how to pirate a video signal between the video card and a monitor? Would this really provide any protection from that signal pirating? What use would this have for the common Joe Geek?

Re:Why? What are they trying to acheive?

[|c0bra|]

Ultimately, they are attempting to gain more control over the consumer. Thats the trend things seem to be taking lately. This really blows.

What's the point?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sooooooo, Maybe I'm just really stupid, but what the h*ll is the point? Just because there are *not* encryption standards in place at this point for this link i the chain means we need them? Perhaps someone, original poster, or otherwise could explain to me the practical applications of this and just how far this will extend? Are we just talking about satalite transmitions as mentioned in the article? or all data sent through my machine to the screen? Seems unnecasary, but hey, like I said before, I'm *really* dumb..... Please o please.... Someone give me a reason for the need... The real question is: Will this effect my fps while playing Quake?

Re:What's the point?

[Stary]

Sooooooo, Maybe I'm just really stupid, but what the h*ll is the point? Just because there are *not* encryption standards in place at this point for this link i the chain means we need them? Perhaps someone, original poster, or otherwise could explain to me the practical applications of this and just how far this will extend? Are we just talking about satalite transmitions as mentioned in the article? or all data sent through my machine to the screen? Seems unnecasary, but hey, like I said before, I'm *really* dumb..... Please o please.... Someone give me a reason for the need...

It's really sooo simple. The practical application for this is for intel to earn some easy money.

The real question is: Will this effect my fps while playing Quake?

Probably not... might affect the price you pay if you wanna be able to play Quake IV: Master Bloodbath - Blood n Guts All Over Your Screen, though.

The right place to put the descramler

[XNormal]

is at the very last moment before the information is presented to the user. This minimizes the number of places where the unencrypted data may be intercepted.

Please note that I am treating it from a purely technical aspect. I will not get into whether content copy protection should or shouldn't be implemented.

Two issues, though:
1. Why just 56 bits? the new export regulations specifically exempt encryption used for copy protection from such limitations.

2. How will this interact with compression?
Decryption is, by definition, not linear i.e. decrypt(decompress(x)) != decompress(decrypt(x)).
Here they are talking about decrypting the high bandwidth raw video data

----

Re:The right place to put the descramler

[lapdog]

Correct if I'm wrong (really), but where _could_ you put the descrambler where at some point it would not be possible to grab a digital copy of the data. Does this make sense? Since it is digitally encrypted digital information (huh? =]) at some point it will be digitally decrypted and then translated to real pixels for your eye? No matter where you put the descrambler, it will have to have a layer between it and the display conversion, right? And especially since this is proposed for lcd's and other digital displays, you eventually get a perfect picture. So why couldn't you just grab it there (if you reverse engineered the hardware enough?).

And I think CmdrTaco made a valid, simple point one time on geeks in space, regarding DVD's, but it applies to all content scrambling systems, "If we can watch them, we can rip them."

Dave

Re:The right place to put the descramler

[Anonymous Coward]

On the ASIC in the video player.

compressed (weakly encrypted video) => |asic| => encrypted video stream comes out.

The ASIC never exposes a raw signal. It just decrypts/decompresses and re-encrypts and sends it on the wire to the video display

Re:The right place to put the descramler

[jonathanclark]

Two issues, though:
1. Why just 56 bits? the new export regulations specifically exempt encryption used for copy protection from such limitations.

Think global. Not all countries have the same legislation as the US. Also 56 DES decoder chips are much cheaper to make then 128-bit counter parts. That's a pretty high-bandwidth stream to decrypt if you are looking at 640x448x32bit at 30fps.

2. How will this interact with compression?

A very good question. It would seem they would need to do the mpeg macro-block decoding in the monitor which is a very freaky idea. That means the monitor needs some video memory of it's own.
There is no mention of this in the article. This would make the monitors quite a bit more expensive.

One other issue I thought of is image scaling and clipping. Suppose you want to run the DVD in a window, how can you scale the bits if they are encoded? Or if the window is obscured by another window you have to clip at pixel boundaries not macro-block boundaries. Monitor supported overlays could do this, but again more cost in the monitor - basically the monitor needs it's own video card with video memory. In which case, why have one in the PC as well?

Re:The right place to put the descramler

[powerlord]

Maybe thats their goal.
Intel tried to compete in the Video card market and failed. Maybe they are trying to move into the market again but from the other end.

I could see an Intel chipset that had a video out, not as an agp slot, but as a cable connector, that would connect up to the monitor with an 'Intel Only' vid card inside of it.

They can promote it as a new standard of video security, and incidentally remove competition, all from your good friends at Intel.

Re:The right place to put the descramler

[MassacrE]

assuming DVD (with hypothetical, less-laughable CSS2)->ASIC(on video card)->Monitor, yes.

There are problems with this though. First off, the ASIC will have to contain enough memory to both completely decrypt and then decode the MPEG-2 stream, then to stream it out (well, probably block-encrypted) to the monitor.
If you do this, the encrypted data could only really be viewed fullscreen.

Also if the memory for decryption was not stored outside the chip, you could just set it up to copy out the pre-encoded frames from video memory. Or even better, just the same with the original MPEG2.

I think the goal for this would be set-top boxes, where you don't have an underlying OS to use to snoop. But unless digital TV comes out and intel supplies the chips, there will never be enough consumers 'duped' into buying televisions with this technology for it to be really used.

Re:The right place to put the descramler

[Anonymous Coward]

The 56 bits also raises the obvious question of key management -- they're talking about a revocable key, which would seem to indicate some kind of per-unit as well as per-content-item key. Now maybe these things are separate (in which case, say, you would have to get a new key if you got a bigger screen or sold your screen to someone else) but if they're not it seems that the keyspace gets awfully small if it has room for any significant number of users. I'd hate to have an hour's delay before my pirated copy of Leonard Part VI started playing properly, but if it were a one-time thing it would probably be OK.

hmm..

[Anonymous Coward]

you don't need a public key.

and you're not funny.

Huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Huh? What does compiling Java have to do with anything?

What's the point

[Cryp2Nite]

Is there anyone that sees a use for this?
If I want to evesdrop on you it has been possible for some time now to read radiation patterns from a monitor. Allthough usually looking over someone's shoulder should do the trick just as well.
It's not like I won't notice someone sittingunder my desk with his ear to my monitor cable, right? Unless some of you have monitor cables ranging several tens of metres.
--
two-thousand-zero-zero
party over, it's out of time

Sell more chips!

[mr]

Intel has publicly stated they wish to sell more chips.

To that end, they have invested in many startups that will drive chip sales.

This encryption thing is just a way to sell more CPUs. As far as I am concerned, a cheap way to do it. (Cheap as in low cost for Intel. Encryption glued onto video. *YAWN*)

IF they want to drive chip sales in the display market, IBM and Toshiba's 200+ dpi LCD displays will need a whole new generation of silicon to drive them, and these applications would actual be useful.

News? Only in "news" means "old news"

[Anonymous Coward]

This has been known about for over 4 months.

How about some NEWS for a change, folks?

Let's now sit back and laugh as indignant linux users froth and foam at the mouth with indignation over something which causes ZERO problems at all and offers several benefits in terms of protection of copyright.

Re:News? Only in "news" means "old news"

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow... Jack Valenti reads Slashdot?

Cryptonomicon

[EChris]

Why not do this? Well..

Just like in the Cryptonomicon, where the characters did "Van Eck Phreaking" to watch a display from another room... It's ultra-paranoid security. I don't think it'll catch on outside of the government.

EChris

Re:Cryptonomicon

[finkployd]

I don't think it'll catch on outside of the government.

All some company has to do is make up some claim about how this improves your monitor resolution and hordes of people will buy it. Plus, all they need to do is make computers that will only work with this. What choice will we have.

Finkployd

Re:Cryptonomicon

[McBeth]

I would give people a little more credit than that
many of the same type of claim was made about
DIVX, but precious few jumped on the band wagon.
The thing that gets people to jump onto a bandwagon isn't that the company says everything is better, it is what the nerd friends that everyone has tells them... And unfortunately there are still too many nerd friends too afraid to try linux to swing that one over.
I'm rambling.

Re:Cryptonomicon

[finkployd]

True, but DIVX didn't have that much corporate muscle behind it. I'd hate to think what would happen if MS, Intel, and the MPAA could force on us if they tried.

Finkployd

Re:Cryptonomicon

[delmoi]

This has to do with the cable to your monitor. Not the monitor itself. "Van Eck Phreaking" uses the radiation emitted by the glass tube (or LCD screen), not the cable. Also, you can already buy monitors that subtly mess up the picture so that they can't there images can't be resolved remotely.

[ c h a d o k e r e ]

What comes first, HW bypass or SW cracker?

[Rollo]

Ho hum. This will surely stand the test of time (for infinitely small values of t) just like the other copy-protection attempts.
Lemmesee, will dvd rippers build something that intercepts the decrypted signal or will they go for the software solution and break the crypto? It's just a matter of personal preference, both methods are kinda easy.
Encryptimg something that eventually will be presented to the user in decrypted form...doesn't this sound fundamentally wrong?

Interesting !?!?! NOT !

[Anonymous Coward]

This is part of the MPAA plan to prevent easy access to digital content. I suggest boycotting it at all costs. Another reason to buy AMD.

Way off-Topic

[Anonymous Coward]

This is way off-topic, but has anyone else noticed that the moderation is getting better over the last few days?

It appears that the moderators are modding the good comments up and leaving the trolls just at zero. Not longer are they just tagging everything trollish or off-topic with a -1 just to dump their mod points. They are marking good comments up and letting the poorer ones to just drift to the bottom.

Good job moderators.

Wow, what a change, moderation by the suggested guidelines. That's refreshing.

So then hack the screen

[Anonymous Coward]

It has to be decrypted somewhere. The signal must go "pure" digital somwhere. It's really interesting to see how they try restrict access to digital media with these methods. I guess the only safe way for these companies to protect themselves is to implant decoders into ppls brains. You would have to make it self destruct if someone scanned your head with an NMR camera though. BOOOM :)

Privacy concerns

[spiralx]

HDCP uses a 56-bit key, with individual keys distributed to the various vendors. A violated key could be tracked down and revoked over a satellite broadcast network, for example.

Is there anyone else who thinks that this is a bit dodgy? It seems to be saying that there will be some kind of two-way connection to the HDCP system, linked to the broadcaster. This raises all kinds of concerns about what the system will be sending them to so as to "secure" the system. I don't really fancy any kind of information flow from my PC saying what I am currently displaying, even if it completely innocent.

maybe

[karb]

The FBI can also tap your phones, search your house, throw you into jail, and seize your property.

But it ain't bloody likely unless you enjoy attacking e-commerce sites or something else horribly deviant. They're pretty much flooded with cases and paperwork all the time, or so I've heard from my one federal law enforcement friend ;)

Re:maybe

[Anonymous Coward]

But it ain't bloody likely unless you enjoy attacking e-commerce sites or something else horribly deviant.

Or have enemies in high places who want you put away. And if you do, they can surely find some law you're breaking. Or at the very least confiscate your property on the suspicion that you're a drug trafficker. (It's called civil forfeiture, and is on the books. Check it out folks.)

Re:maybe

[slashdot-terminal]

Or have enemies in high places who want you put away. And if you do, they can surely find some law you're breaking. Or at the very least confiscate your property on the suspicion
that you're a drug trafficker. (It's called civil forfeiture, and is on the books. Check it out folks.)

You would really have to try to make enemies like that. I advise not to put a message telling them to "Fsck the FBI" on your personal homepage on your official .gov site. Really very few people make enemies of the National government. Peole should never give themselves great ammounts of flattery.

Paronoia becomes evident

[Jeremy Erwin]

Not much of article, and it begs the question-- why? At some point, the signal needs to be converted into analog. At that point, the signal is recordable. I suppose they could devise a cybernetic implant that activates retinal neurons if an individual is "licensed" to view content. If this things catches on, I bet we'll see the development of video cameras that are adapted to take screenshots.

Re:Paronoia becomes evident

[hedgehog_uk]

Have you read the article? It clearly states "The High-bandwidth Digital Copy Protection (HDCP) approach encrypts each pixel as it moves from a personal computer or set-top box to digital displays" Displays such as digital flat panels don't convert to a recordable analog signal.

I would strongly object to anything that prevents me from recording the output from my computer. I fail to see why the link between a video card and a digital display needs to be encrypted.

HH

Re:Paronoia becomes evident

[geekatlrg]

"The High-bandwidth Digital Copy Protection (HDCP) approach encrypts each pixel as it moves from a personal computer or set-top box to digital displays"

The key to this is that the data is encrypted just before it is transmitted, implying that if it was encrypted any other way prior to "now" that it does exsist in an unencrypted form on your system during the conversion process...

This seems like a waste of clock cycles if you ask me. Not to mention the fact (I believe a million people brought this up already) that it's only using 56-bit encryption (likely for two good reasons: it keeps the hardware cheap and the decryption method is fast enough to ensure that you can decrypt the massive quantity of data that is being transmitted...) so it won't be long before they have to start zotting keys...

oof... doesn't matter anyway, no consumer in their right mind would buy this piece this crap, it'll be too expensive with virtually no pay off....

-geek@large

Re:Paronoia becomes evident

[Jeremy Erwin]

Displays such as digital flat panels don't convert to a recordable analog signal.

I was using a very wide definition of "analog." Think of it this way. Your eyes, and ears are all analogue devices. If I play a CD-Audio disk, the only way I'm going to hear the music is if at some point, the digital data is converted into sound (an analog medium). Cheap CD-players convert into analogue using an onboard converter. More expensive players (transports) use an outboard A/D converter (either a seperate cconverter or one built into the pre-amplifier. The most exotic systems convert in the speaker. The sound that comes out of the speakers can be recorded.

If I place a microphone in between the speaker and my ear, I will be able to intercept a signal for recording. I don't know of anyone who has an S/PDIF connector into his/her brain (although it may be feasible to hack a cochlear implant).

>> Yet another way.... <<

[chris.barton]

..... to stop you recording the show while your out
(working later configuring a new hose-pipe array...)

56 bit, no problemo

[threaded]

Oh give me a break. Why do they think up these scams, sorry sceams?

NOT TEMPEST!!

[PG13]

Look this almost certainly won't help against tempest. Ths only encrypts things between the computer and monitor. If that could prevent tempest sorts of attacks so would cable shielding.

I understand the tempest signal actually comes about from the process of putting the information on the screen.

Moreover they have provisions to remove compromised keys. What good does this do? If I am an organization devoted to gathering information covertly I am sure as hell not going to tell anyone I have comprimised the key. Only if I am trying to copy signls (or help my friends copy) would I expouse my key knowledge.

The scary thing is that w/ hardware to hardware encryption and maybe DES they really could make the single hackproof (or nearly so)

Re:NOT TEMPEST!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Dunno, but if a Tempest system requires that one shoot electrons at a target, with a magnetic field
steering them around, then a flat panel is pretty much immune to that. And that's what this seems to be all about, LED panels (or plasma, or whatever).

Also, I think the problem with getting to the decrypted data is a bit overblown, on computers anyway. This sounds quite a bit more like a technique for home satellite video, and controlling what people record. Rather amazing that it's come to this.

And a big 'fuck off' to you folks who think that content control should stop me from recording a satellite video feed!

kabloie

DeCSS your monitor!

[rdmiller3]

It's completely futile. Any encryption they implement can be emulated in software eventually. Just as was done with the CSS for DVDs.

Just imagine the user-interface problems this would cause! Can I do a screen-print? Will it stop a "kibitz"-like application from "sharing" a chunk of my screen?

What it comes down to is that the only way to succeed in copy protection is to convince your customers that it's in their own best interest not to copy your stuff without your permission.

• Don't charge outrageous prices.
• Allow copying with reasonable restrictions.
• Prove that the money your customers send you will benefit them by continuing to produce new, quality products and/or advancing the state of the art.

CSS from the cradle to the grave

[Megane]

There's only one use for this, and that's to satisfy the RIAA/MPAA types that it is sufficiently difficult for Joe Bitshift to intercept copy-protected movies and other images and save them as an unencrypted file. There is also a desire to move toward similar encryption to audio output devices as well.

Remember how one of the arguments in the DeCSS case is that with players which dump the data into the video card frame buffer, you can simply re-digitize the picture to create your own MPEG-1 files? Well, that's what this is all about.

It has nothing to do with "Van Eck" or "Tempest" radiation, because those read the image off of the CRT tube's electron beam.

Will drivers for this crap be avaliable for Linux, which requires GPL kernel drivers due to its design? It's possible. An important reason why CSS was cracked is that software implementations of DVD players existed, making it much easier to determine the encryption algorithm. A proper hardware implementation can keep the "secrets" out of the drivers themselves.

I do see one problem with maintaining sufficient security with this scheme, though. If you get data from an outside source (the internet, a DVD, etc.) which has to be processed before being displayed, all processing steps have to be kept in hardware where only encrypted intermediate data is available to the main CPU. I think this will be sufficiently difficult to maintain (after all, someone has to process those .IFO files from a DVD) that this will in the long run not be feasible.

Or at least let's hope so.

Re:CSS from the cradle to the grave

[chialea]

um, actually, I believe that Linus has decreed that bianary-only drivers are ok -- I suppose a way of getting hardware to work that you can't get to work any other way...

and I think that they can keep everything that matters in hardware -- of course, it's going to cost us. lots.

Lea

Re:CSS from the cradle to the grave

[Megane]

I seem to recall that he said binary drivers are okay, but that he would make no effort to keep the API unchanged if it was a choice between compatibility with binary drivers vs improving the kernel.

hay ... anyone know

[ihxo]

when we'll have mouse signal encryption and keyboard signal encryption ??

Can someone explain why the communication between hardware _locally_ need encryption ?? .. ~_~"

Anymore useful technology ??

Re:hay ... anyone know

[QuMa]

It's not only the link that gets encrypted. The data comes of the net/a dvd encrypted, goes to your video card encrypted, and is sent to your monitor encrypted. Your monitor then decrypts it. (in hardware)

Not for home users PC's

[Anonymous Coward]

I see what they're trying to do but I don't see that the market for this will initially be home users PCs.
It's a great idea for specialist areas (high security data centers, maybe even portable eye set screens and the up coming MS black box) but in order for it to be used in the PC market people have to be pursuaded to buy a special monitor - easier said than done. It's not the same as buying a DVD drive.

So this is to prevent US evesdropping on...

[Shanep]

our own shit! Basically, they don't want us having access to our own digital perfect media. Crypto from storage to display! No middle man. And if there is a middle man, he is being watched! Sorry Intel, I'm not buying this shit, nor will my next CPU or chipset have Intel stamped anywhere on it. It'll be AMD/Athlon and Transmetta all the way. Rage Against The Fucking Machine!

Re:So this is to prevent US evesdropping on...

[Shanep]

"from a personal computer or set-top box to digital displays"

From this, it is obviously only targetted to digital displays. VGA and the likes are analog.

This crypto is not to stop people in vans reading your email, it is to stop you from making a digital copy of some media that you own.

If I want to make a backup copy, well guess what Intel, I'll do whatever the fuck I want with what I own. I dare you to come into my home and stop me.

would this defeat DeCSS

[Anonymous Coward]

I was trying to think of reasons Intel would implement this. Instead of focusing on the tech, we need to focus on the "why" of the technology. Wouldn't this defeat the DeCSS hack (I believe that this hack was simply the interception of the unencrypted DVD data on its way to the monitor.) As far as I can tell, Intel is implementing this not for Tempest-type purposes, but to protect Big Business Intellectual Property. Any other views?

Re:would this defeat DeCSS

[G27 Radio]

No, this wouldn't defeat DeCSS. However even without DeCSS it was still possible to capture the video on it's way to the monitor. This would prevent that. I think the intent is to force users of future types of media from using it on 'unauthorized' equipment.

What I wonder is how they intend to force people to buy encrypted monitors. Why pay extra money for a device that introduces limitations on how and where you use your software/media?

numb

Re:would this defeat DeCSS

[Anonymous Coward]

Simple. Content encrypted with this scheme is not viewable if you don't have one of these monitors.

Van Eck Phreaking

[AmirS]

This will not prevent Van Eck interception if a CRT monitor is used, as that is what generates the signals that could be intercepted. No-one intercepts the signals going through the monitor cable, so it is no use against that.

There is only on possible use for this - Software or hardware producing commercial video/images, which they don't want copied, can be encrypted all the way to the viewing device, so people cannot use screen capture type programs to save what they are watching to disk.

It provides no advantages for any user (even paraniod ones).

Amazon.com conspiracy

[jabber]

That's what it is - Jeff Bezos is probably in this up to his neck.

Think about it. Encrypted video will put the same sort of strangle-hold on computer displays that the MPAA is trying to get via DVD encryption. Can you imagine buying your whole PC in a 'region' that will only work with monitors bought there? It goes without saying that you'll need to buy all new hardware. Sort of like the Microsoft upgrade cycle, as applied to video boards and monitors.

Then of cource, to protect their collective IP, the software will come with 'regional' keys. So you can only buy compatible software here, not there - and at a premium, since the big, bad hackers can't read your encrypted monitor from 2 miles away after they hack into the international Echelon system that doesn't exist.

So what's Bezos got to gain? Well, after people figure out how duped they've been, they'll buy little software, few monitors, and lots of books! :)

I'll just have to wait for the encryption-enabled keyboards and mice, so nobody can tap my input either. Then I'll learn to speak Navaho.

Re:Amazon.com conspiracy

[chialea]

"There's something happenin' here
and what it is ain't exac-a-ly clear"

:)

actually, this won't encrypt your monitor, so people can still walk around with a big antenna and take a look at the radiation streaming off your monitor...

of course, it would probably protect against van eck phreaking, would it not? I believe the place where the bytes are snarfed from is the nice, big, transmitting cable to your monitor (or the nice single set of wires that serve the same purpose, in a laptop). if you integrate the display chip with the encryption chip in an LCD, you'd be SOL. probably the same thing for CRTs, but it would be harder...

Lea

Lea

Re:Amazon.com conspiracy

[Skinny Rob]

Well, after people figure out how duped they've been, they'll buy little software, few monitors, and lots of books! Funny.

But how do I get to Amazon if I've thrown away my computer in disgust? Have to go to high street instead (paying in cash of course, and wearing false mustache to thwart video surveillance)....

Re:Amazon.com conspiracy

[jovlinger]

I'm sure the long cable emits a plenty strong signal, but with a sensitive enough antenna (and you always assume your enemy is omnipotent and -present) picking up the output from the decryptor should be doable.

However, (and I'm fairly certain I read a comment to this effect already, so I'm redundant) if you combine decryption with decomression in one sheilded chip, the best you can intercept is decompressed signal. So then you'd have to suffer the loss of quality from recompression if you were to tap it there, or you could just not recompress and hope that eventually storage tech caught up with you.

Oh this can get really sick: you could also try to undecompress the signal -- not recompress ('cause then you're compressing rounding errors => loss of quality) -- but try to find the unique(?) compressed signal so that its decompression yeilds bit-for-bit the uncompressed signal you intercepted. This would be mega expensive (less/more than cracking encryption? probably more expensive, given 56 bit keys), but it'd work -- you'd get a perfect digital plaintext copy of the compressed and encrypted content.

As an attack against this, the sheilded de(compress/crypt)or chip could add random lowest-order bit noise to its output -- adding entropy w/o noticably harming display. Now you as the copier have a dilemma. You can't claim a "perfect digital copy" unless you keep all of the intentional entropy, but that would mean a much larger file than the original encrypted format (and making the job of undecompressing even harder -- before, at least you knew there existed an input stream with certain properties (bandwidth limits, what not)). Or you could back down from the "perfect" claim, but that is a slippery slope.

This is fun, but in all likelyhood, just bruteforcing the key is easiest.

Johan

LiquidAudio Crack example

[alch]

Look at how Liquid Audio (Micro$oft) was cracked - record the digital audio just before it hits the sound card - at this point it it is no longer encrypted.

Now imagine if the decryption is in the hardware - you would need to physicaly connect to the sound card just after the decrypt is performed. This is out of script kiddy league

That is the purpose of this - copyright protection to the screen (Audio can't be far away !!)- the only way to record it is using the camcorder or hacking the hardware !!

Hmmmm.... Picture genetic implants at birth in your eyes and ears !! As you grow older you get new keys to what you can see - only when you are of legal drinking age can you see Beer ads or Bar signs on the street. Can't jump the fence at Disney - my eyes don't have a key to decrypt what I see. Man gotta stop smokin that stuff... hahah

Re:LiquidAudio Crack example

[kurowski]

Hmmmm.... Picture genetic implants at birth in your eyes and ears !! As you grow older you get new keys to what you can see - only when you are of legal drinking age can you see Beer ads or Bar signs on the street.

perhaps, but the tabacco lobbyists in congress will make sure that you can always see the cigarette adds, even if you aren't 18. don't forget the other people that control congress...

Worried?

[|c0bra|]

Is anyone else besides me frightened by all recent events that seem to be happening? UCITA, which is being backed by AOL. Then this, which could help TimeWarner. I don't know exactly whats going on, but I would bet money that ther'es a big conspiracy behind this.

These are large companies, and when they throw their weight around, things move.

The Point

[|nion|]

The point of the encryption could be to prevent any cable leakage from being monitored. It is a basic van eck work around. The problem is that until everyone is using digital displays, the analog signal that is used by the CRT to actually do the displaying, and the display itself, emit enough radiation to be monitored.
The primary method of preventing this is to implement either shielding around the unit or make the distance to the perimeter greater than the maximum distance the radiation can reach.
Either of these two options is cheaper from the stand point of van eck. If they are attempting to enforce some other type of content control, this would be the perfect method...probably more likely IMO.

GST

[ghazban]

Australian GST is 10%, and I damn well hope it'll stay there like they promised.

This is bull...

[Jerom]

If the data travels through your monitor-cable
encrypted, then all an evesdropper has to do
(in stead of just picking up the signals), is
picking up the signal, and using a reverse
engineered monitor for decrypting it. Hell he
could just pull the decryption-chip out of a
computer he bought.

it stinks,

J.

Not for me...

[pjr]

I will not be using this technology. It's primary purpose, as I see it, is to buttress information hoarding schemes such as CSS. It's well known that content scrambling methods such as CSS will fall to a well written program that reads the decrypted information out of the video framebuffer. I see this as an attempt to close that "loophole".

Since I am morally opposed to information hoarding, I tend to boycott systems that facilitate it. I expect to structure my life in such a way that communications between my video card and my monitor will not need encryption. If this means that some information will not be available to me, so be it.

This may be somewhat moot since, if they're really using 56 bit DES, the information will not be scrambled for long.

Boy, you guys don't get this at all

[Anonymous Coward]

How are you going to make DeCSS when this is in use? The content is not decrypted until it reaches the hardware decryption in the monitor. If you don't have a monitor with the decryptor, you can't read that content at all. If you do have one, there is no place to intercept the decrypted scheme. The only way to hack this thing would be to (a) bruteforce the key, which is possible because it's 56-bit, but if they fix that it won't be possible, or (b) rip into your monitor. Option B will be difficult if they tamperproof it. Selling hardware decryptors will of course be illegal. Also, note that they have a way to revoke keys, so (a) doesn't buy as much as it did with DeCSS. This is the first really workable means of copy protection.

That's it. First the chip ID thing, now this. Intel can bite my ass. I'm switching to Transmeta.

The DVD CCA at work

[Anomalous Canard]

The common aphorism is if you can see it, you can rip it. (There are cases when this isn't true, but it's largely true.) This is an attempt to defeat that truism.

If your DVD player sat on a bus with your vidoe, then encrypted data can be sent to the video without it being available unencrypted for snooping. If your sound device sat on the same bus, you couldn't snoop the audio from your DVD movies or audio (assuming they got their act together and used some *real* encryption.)

This is the future of Firewire.

Anomalous: inconsistent with or deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected

Wealth of consumer offerings?

[guardian-ct]

Err.. Not exactly.

I don't see how a truly unbreakable system (which doesn't yet exist) would encourage the movie studios to release things to the public that they wouldn't have before. I see this solely as a way for the movie studios to be able to charge more to provide essentially the same content as they provide today. Almost every new movie technology that's come out has been followed shortly by an increase in ticket price.

Haven't they learned ANYTHING from DivX? Forcing people to buy more expensive equipment that has more limitations on what can be done with the data just doesn't work very well.

I guarantee that HDCP will increase the cost of a digital display. How significantly, I don't know, the spec isn't public yet.

As someone earlier in this discussion said, there's still the Linux-based display problem. No one in the Linux world was willing to shell out $10000 for the DVD license. I don't see anyone wanting to shell out more money for more restrictions anytime soon.

I won't be buying or using anything DVD or CD related until the MPAA, DVD "open forum", etc all come to their senses (ie, when hell warms up (See Dante)). Equivalently with Intel's HDCP, I won't be buying a digital display with such encryption technology built in.

Re:Wealth of consumer offerings?

[Kwikymart]

No one in the Linux world was willing to shell out $10000 for the DVD license. I don't see anyone wanting to shell out more money for more restrictions anytime soon. well, actually somebody did. http://www.csh.rit.edu/lsdvd/

Another DVD Scheme

[avandesande]

The only use of this would be for licencing. It would not stop someone from picking up emf from the monitor. Soon they will try to encrypt my eyeballs!

Re:Another DVD Scheme

[chris.barton]

contact lenses with micro mirror filters to unscramble the junk on your encoded screen according to your digital-DNA-.sig hmmmm

Would get over the problem of script kiddie with emf scanner in grubby-hand

*duck*

Sell more chips

[ch-chuck]

Once you've milked the 88/86/286/386/486/P5/.../IA64 etc lineage up to a gazillion or so transistors, you have to create a NEW market to dominate. If you can't compete in, say, 3D accels, make a market you CAN compete in. If YOU create the market (Gee, I didn't even know I needed one of those untill the salesman told me how bad off I was!) you make the rules and you own the trade secrets and you got another cash cow. Ingenious!

Already exist.

[threaded]

I bet we'll see the development of video cameras that are adapted to take screenshots.

Such things already exist with the specific intent of being able to transmit old Cinema films on the TV.

This encryption just seems so pointless.

Conspiracy? BIG TIME!

[|c0bra|]

There is definetly some sort of conspiracy revolving around these recent events, but who knows how many companies are involved. I just know that we're not going to benefit from it.

That's baaaad

[Kaa]

Remember all these posts on Slashdot that said that you can never successfully protect content unless human eyes and ears become copyright-protection-device-compliant?

Well, Intel listened, and heard, and we are moving in this direction.

The idea is very clear: if the video stream is decoded only inside the display, then you cannot intercept it and divert it to make a copy. They would claim, of course, that this is prevent piracy but somehow I think this is all steps toward attaching a meter to our eyes so we pay fore each second we look at something.

Kaa

Re:Replacement for Tempest? Nope.

[Anomalous Canard]

Tempest detects the EM emitted from the monitor as it displays the screen. Since the stff is still being displayed, Tempest-type equiptment can still read it.

Anomalous: inconsistent with or deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected

Be very wary of additional encryption

[Anonymous Coward]

Bad,bad,bad. Just one more thing I can't control on my computer.

"HDCP uses a 56-bit key, with individual keys distributed to the various vendors. A violated key could be tracked down and revoked over a satellite broadcast network, for example."

Maybe the DeCSS thing has made me jumpy, but doesn't this have the potential to become a BIG problem? What if they take this a few steps further and decide that only an "approved" OS who buys the proper codes can access the monitor hardware? (Read: no linux drivers can be legally created.) We must watch the industry carefully. UTICA is proof enough of that.

I wonder if all this is sort of a backlash effect. Linux and the Open Source movement are a huge increase in freedom in software and standards. It's almost like the software industry and computer business are so freaked out by this that they are making EVERYTHING closed to deny the competition from a free product. If this UTICA and CSS thing spreads, it would really become a pain. (Hence my dislike of another encryption, this time in VITAL hardware components.) Instead of just software, we might have to create an entire independant INDUSTRY, from the chips up, to compeat with them! Maybe an overstatement, but if we aren't careful the attitudes we've seen so far may do just that!

If nothing else, Open Source is worth it to blow some management minds!

Re:Be very wary of additional encryption

[Anonymous Coward]

>>> Read: no linux drivers can be legally created.)

I wouldn't worry about this because there is already a large worldwide market for Linux. If "they" could get every single monitor manufacturer to cooperate and only produce encrypted monitors, it would just provide _great_ oportunity for a startup monitor manufacturer to produce regular monitors.

It's too bad that this wouldn't happen for DVDs where a startup company makes a machine that can play old style DVDs and also newer open DVDs that don't have macrovision/encryption/etc -- (there are some content providers (indy films/video catalog applications/etc) that would support open DVD)

If you can't legally embrace and extend the DVD format, having the ability to play regular audio CDs, VCDs, MP3 cds, etc will help you persuade some customers to buy. Low cost sells good too.

If they make "broken" products (DVD-macrovision) then there is always room for new hardware companies to provide "working" products. Open source hardware venture capital fund anyone?

PW2
www.remote-control.net (not much there yet)

End-to-end copy protection

[RebornData]

The main use of this kind of technology would be copy protection. Let's say that the DVD encryption standard is improved to the point that it is unbreakable (hah!), and the only way to watch DVD's is with a legitimately licensed DVD decoder.

In order for you to watch this DVD, at some point the bits have to be decrypted and put onto the screen in front of you. MPAA and co. are scared that if you're clever enough pirate, you'd find a way to grab those bits between the decrypt and the display.

This is a pretty reasonable concern if you're an agressive paranoid about copy protection. Assuming the bad guy has a good MP3 decoder, grabbing the bits off of a digital display output for an LCD monitor would give you an extremely high quality reproduction of a movie. With standardization of digital display outputs, there's a potential for someone to legally build and sell a "black box" device for this purpose.

Thus, the need to encrypt all the way to the LCD monitor. If the decrypt happens inside the monitor, it's much, much more difficult to grab the clean bits.

Because the holders of the display encryption technology copywrites would only license it to authorized monitor manufacturers, there'd be no legitimate, legal devices on the market which could bypass it. There's no "standard" interface through which the clear signal runs, so getting around the encryption would require reverse engineering of specific monitor designs, and you'd end up with something that only worked for a specific monitor model.

I wonder when we'll see standards for encryption of audio signals all the way out to the speakers...

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[Prof_Dagoski]

This is why this is lamest protection scheme I ever heard of. So there's hardware in the display to decrypt it. So what? Some of us have the ablity to pull apart the display and separate the components. Put a cable on the end of the decrypter and you can feed it whereever you want. I could easily see a cottage industry spring to make special reverse enginreered box to decode the signal. This happened with cable back in the eighties. You might even be able to find the plans for one of these things on the web still. I get the feeling that these guys just don't have any grasp of history.

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[Anonymous Coward]

>Thus, the need to encrypt all the way to the LCD monitor. If the decrypt happens inside the monitor, it's much, much more difficult to grab the clean bits.

No, just more expensive. Instead of just downloading some free software to get the job done, I have to buy a modified "grey market" monitor with a decrypted output for a large cost (probably 2x the real price).

What does that mean? That means that the average Joe won't easily copy tapes, but big pirate houses will (because they have the money to waste). So the MPAA will save at least $10,000 a year. [sarcasm]Wow......[/sarcasm].

Why doesn't the MPAA do what other people do when someone steals their stuff - BUST THEM? Wow, what a concept! You can then hold them liable for their earnings AND make your money back, and get some kind of bonus, too! Wow! This is sounding better and better! And then, since you know how to make money, you'll only go after the real problem people - the people pirating New Release videos and the people selling them at 1/2 price at flea markets.

But that would make sense. Chewbacca, help me!

This method works well for other restricted items, why won't it work for movies?

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[Thantalos1]

Gee, you could just take it one more step and TEMPEST the output of the monitor and record that... This is the same problem we have had all along (give me the fourth word from the third line on page 26). When are these people going to realize that if you can see it at any point then it can be copied?

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[ErikZ]

Ah, I know electronics and I have no desire to ever do such a thing unless I had no other options.

The logical way to get around such a protection scheme is to buy a monitor that doesn't have built in decryption. Everyone owns a monitor like this, so INTEL must have a way of turning off the encryption if they want to sell this at all.

Later
Erik Z

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[Spoing]

So there's hardware in the display to decrypt it. So what? Some of us have the ablity to pull apart the display and separate the components.

What if the commodity chips thatdrive the display also do the decoding? Unless you rip that chip apart, and can seperate it into pieces, it's not going to matter.

Having said that, there may be seperate decode/display chips in some units, but I doubt that they will be very common due to economies of scale.

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[Coward Anonymous]

There is another potential 'cleartext' hole which would be much easier to hack into and would be portable.
It is very unlikely the that the 'protected' content is directly encoded into the encrypted monitor driving signals. In other words a movie on a disc would still be encoded as an MPEG stream and not an HDCP stream.
Software that would want to run a DVD, for instance, would decrpyt the DVD (MPEG) and then re-encrypt it (through the driver or specialized hardware?) into the encrypted monitor driving signals (HDCP).
Unless these conversions are done in some specialized chip it would be just a matter of disassembling the player software.
IMHO, it is highly unlikely that there will be such specialized hardware.

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[SEWilco]

MPAA and co. are scared that if you're clever enough pirate, you'd find a way to grab those bits between the decrypt and the display.

For a while there have been programs for MS-Windows which grab the output of a licensed DVD player. It's been done.

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[acb]

Separating the decryptor and display is a lot easier if the entire system is not on one solid-state chip. If there's one monolithic blob of silicon between the encrypted signal and the million or so transistors on the display, your only option would be to take apart the display, solder a million or so wires to it and construct a custom digitiser. And you'd be better just pointing a camera at the display in that case.

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[Coward Anonymous]

oops...
(just in case it wasn't obvious like I thought it was)
.....It would be just a matter of disassembling the player software and finding the point where the stream is in it's cleartext MPEG form or rasterized.

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[darthscsi]

But you forget. This is for DIGITAL monitor interfaces. Of corse it is useless on old monitors, they don't use the "standard" digital link between monitor and computer, they use the standard analog one. This technolog is applicable to almost no monitors being made right now.

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[DuckWing]

This is probably the exact reason behind this technology. The thing is, as far as DVD on Linux is concerned, why is there such a fuss over software DVD Players? Before you go throwing tomatoes or moderating this down, listen up.

Even in the Windows and Mac world, software DVD is not the way to go. Yes it works and works well, but really hardware decryption is the answer. Not only that, with the DeCSS code in hardware, Linux DVD projects can remain open source and the MPAA can go suck an egg. All DVD Players would be "sanctioned" By the MPAA at that point and they would know that there's no Pirating going on.

Think for a second about the Creative Labs dxr2 open source project. I think this method is a good compromise between the two waring parties. What we need is more Video card vendors that have hardware DVD support (ATI, Diamond, etc), and more DVD Drive Vendors that come with a proper MPEG card (ala Creative) to write drivers for their products such that DVD is "properly" supported in Linux and everyone is happy.

What think ye?

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[Nebulo]

Software that would want to run a DVD, for instance, would decrpyt the DVD (MPEG) and then re-encrypt it (through the driver or specialized hardware?) into the encrypted monitor driving signals (HDCP).

Unless these conversions are done in some specialized chip it would be just a matter of disassembling the player software. IMHO, it is highly unlikely that there will be such specialized hardware.

Mmm - not to beg the point, but aren't "specialized chips" just the thing Intel is known for?

It seems to me that Intel is just doing what any business would do: try to steer an industry in the direction that will make them money. By pushing this technology, they are trying to create a market where none exists today. One must admire their ingenuity, at least, even if one does not admire the product itself.

Personally, I think that they are going to split the computer market into two distinct categories that use different hardware:

1) Consumer - Joe Six Pack wants to e-mail, browse the web and look at the pretty DVD pictures. He buys a sealed system with a DVD-ROM and a CD burner; the thing has encryption top to bottom that prevents him from pirating the pretty pictures. These machines can be mass-produced (in iMac fashion) and will be dirt-cheap.

2) Tech-Head - This is where most of slashdotters will fit in. We want to be able to take the computer part, repair and upgrade it ourselves, and develop software and hardware for it. To do so, we must have unfettered access to every niche and cranny of the system.

Unfortunately, you and I are going to be in the minority. A hardware "underground" may form, supporting an entirely different platform than the Consumer platform outlined above. A select few (smaller) companies will continue to manufacture conventional computer parts (seperate video cards, sound cards, motherboards, etc.) for this smaller market.

Much of the software that companies are producing today will eventually include hooks to the Consumer platform's encryption scheme, so it won't run on the Tech-Head platform - and again, a software underground will be spawned, continuing development on what we already possess in the public domain.

-=-

On another note, has anybody thought of this particular feature of encrypted video - the manufacturer of a digital monitor could lock the monitor into a specific display adapter through encryption.

Another idea - products like VirtualPC for the Macintosh currently emulate the video hardware in software. Will products like VirtualPC no longer be able to operate properly if the operating system itself requires encrypted video?

Lots of questions - no answers in the short term, I think. This is going to be an interesting trend to watch. Nebulo

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[buss_error]

The main use of this kind of technology would be copy protection. Let's say that the DVD encryption standard is improved to the point that it is unbreakable (hah!), and the only way to watch DVD's is with a legitimately licensed DVD decoder.

This assumes that someone doesn't put a digital camera in front of the monitor, rendering the encrypted/copy protected system moot.

And yes, you CAN get fair quaility out of this scheme, the same way you could show 35 mm movies on televison with the right equipment.

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[Anonymous Coward]

Hardware solutions can only get you so far. Plus, they have a nasty tendency to employ passthru cables degrading your signal and making you subject to interface obsolescence.

Whereas a slower software decoder will not have either of those problems. Pretty soon, it won't even matter any more as Linux mpeg2 decoders get better and CPU's get faster such that wasting cycles on an MP2 decode is not such a big deal.

The only real hitch is CSS.

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[aldur]

Bruce Schneier mentioned something like this while covering the DVD encryption hack in the November Crypto-Gram (monthly newsletter). See here

" It might be a bitter pill for the entertainment industry to swallow, but software content protection does not work. It cannot work. You can distribute encrypted content, but in order for it to be read, viewed, or listened to, it must be turned into plaintext. If it must be turned into plaintext, the computer must have a copy of the key and the algorithm to turn it into plaintext. A clever enough hacker with good enough debugging tools will always be able to reverse-engineer the algorithm, get the key, or just capture the plaintext after decryption. And he can write a software program that allows others to do it automatically. This cannot be stopped.

If you assume secure hardware, the scheme works. (In fact, the industry wants to extend the system all the way to the monitor, and eventually do the decryption there.) The attack works because the hacker can run a debugger and other programming tools. If the decryption device and the viewing device (it must be both) is inside a tamperproof piece of hardware, the hacker is stuck. He can't reverse-engineer anything. But tamperproof hardware is largely a myth, so in reality this would just be another barrier that someone will eventually overcome. Digital content protection just doesn't work; ask anyone who tried software copy protection."

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[mcrandello]

""Some of us have the ablity to pull apart the display and separate the components. Put a cable on the end of the decrypter and you can feed it whereever you want. ""

As far as legality goes, would marketing this as a "device to allow legacy monitors on new EQ" angle be enough to prevent lawsuits under the DMCA? Remember that Jon Johansen isn't being charged for writing DeCSS, or for copyright infringement, but the exact same thing that we're proposing here. Distributing a device designed to circumvent copy protection.

BTW check freshmeat for the DeCSS Announcement. It's mildly amusing...


mcrandello@my-deja.com
rschaar{at}pegasus.cc.ucf.edu if it's important.

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[billybob jr]

What would be the motivation for all of the graphics card companies to produce cards that worked with this encryption? If it were legislated, that would truly suck. Other than that, why would a company produce a card that supported encryption, and more importantly, why whould _all_ companies produce cards that supported the encryption?

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[jasassin]

I wonder when we'll see standards for encryption of audio signals all the way out to the speakers...

This can only go one level further. Encryption of the audio stream all the way to the human ear, where a decoder is placed. The RIAA can prevent your friends from hearing music from the same speaker as you. If your friend wants to listen, he'll have to have your earpieces (assuming they aren't a mandatory unremovable installation, forced at birth by the RIAA AOL INTEL MICROSOFT US GOV conglomeration) or he'll have to go buy a CD encrypted for his earpieces.

Heck, guys, why not add some encryption to the earpiece for normal sounds! If you want to hear a bird singing in a tree, or water flowing down a creek you had better buy the key (which is good for at least 30 mins) for decoding those, otherwise it'll just be an ugly encrypted sound.

I read these posts and get more and more scared. I used to wish I was born a little later in time, so I could see all the technology. Now, I hope I wasn't born to late.

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[bogado]

This is only true if the encription on the monitor is diferent from the encription on the DVD. Once this monitors are common they could change the usual CSS (witch is already broken) with the new encripted monitor signal. It would faster, since the monitor must decript this very fast to be able to display at all, and would not require any CPU from the computer. It would also be easy to play DVD from linux (cat /dev/dvd /dev/encript_monitor?) or any OS for that matter.

The problem I see is that public/private key are very slow to ancript/decript and for that kind of speed it would be very hard to implement. This monitor would have to accept a simetric key that is good for both encription and decription, since the OS must display data in the monitor it would alsready have a key and a encription algorithm. It would be fairly easy to create a brute force atack to the monitor to find out all keys that it recognizes. Am I way off here?

--
"take the red pill and you stay in wonderland and I'll show you how deep the rabitt hole goes"

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[Kris_J]

The main use of this kind of technology would be copy protection

No, like DVD's CSS, it's about playback control. Now, why on earth would I pay to restrict what I can see on my screen? Another post mentioned a simply switching box that might be knocked over by such technology. Well, I can tell you that the VHS copy protection screwed me over way back when I had several computers and a couple of VCRs all hooked together across two monitors - I had only one way I could cable it all together to be able to switch things around how I wanted while maintaining a good quality of TV reception, but I couldn't play any VHS tape with copy protection because the signal went through an extra VCR. After that crap I can tell you that I'm not going to be introducing such unessecary encryption into any of my equipment.

Chris J. - proud non-owner of any DVD equipment.

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[scrytch]

1. The fidelity you're going to get from TEMPEST is going to suck. Just running my microwave in the same room would probably give the picture the jaggies from hell.

2. When a TEMPEST system tries to read your screen, it's amusingly easy to fool (there's a paper that showed how using antialiasing tricks, they could change one sentence into a completely different one on TEMPEST). So there's your MacroVision for TEMPEST. TEMPEST is good for showing that a CRT was on at all, and that the activity corresponded to some known signal. It's more like *listening* than watching.

3. TEMPEST only works for CRT's. It does NOT work on LCD, and I suspect it doesn't work on plasma. CRT is a slowly dying technology for home entertainment units (I emphasize slowly).

Anyhow, let's imagine this succeeds, and the DVD CCA gets end-to-end encodning. First, the technology transfer rate in the TV world is *glacial*, so it'd take at *least* 10 years for this to get out to market. Secondly, we already broke their code the first time. Putting the decryption key in the medium is inherently flawed. It WILL be broken. This technology isn't for DVD's, it's for video-on-demand, where the server can encrypt per-session. So long as you're not a VLSI hardware hacker, then Disney-Microsoft-AOL-Time-Warner-TCI can be assured that you're paying whatever they want you to.

I had more to add, but ultimately I just have to throw up my hands at some point and say forget it. Create your own content, use your brain, and stop consuming, and starve the media conglomerates into submission. When you stop feeding at the trough, they will do what you tell them to, they're addicts to your money. Unfortunately that takes faith in the others around you to do the same, and neither the prevailing zeitgeist nor history give me much to hope for.

It's a Brave New World (copyright renewed 2358-49000, estate of Aldous Huxley Inc)

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[scrytch]

A million wires? Hardly, try one. I sincerely doubt the decryption would be done at the demultiplexer that feeds your display matrix (let's assume this is a plasma or LCD display by this time). You just need to split that off into a recording device. You still lose a lot of the benefits of the recording medium (multiple scene selection, optional captioning, etc) but you have the content more or less.

Of course that still means cracking open your tamper-protected sealed-unit display and risking a federal prison sentence for doing it, which will get noticed the next time they knock down your door on a no-knock drug raid. I guess I better stop before I start talking black helicopters (they're not black, they say POLICE on them, they're state property, and they IR scan your neighborhood for grow lamps -- okay, nuff)

Re:End-to-end copy protection

[acb]

A million wires? Hardly, try one. I sincerely doubt the decryption would be done at the
demultiplexer that feeds your display matrix (let's assume this is a plasma or LCD
display by this time).

The sensible thing for them to do would be to put as much of the decoder into the chip as possible, to render the outgoing data as unstructured and unusable as possible. I don't know much about how TFT displays work, but if they have 1024+768 row/column lines (or something like that, factoring in RGB components), that's not something recordable.

Of course that still means cracking open your tamper-protected sealed-unit display and risking a federal prison sentence for doing it

Interesting point. How long until we routinely see stickers reading things such as "This unit contains copyright enforcement mechanisms. Unauthorised examination prohibited by federal law" on consumer electronic devices, threatening fines and prison terms alongside voided warranties?

Whats This For Anyway?

[Prof_Dagoski]

I have to admit some confusion on what the technology is for. Big deal, you encypt the wire, but you still have to tempest shield your CRT. Am I clueless on this? How big of a threat is someone tapping into my monitor cable. Waitaminute. I just figured it out. Copy protection. If I understand this right does that mean, the video signal out will be encrypted and that the monitor will decrypt the signal? Now I'm more confused... That sounds like the lamest copy protection scheme I ever heard of. I know I'm missing something. Can someone more knowledgeable explain the point of this new tech?

Re:Whats This For Anyway?

[chris.barton]

Encrypted eyeballs...

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=00/02/18/085 3243&cid=89

So we buy the decryption license from Intel?

[Dr. Evil]

I suppose this means that whomever controls the standard, controls who can and who cannot enter the graphics or display industry?

Nowhere does it say what they are trying to prevent people from copying.

How would this impact VNC?

[Anonymous Coward]

Virtual Network Computing software could have some real issues with this. If monitors are built expecting encrypted input, how will VNC cope with it? Anyone?

A bit of poetic justice

[Just Some Guy]

For once, the US Gov't's own stupid laws can work for us. If they'd intelligently removed the arbitrary 56-bit limit, then we'd have a much tougher beast to deal with. However, consider this:

The keyspace is only 2^56 in size - the same size as RC5-56. Remember, that algorithm that distributed.net killed a year or so ago? Now, Moore's Law (and Tom'sHardwareGuide) say that our collective computing power has increased by a few hundred percent since the start of that contest.

So, let's launch a new contest, then, except this time we'll have:

1. More willing participants (you directly benefit from the results!)
2. Much, much faster equipment
3. A keyspace that is only 2^56/n, where n is the number of monitor vendors who've been issued unique keys.

In any case, it should only be a few months until we could have the decryption keyspace entirely mapped.

Now, is that sweet irony, or what? God bless our Congress!

The point of this scheme is ...

[emin]

A lot of people seem confused about the purpose of Intel's encryption scheme. The point is not to provide the consumer a service. The point is copy protection .

Imagine that Sony wants to sell a movie on DVD. They want you to be able to watch the movie only on your monitor and not be able to copy it for a friend. They sell you a DVD/movie encrypted for your monitor only. When you play the DVD, your computer sends the encrypted data to your monitor which decrypts it, letting you watch the movie. If you copy the DVD and give it to a friend, it won't work on his monitor. Voila, copy protection.

Another application would be Pay Per View (PPV). Assume that you want to watch a movie on PPV. If PPV just sent you the movie over the internet, you could copy it and give it to all your friends. However, if PPV encrypts the movie so that only your monitor could decode it then you can still watch the movie, but if you give a copy to your friends, they can't watch it.

As in all copy protection schemes, there is a way to defeat the copy protection. For example, you could hack your monitor to extract the decryption key. However, hardware hacking is complicated and difficult. Sure a few people will have the time and effort to hack there monitors, but most people will just pay for the movie.

Without taking a position on the ethics/morals of copy protection, I think this is the best copy protection scheme anyone has yet proposed. Once companies start making these kinds of monitors/TVs content producers such as Sony, Paramount, etc. will start producing encrypted movies that can only be displayed by these monitors. If you buy a non-compliant monitor/TV then you can't watch the new movies. If you are anti-copy protection this is something to worry about.

Pretty much the only flaw I can see in this system is a few brave hackers can extract the decryption key from their own monitors. Then they can buy/rent DVDs or movies and anonymously post the decrypted content to the Internet. Then everyone can grab copies of the decrypted content to play on regular monitors.

Anyway, I've probably rambled long enough. However, I think this is an important or scary development in copy protection (depending on your point of view). Hopefully I've helped illuminate some of the important issues. By the way, for those people interested in copy protection of movies/DVD I wrote a brief summary about some of the important ideas about a year and a half ago. The paper is at http://www.csua.berkeley.edu/~emin/writings/warp.h tml.

-Emin Martinian

Re:The point of this scheme is ...

[Gerv]

They sell you a DVD/movie encrypted for your monitor only.

And what happens when your monitor goes up in a cloud of smoke? Your DVD collection becomes useless?

Not good.

Gerv

Re:The point of this scheme is ...

[Anonymous Coward]

And what happens when your monitor goes up in a cloud of smoke? Your DVD collection becomes useless?

Not good.

No, very good. For those selling DVDs. :)

Did you think this was for your benefit?

Re:The point of this scheme is ...

[CComp]

They sell you a DVD/movie encrypted for your monitor only.

Nope, no sale. No thanks. One of the main points of retail business is remembering that you don't *sell* anything to anyone.. a customer *buys* something from you. It's always an action initiated by *them*. Sounds obvious, but it isn't always remembered..

Just cos it's offered doesn't mean people will buy it. We're not reverse-vending machines. =)

Re:The point of this scheme is ...

[Hard_Code]

"The point is not to provide the consumer a service."

That is the point of all business. Sure this copy protection my have other applications, but don't try to stuff it down the consumers' throats.

Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla

Re:The point of this scheme is ...

[BlueMonk]

They sell you a DVD/movie encrypted for your monitor only.

How the heck are they going to manage that? You bring your monitor's key on a credit card-like device, then at the store they somehow copy/encode each disc you buy with that key?

So you can't bring it to a friend's house either then, I guess... even if it's the real original... unless you bring your monitor too.

No way is this idea going very far.

Re:The point of this scheme is ...

[DrEldarion]

"The point is not to provide the consumer a service."

That is the point of all business.

Heh, maybe a hundred years ago that was true, but today? Today business is all about making money. They don't give a shit about the consumer... especially they're selling a product or service that the consumer 'needs'.

-- Dr. Eldarion --

This closes the last hole

[BigJimmy]

With our current copy-protection technology for digital content that is downloaded, no matter what type of encryption it uses it always has to be decrypted before it reaches the display driver. In theory, someone could hack apart the video driver and capture the unencrypted video stream to a file. With this new technology, the decryption is hardware based and there is no unencrypted stream to be captured anywhere.

This would effectively prevent casual copying and will encourage movie studios to make their movies downloadable. Of course, it will be several years before this standard is implemented, and it will be years before the home user has enough bandwidth and storage space for a reasonably sized movie collection.

crappy performance

[netwiz]

Gee, let's find yet _another_ way to increase hardware requirements! I personally enjoy watching my screen redraw one line at a time. And seeing all those icons getting swapped back into the display page? Woo, gives be a shiver.

Someone else here mentioned the RIAA and the MPAA. I bet they're gonna _love_ this tech. I say fuck'em.

Yes, it's effective

[RebornData]

Print screen requires that the OS can read the bits in the clear. Because this is intended for copy protection, it will likely only be used for movies. Which means that the OS doesn't necessarily need to have access to the clear, unencrypted data so that "print screen" will work. The DVD decoder could output encrypted data to be stored in the display buffers and sent as is to the monitor. On a "normal" monitor, it would appear as garbage. On an Intel-licensed monitor, you'd see the movie.

Of course, this is all speculation, but I'm guessing there wouldn't be a hole that big...

Re:Yes, it's effective

[Nebulo]

Interestingly enough, the Macintosh already prevents you from taking screen shots of DVD video.

The Macintosh DVD system places the responsibility for displaying the DVD video stream onto the video card - it uses some sort of an alpha channel system to overlay the DVD video over a window filled with a particular "color" of pixel. This all happens on the "other side" of the frame buffer, so all the OS sees is a window filled with dark green.

This has some advantages - there is no drag on the CPU to display the DVD video stream on the screen - but it is very effective against capturing the video.

Nebulo

Re:Yes, it's effective

[Anonymous Coward]

Well this is also how apple implemented video in for the Quadra AV and the PowerMac AV. Just make some part of the screen have a value of about 4 for green and boom, it displays the video. For that matter just about any dark color works, I think. I wonder why it won't let you copy a frame. As an aside, I miss the secret translucency feature of the Quadra AV. This would be nice in just about any system where this is applicable. The video window would play through any overlapping windows but not blot out the overlapping window. So you could play a video, have a window on top of it and still be able to watch the video and see whatever was in the window. **obligatory question** Is anything like this implemented with video in for Linux?

Re:Yes, it's effective

[BlueMonk]

If my understanding is correct, then Macintosh is not unique here. Any system with a hardware decoder will be uncapable of picking up the pixels in something like a Print-Screen. DVD packages like the Creative Labs DVD Encore package, for instance, include a hardware decoder card which overlays the graphics onto the video signal. It's like a 3D card. I have to plug my monitor into a series of 3 cards (2-D, 3-D, DVD) to get the complete video signal. The OS cannot pick up the output of the DVD card, it sends the DVD video stream to the card and then it gets overlayed onto the signal, which, naturally, is not something the OS can access.

Of course, I also have software DVD decoder-player programs with which Print-Screen works just fine (the data never goes through the DVD card in that case).

Re:Yes, it's effective

[Eivind]

You're rigth, if the OS doesn't know the cleartext-bits, it cannot copy them. However ,theres one large problem with this.

Imagine that you instead of mpeg-encoding the movie and putting that on the dvd or wherever, in encrypted form, like with current dvd-movies, you instead put the encrypted bits on the dvd, and have the os merely stream these bits to the display, without ever knowing the cleartext.

What happens is that compression won't work. That is because a prime charateristic of any encryption-method I know of is that the encrypted stream looks completely random, and as such it's not compressible.

Try it yourself: make a text file, then first encrypt it in your encryption-program of choise, and thereafter compress the encrypted file. Doesn't work. On the other hand, first compressing the text-file, and thereafter encrypting it, works fine, and that's how it's currently done dvd-movies.

This is no idle point. Abandoning any and all compression of the video makes the files a lot larger for similar quality.

No problem

[brunes69]

It seems to me that this spec will die for several reasons. Unless it encrypts all video data exported from the PC, weather it be Monitor, RCA Out, S-Video, etc, it is useles for copy protection. But if they DO begin this encrytion, it will HAVE to be backwards compatable with ALL current Monitors, RCA jacks, etc, or else the vendors won't support it. (Imagine Phillips suddely saying "Anyone who buys our new PH-9000 must also buy an Intel-encryption compatable video card." Yeah, that would go over well...

Don't sweat it, this whole spec won't work

Re:No problem

[Emil Brink]

Not true. The important thing to keep in mind here, I think, is that this encrypts the signal to a digital display. To see why this is important:

• You buy a great DVD movie. The video stream is encrypted on the disk (let's ignore JJ for a while)
• You play the movie on your DVD player, which decrypts the stream and sends it to your video card
• The video card dumps the video stream into a window on your desktop
• The video card emits your desktop to the display device, in blissful ignorance that:
• You have disconnected your display, and instead connected an Evil Recording Device!

The net result in this scenario is that you "rip" the movie, in its original all-digital quality, even though it was delivered to you in encrypted form and therefore "supposedly" secure. Sure, you might need to do some trivial editing to get rid of your desktop (or just run the player full-screen), but you still have it. If you instead send the desktop out through S-Video or anything analog, the quality would degrade and you could not duplicate the movie further at original quality. I think the movie industry fears ripping original-quality content quite a lot, since that really makes it "easy" to e.g. resell the content at top quality. This is why this form of encryption really makes sense, from Their perspective.

Hmmm, I assume that this encryption is implemented in the latest stage of the video board (where the RAMDAC would be on an analog board), since having an encrypted frame buffer sounds so stupid it almost scares me.

Re:No problem

[rhdwdg]

That's why it's the perfect time for it. LCD monitors are just about to come down to the price where a normal person might buy one. And they need different signals than a VGA compatible CRT. Besides, consumers fall for it all the time anyway. Ex.: I can refreq my pager to go with any carrier, but my PCS phone is worthless off the Sprint PCS network.

But this has nothing to do with stopping rippers. I don't see how it could, although the angle of downloading a video stream that matches some of the hardward in your system has some appeal. Still, that's mostly been tried through the P3 serial number, and the market didn't buy it. It has everything to do with the fact that Intel builds perfectly adequate video controllers into all their consumer-grade chipsets and thus have a huge portion of that market. Now they can get a license fee from all the monitor manufacturers that want to sell to the $400 PC market. With some tens of millions of units sold each year, that means some quick cash.

Then they can license it to other video card manufacturers ... then tell the monitor companies to stop supporting legacy input ... then tell the video card manufacturers to include a few bytes in their BIOS to detect whether they're on an Intel CPU or not ...

Re:No problem

[brunes69]

If you had read my comment at all, you would realize that I never said that this wasn't desirable for the companies, I said that it was not feasibly possible for them to do.

Sounds like more access control to me...

[Stary]

Well how does this stop me from putting a recording device between the input and the screen, recording the encrypted signal, and then sending exactly the same encrypted signal to the screen again? Seems to me like it's more access control, not copy control...

Re:Sounds like more access control to me...

[Skinny Rob]

"...putting a recording device between the input and the screen, recording the encrypted signal, and then sending exactly the same encrypted signal to the screen again?"

Now THAT's a good point. Wish I'd thought of it. But according to the company behind it (linked to from the eetimes.com story) their business certainly is "protecting commercial entertainment content".

Re:Sounds like more access control to me...

[acb]

Well how does this stop me from putting a recording device between the input and the screen, recording the encrypted signal, and then sending exactly the same encrypted signal to the screen again?

What you're describing is a replay attack, which depends on a cyphertext being valid regardless of context. There are a number of ways of thwarting these. Requiring a timestamp or serial number in the encrypted data, and discarding data with a repeated number, would do. If it's a two-way protocol, of course, it becomes easier. A challenge-response system, in which the monitor issues challenges which the transmitter must respond to, would weed out blindly replayed data. This could be as simple as having the monitor choose part of the next encryption key.

Re:Sounds like more access control to me...

[mr bozo]

Uh, because the stream is encrypted by a random session key from the screen.

Each time a videosource starts talking to a screen, the screen generates some random bits and the videousource must use these in the encryptionkey, or the screen will not display.

Re:Sounds like more access control to me...

[B'Trey]

Essentially, the idea is that it should work like encryption over the net. The monitor and the playback device establish communications and talk over an encrypted channel. The monitor is not just a passive device. It actively communicates with the DVD player (or whatever.) Recording a stream of encrypted data and playing it back will not work because the monitor will not get the proper response.

Consider the case in the UK.

[threaded]

So someone buys one of these films. Some time later the TV dies. Some time later still the Old Bill turns up, "We believe there are instructions for a drug deal on that disk"...

Moderate that up...

[Spoing]

...he's the first person I've seen posting that gets it.

As for 'encrypting to the speakers' can you say 'DVD-Audio'?

Re:Moderate that up...

[Anonymous Coward]

Please! Bust them. What a joke. You clearly have never been to Hong Kong or Thailand or hosts of other places where busting someone for piracy (except for an occasional well-publicized stunt arrest designed to soley placate critics, but have no real effect) isn't an option. Technological magic to enforce unnatural ownership of information is always going to appeal to those whose large wealth is dependent on these unnatural notions of ownership and control. Of course this technological magic simply leads to additional escalation in an unwinnable technology arms race, but it's hard to blame those whose wealth and influence in society is based on these unnatural and immoral notions from trying.

I have the ultimate solution!

[Anonymous Coward]

Not efficient enough! What about implementing a little device in people's brain to trigger an electrical chock each time one tries to copy (or even think of it) any DVD or piece of software?

Pardon the fsck out of me

[Hunter Rose]

Would someone please be so kind to inform as to why, exactly we have a new 'standard' for encryption of _video_to_monitors_, plus such silly things as specific CPU ID numbers, yet nowhere do I see Intel (or any other large corporation) supporting/ developing/ creating standards for protection of user privacy such as encrypted file systems, encryption for email, encryption for netnews, etc. etc. etc. Granted, encryption schemes can and are broken, but this sure seems like yet way that the 'idiots' who buy the crap can be screwed up the rear by Intel so they can continue to expand their profit margins. (I get the sense ever sense they happy dancing fab guys in clean suits as campaign that the attitude over there is, 'If they bought that, we can put ANYTHING over on them.'
One could rant about the complete lack of 'moral uprightness' (for lack of a better term) displayed by such companies but given that they seem to have a total lack of even the sense of such a thing, one would be wasting one's breath, leaving one grasping for a proper reaction.
Feh.

ash
['I say we pull back and nuke the site from orbit.']

Certainly easier than OGR.

[threaded]

Well this would certainly be easier than running the OGR project. All my boxes are chugging away and all I've done so far is just over 100 packets.

Missing the Point? Bend over, baby!

[starlingX]

To me, the point of this isn't to protect the consumer from SPYING... but as with any "innovation" involving digital media these days, it's designed to stick it to the consumer in the ass. The only reason I can see the established media companies wanting this is to prevent interception and recording of their content on its way to the display device.

You don't really think that they're trying to protect you from Big Brother, do you? They're trying to protect THEMSELVES from THE CONSUMER.

Previously, this has been the Achilles heel of all content protection schemes... the fact that somewhere it had to be decoded in order to play it. You could just stick your recording device (be it hardware like a VCR or just software that grabs audio on its way out to your soundcard) inbetween the decrypttion device and the display and happily record away, circumventing whatever "protection" that media content might come with. But with this, it moves that vulnerable "clear text" link from outside your display device to inside of it, where it's much harder to intercept.

Think about this new development... and the fact that recordable DVD technology for consumers seems to be seriously lagging behind, and you've got yourself a nice little conspiracy theory going. Pretty soon, some new "innovation" will make our recordable analog VHS video cassette machines unusable with new technology and we'll be left high and dry without a way to record _The Simpsons_ unless we pay the proper fees to get the one-time decryption key programmed into our digital recording device.

Looks like it's time to print up another batch of "Big Brother Inside" stickers...

If I can see or hear it...

[Anonymous Coward]

I can copy it.

(Paraphrased from another slashdot user).

Is it live, or is it Memorex? [smashed glass logo]

Crypto attacks...

[boredgourd]

A 56 git key? In the face of gigabits of known cleartext and cyphertext? WHATEVER algorithm they choose has got to fall apart (i.e., spout 56 keys like Mount Vesuvius) the moment an experienced cryptographer gets their hands on this, no?

JA

Yeah, I'm happy too...

[Anonymous Coward]

You notice that with decent moderation the trolls have gone down?

I think half the trolls were once people wrongly moderated... (I know this from experience).

Re:Yeah, I'm happy too...

[Anonymous Coward]

he he, I think over 90% of the trolls are folks who just got too pissed at the moderators, me included. That's what the whole Tuesday is for trollin stuff is apparently about. The trolls post all this off-topic and flaming stuff to bun the moderator points,. It really isn't a bad system if the keep the mindset of marking good stuff up and leaving the real crap at zero. It will keep the "Your my friend, so I'll mark your lame post up as Insightful" crap down a little as well.

Pay-per-view movies?

[DaveHowe]

This frightens me - not because of the potential of encrypted computer displays, but of Digital video players piping directly to a digital display suddenly requiring a card to access the signal from hardware you have bought, running a film you have already paid for - with reverse engineering of it prohibited by the same rules the DVD organisation is using against DeCSS.
Market forces have already seen off the last attempt to produce pay-per-view videos - this could be an attempt to sneek them back in by the back door.
--

Re:Would this be good against eavesdropping? hahah

[Mongoose]

No, tempest works by catching the CRT output - this product would only allow for locking you out of "unacceptable use". This a measure of content control. In short, they want to give you the shaft. =)

aim = pirate-thwarting

[Skinny Rob]

The motivation is to make it impossible to grab a copy of your favourite video by tapping the stream between the player and display (I don't know how that is currently do-able but I reckon it must be do-able). In reality I predict two effects: lots of people have to buy new displays and get very annoyed, and then the piraters either break the encryption or just move even further downstream. The site linked to from the article (http://www.digital-cp.com) explains the company's business: "This organization licenses technologies for protecting commercial entertainment content".

Intel is up to something and this is not good!

[Anonymous Coward]

I think Intel is doing what the DVD CCA was doing a few weeks ago. This encryption scheme will not prevent anything (AFAIK) apart from us using our VCRs to record the movies from the TV-out of our display cards. For example, you will still be perfectly capable of using DeCSS and the like applications to do whatever "nasty" (by the corporations' definition of "nasty") you can do.

I think Intel is really up to something else, like controlling the monitor market or whatever else some CEO thought up when he/she was in a dodgy mood. Smart move by that Intel CEO. He/She realised that the buzz-phrase these days in the corporate / media world is "copy protection" and thought that this would be a great chance for them to push some sort of new market / monopoly (especially given the hard time they have been getting by AMD lately :-)

By the DVD's example it should be pretty clear to everybody that 56-bit encryption is hardly encryption. Result: some guy will get to break the algorithm and we'll have yet another Johanssen case to look at, after giving a big D'OH to the Intel geniuses / "engineers".

To sum things up, I think Intel is trying to grab the chance to promote some *useless* technology (which I bet they began developing as soon as the DeCSS case hit the news) to our PCs in order to get a few (hunreds) more dollars/euros out of our pockets.

No, thanks Intel

Trian K. (Europe)

What a waste of time...

[Anonymous Coward]

A copy protection scheme that requires hard work to break, stopping the "average joe" from copying movies/etc.

Well, I suppose it takes care of 1 to 5% of all the movie piracy. Now if only they could do something about that other 95%...

But that would take effort, like hiring lawyers and getting the FBI to bust the people who have the illegal copy shops going. And, as we can see from how easy DVD was to crack, the MPAA isn't into effort.

Re:What a waste of time...

[Danse]

Actually, most of the big-time commercial piracy goes on in other countries like China where the MPAA has no legal recourse. They can't do much about piracy over there unless the foreign governments want to cooperate, which they usually don't want to do in any meaningful way.

That still means that this scheme will do little to stop piracy, but a whole lot to remove the rights of consumers.

Re:What a waste of time...

[Anonymous Coward]

>They can't do much about piracy over there unless the foreign governments want to cooperate, which they usually don't want to do in any meaningful way.

You are very correct. But here's an idea the MPAA should have come up with a LONG time ago: Bribes. In countries like China $1,000,000 goes a long way to getting what you want. I have a feeling that kind of cash would cause some law changes there. And then the MPAA could step in and clean up their act (the Chinese government wouldn't even have to lift a finger, except to write a decent copyright law). Now that bargain is a "steal" :-)

Re:What a waste of time...

[Danse]

In countries like China $1,000,000 goes a long way to getting what you want.

Sure, why not... it works over here, and that's even more money over there.

Copy Protection vs. open-source OSes

[acb]

DeCSS was the first salvo in what looks like a battle to the death between strict copyright enforcement and the open-source movement.

The reason there aren't (and will never officially be) any software DVD players on Linux is because the Linux kernel is open-source, and thus not guaranteed to be trusted. With Windows, an evil pirate cannot recompile the kernel to snoop on a process, defeat anti-debugging measures or redirect output to a file. With Linux, if a process has something you want to get out of it, you can always get it, at most by hacking a few extra features into the kernel. This is also why Liquid Audio and such do not and will not support Linux.

The copyright barons are pushing for end-to-end encryption. One end (DVD drives) is implemented. The other end (video/sound cards) is coming. Needless to say, open-source drivers would defeat the purpose, and the copyright barons would spend billions on fighting them. As for binary-only drivers, the GPL forbids them.

So it's shaping up into a fight to the death between Linux and copyright control mechanisms. If Linux becomes massively popular before these systems are implemented and popularised, they will not catch on. However, if the copyright barons can get them out the door soon, they will be a blunt instrument against Linux on the desktop. After all, the GPL itself will lock Linux out of being able to access new "copyright-enhanced" hardware. And you can be sure Microsoft will be more than happy to hammer the point home.

Re:Copy Protection vs. open-source OSes

[Anonymous Coward]

With Windows, an evil pirate cannot recompile the kernel to snoop on a process, defeat anti-debugging measures or redirect output to a file.

NOT TRUE This is weak FUD. Windows is JUST as hackable as Linux. The kernel mode portions actually have better documentation than Linux. Ref. all the device driver writing books for Windows compared to Linux's one.

Furthermore, Why do drivers on linux have to be GPL'd? Why can't a vendor make a KLD or KLM to support their hardware without releasing the source to it? They can and do.

Reverse engineering is still reverse engineering no matter what your platform. The encryption people DO want to make regioning and very tough to crack formats. Its all for money. And if money dictates they need a linux viewer they will make one. Right now they are going to the 95% case, Windows users.

Re:Copy Protection vs. open-source OSes

[acb]

NOT TRUE This is weak FUD. Windows is JUST as hackable as Linux. The kernel mode portions actually have better documentation than Linux. Ref. all the device driver writing books for Windows compared to Linux's one.

In the places where you're meant to hack them (i.e., to write your own drivers). But there are undocumented portions. Some Windows binaries are written in such a way to make debugging impossible without a hardware ICE debugger. (And if the DeCSS decision is precedent, you can bet that you'll need a special licence to own/use such debuggers in future, much as you need a locksmithing licence to legally own lockpicking tools.)

Under Linux, you can always change the kernel under whatever program is running. Under Windows, you can write some DLLs, but the kernel itself is fixed. And while you could hand-disassemble it and diddle the machine language, most people aren't so masochistically bloody-minded.

Re:Copy Protection vs. open-source OSes

[CunningPike]

The reason there aren't (and will never officially be) any software DVD players on Linux is because the Linux kernel is open-source, and thus not guaranteed to be trusted

Yep, you can't really trust the kernel not to have been modified, but aside from the windows-can-be-hacked-too idea, the main reason is that encryption doesn't solve copy protection problems. Encryption allows people (like Intel) to charge fees to everyone else who wants to use their technology.

If the video is, at any time, on some well-known medium (e.g. DVD, Internet, EM radiation), then it can be copied. The only ways of preventing copying is either:

• to make it impossible to access the video medium (how do you watch the film)
• to record it on some new medium and not tell anyone about it (and hope noone figures it out or leaks info)
• or make the blank media either too expensive, or unavailable (both apply to CSS/DVD at the moment)

So it's shaping up into a fight to the death between Linux and copyright control mechanisms.

Yes, this will probably end up being quite a battle, but it does not have anything to do with copy-protection. I have a bad feeling that this "detail" will get lost in the noise: "those Linux people, they just want to pirate everything" ...

| What? you were expecting

Re:Copy Protection vs. open-source OSes

[vroetman]

Actually, it seems that this WOULD allow open source drivers. The monitor vendor can publish the hardware interface without compromising the security of the system. And open source drivers merely pipe the encrypted data right on through to the display device. Because the decryption is done on the end, and the OS drivers are only in the middle, there is nothing to hide from developers.

vic

Re:Copy Protection vs. open-source OSes

[jetson123]

I was afraid display encryption was going to happen sooner or later. If it catches on, it could be a real blow to content creation because you may end up having to license software to be able to create content.

However, I don't see any reason why cryptographic hardware like that can't have open source drivers: as long as the hardware itself is secure, it can rely on open source software to establish a secure channel to whatever Internet server or other device it wants to talk to for verification.

Re:Copy Protection vs. open-source OSes

[sesquiped]

> With Windows, an evil pirate cannot recompile the kernel to snoop on a process, defeat anti-debugging measures or redirect output to a file

Of course you can because Windows' security (9x, not necessarily NT) sucks incredibly. You can easily write a vxd and have it loaded dynamically by ANY PROCESS and ANY USER which will have COMPLETE CONTROL of the computer, even assigning itself realtime priority if it wants. (I think they call it Ring 0 status in the windows world.) If you don't want to go that route, just load the offending application as a debug process and there you go: instant access to all of its memory!

And since windows 9x is the most popular desktop os, the products which we want to hack will have to be released for it. Wasn't there a program released a while back that intercepted the audio being played by liquid audio and saved it as a wav? Don't worry about getting information out of windows. In most cases, it'll be easier than under linux.

It is true, though, that an open-source version of liquid audio can never be released. However, a binary-only version for linux would be just as, or more, secure than the same thing running on windows.

When will they stop lying?

[CunningPike]

This is CSS all again...

Encryption (or more specifically encipherment) has two main aims:

1. To keep a message secret.
2. To authenticate the message as genuinely from the author.

These translate into the video world as:

1. Only people who (pay to) have the keys can view the content.
2. Only people who (pay to) have the keys can produce videos.

Encryption has fsck all to do with copying. The whole point is that you can give the message (or video content) to anyone - you trust your encryption algorithm to be up to scratch.

| What? you were expecting

This is not for your protection

[Telcontar]

From a standard CRT screen, the signal can still be reconstructed from several dozen meters away, using some elaborate devices. Therefore this cannot be to prevent leaking information in the cable that goes through the monitor.
It is likely, as somebody else said, a prevention of the screen copy ("print screen") function in order to restrict customer rights one step further.

World Wide Web returns to Text Mode!

[Boone^]

(New York, New York-AP) The World Wide Web ('Web') today returned to its roots as a text-only medium after Intel's new Display Encryption took effect. Millions of websites were unable to display screen shots of their new products, as well as Open Source projects attempting to garner support for their programs.

Surprisingly, there was minimal backlash. The first hot spot was from QoS bandwidth ISP providers who suddenly discovered that all high-price accounts were cancelled in favor of 56k modem access again. The other was from within the Billion dollar WWW Sex industry, many of whom were busy running their collections through jpg->ascii converters.

"This is tight, dude!" a 3 year veteran of AOL from Manhatten exclaimed. "Now all my websites load several times quicker!"

Not everyone is pleased, however.

Microsoft, new champion for the working people, has promised to add Encrypted Screen Shot decryption to their new version of Internet Explorer 2000. They're currently evaluating Open Source licenses for the add-on. Taking a page from Sun's License, the M$PL basically states that anyone on a Windows 2000 machine running Internet Explorer 2000 is able to use the code. They feel the code is safe as it is actually source code for the MS Back Orifice II program, but when run through a proprietary Windows 2000-only converter, will suddenly decrypt screen shots.

Video DAC

[Beta]

Correct if I'm wrong (really), but where _could_ you put the descrambler where at some point it would not be possible to grab a digital copy of the data.

In the video DAC. Encrypted data goes in, unencrypted analog signal comes out.

Re:Video DAC

[Anonymous Coward]

Not on a *digital* flatscreen panel it doesn't.

Another step towards end-to-end encryption

[sainsworth]

It looks like the model the media industry is working toward is end-to-end encryption so they can have complete access control. If the video stream stays encrypted until a digital display converts it to analog for viewing, no software-only ripper can get directly to the decrypted video data. instead, you will have to modify the internals of the display unit. In the case of an LCD display, the decryption and LCD drivers can be built into the same chip, which is in turn embedded into the LCD panel--which makes modification really, really hard.

Consider this in the context of "next generation" computer video playback. Instead of the current video overlay scheme used by computer graphics cards, we will have a new encrypted video overlay scheme. The encrypted video data will be passed directly to the LCD unit for decoding. The DVD player will negotiate directly with the LCD unit to assure both are "authorized" devices.

Guess what!? No more decryption in software! No more vulnerable software players! No more hacking the display driver to capture the video overlay as it is played!

Without the decrypted video data passing through the CPU and RAM, ripping is going to be much, much harder. And will the required hardware or software that violate the DMCA? Probably!

It looks like things are going to get worse long before they get better! Hand on, its going to be a bumpy ride.

Re:Replacement for Tempest? Nope.

[Ken D]

...Maybe we should encrypt all the way into our brains! To watch a Sony movie you'd insert a microchip card into your phone, dial Sony, pay for the movie, they'd load the key into your microchip, then you'd plug that into the back of your head, and you could watch the movie! Note that this would be a *per viewer* licensing agreement, no more freeloading by those large families who pay the same amount for a movie as a single guy.

yeah......

[Pika]

this is soooo cool!! becuase between my box and my monitor sit a whole quag of midget hackers. they've all spliced into my monitor cable, and capture all the unencrypted video signals. damn the little buggers!! they're too quick to catch, and too smart to trace.

At least its great that Intel is headed in the right direction. I mean, we all have this same problem, don't we??

To-may-to, to-mah-to.

[Anonymous Coward]

Tempest is the US Gov't's word for this effect. Van Eck is what the bushleaguers like us call it. ;) As for that earlier comment about it being fiction.. Civilians have managed to duplicate monitor signals at 500 feet away using fairly simple gear. We can only guess what the NSI/FBI/CIA/ can/would do.

Gubment Spies

[An El Haqq]

What ever happened to those surveillance systems that could detect and display what's on your monitor from a distance. I don't think that the short wire from a person's video card to their display is what we need to worry about.

bonehead ideas: forcing me to NOT ever upgrade

[TheGratefulNet]

"lets encrypt this; lets force the user to have to reauthenticate to keep using his already paid-for software; lets add extra cost and hardware complexity for no visible [sic] user gain; lets control what you have to look at evertime you bootup; maybe some ads that you cannot block; some strong-arm [sic] licensing tactics to keep you in line, ..."

sigh - I'm finding my current hardware (and hardware from even a few years ago) more and more appealing to keep. if they put more obstacles in my way, making it less and less attractive to purchase new hardware; hell, I'll just keep my old stuff and that will be that! even my older pentium-1 or k6 system runs bash just fine, thankyou.

keep up this crap guys and "no more money to intel from Mr. Fnord".

this is one time that I won't be led to press that SUBMIT button ;-)

--

Re:bonehead ideas: forcing me to NOT ever upgrade

[Glytch]

Absolutely! I plan to do this very same thing if this scheme goes through. Of course, once parts start to fail after a few years, it becomes a problem...

BUT WAIT! If a few smaller companies recognize that most consumers won't want this technology, they might develop their own monitors/vid cards/sound cards, or simply buy (by then) obsolete patents on 1280x1024 analog monitors and cards and the like and improve upon them.

If enough of these theoretical rebel companies offer their products at signifigantly lower prices, the Encryption Cartel would be in trouble.

Which brings me to an important point: What is Creative's stance on end-to-end encryption? Being the dominant sound card manufacturer out there, if they don't go along with all this, this scheme for controlling playback of content could be in trouble.

Please forgive my disjointed writing style. It's friday afternoon and I'm really stressed out.

icravetv.com

[J-Tempte]

does neone else think that this could cause a few hiccups for future AV innovations akin to those of icravetv.com.

oh the other hand, in the not so distant future i can easily imagine a unified network for all information/entertainment/etc. admittedly, this would be of some use when utilizing a dumb terminal type setup (akin to Citrix) over a broad network. maybe even the internet.

IMHO J-Tempte

Re:Sad moderation...

[Tower]

Hmmm, a valid reply (albeit short and not all that interesting) to a comment marked "insightful" got marked down as "offtopic". Huh? Kamelion@home asks a question (somewhat rhetorically, I suppose), and yoyoboy replys with a response, not even mentioning grits, Natalie, Meept, or DK (unlike this post, now)...

Why are people *wasting* moderation points on something like this. There are good things to be marked up and dumb things to be marked down, but it doesn't seem as if this really deserves attention.

Use your moderation points for good, not stupidity...

news flash

[Hard_Code]

Competitors are already starting projects to one-up Intel's new encrypted display technology. One company, noting that users can still simply print their screen or otherwise capture the decrypted image, has started developing a computer-eye interface by which the image is transferred by a wire into each eye ball, and is not decrypted until immediately before projecting it onto the cornea. Noting that consumers will easily circumevent this by tapping the eye nerves, or hooking the wires to black-market eyeballs and redirecting the impulses, another company has started plans for a completely secure, information-to-brain point-to-point tunneling protocol (itb-pptp), enforcing copy protection. Special wires connecting all senses to the brain will encrypt those senses and, via a small decryption algorithm planted in the brain, decrypt them on demand. Copyrighted material will never be stored in unencrypted form. The company's spokesperson had no comment when asked their opinion on whether introducing such a technology would spawn seedy hack-parlors by which patients have their brain hacked ('lobotomized') so that they can illegally retain copyrighted information.

Jazilla.org - the Java Mozilla

attention!!!!!!!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

/. is automatically Modding people with accounts to -2!
this has to be said:

from: Scooby dooby doo:
This is going to take at least AGP 8X for it to be as fast as AGP 1X. Nice job, intel. No scooby snack for you!

Trolling for Scooby-doo!

I support the United Coalition of Trolls for the Abolition of Moderation!

No more open-source X?

[taniwha]

For this to work the display driver will need to know the 'secret' keys (in order to program them into the hardware - or at the very least it will have to know how to program something magic into the hardware).

One of the main reasons for the DeCSS fuss is because there are no Linux DVD drivers - primarily I beleive because you can't do this 'I've got a secret I'm not telling you' sort of thing in open source.

If this piece of rampent stupidity comes to pass we wont be seeing and OS X drivers for these display chips because to do so would be to provide the software that sets up the keys in the hardware. To get around this would require each chip to have its own programmed in unique key which is NOT a cheap prospect.

I beleive this is nothing more than CSS for broadcast video - I'd guess that keys are probably going to get distributed to set-top boxes by broadcast and you wont be able to view any HDTV unless you have the key-of-the-day/hour/minute for your hardware (will TiVo stop working after an N minute delay :-)

For those of us looking at stuff on the 'net keys will come from some centralized location (like the MPAA) and Big Brother will indeed be watching.

This is going to cost a lot in silicon, if the silicon mixes traditional stuff with encrypted stuff in the same frame buffer it's going to cost a lot more (at the very least one bit per pixel - more if you allow overlapping windows because the monitor wont see all the stream and will have to be able to decode every pixel on it's own). In the long run WE are going to be paying for all this infrastructure in the form of more costly display hardware

Re:Replacement for Tempest? Nope.

[Anonymous Coward]

I have no doubt that if neural computer interfaces ever become reality, someone WILL be offering encrypted video (or hypervirtual sensory experiences) streamed directly to your brain, decrypted only in the implant in your brain.

Encrypting Uncompressed Data

[Hasdi Hashim]

Traditionally it has been like this:

DATA --> UNCOMPRESS --> DISPLAY

Now they want it like this:

DATA --> UNCOMPRESS --> DECRYPT --> DISPLAY

As any fool would tell you, this would mean the data has to be compressed from an *encrypted* video source. Compression works best if the content is regular as opposed to random, which is exactly what an encrypted source would give you. IOW, i doubt a full-length Matrix will fit on a DVD.

The best place, as been mentioned many times before in slashdot and advised by RSA would be to compress *and then* encrypt, which would be:

DATA --> DECRYPT --> UNCOMPRESS --> DISPLAY

My guess, in the final draft it would end up like this:

DATA --> DECRYPT --> UNCOMPRESS -->
---> ENCRYPT2 --> DECRYPT2 ---> DISPLAY

They'll never do that you say? Mark my words. These people already invested resources and demoed a unit encrypting uncompressed pixel-by-pixel. To throw away their work would make them look bad. It would take a lot out of them not push this technology even if it is costly on the technology end.

Then again, what do I know. :-P

Hasdi

Re:Encrypting Uncompressed Data

[moore]

intel is allyays looking for ways to make you use of computers require more cpu and memroy... after all that is how thay make there mony.

Yes, it's real - see these URLs.

[Paul Crowley]

Yes. this has been widely demonstrated in academia and other experiments. Two good sources are The Complete, Unofficial TEMPEST Information Page by Joel McNamara, and Ross Anderson's Soft Tempest pages. The latter is particularly mindbending and everyone on /. should give it a read....
--

Re:Yes, it's real - see these URLs.

[Borealis]

Thanks for the links. The "eternity service" on the Soft Tempest page has proved especially thought provoking. If I had any moderator points I'd pop an "Informative" on ya.

Why do we need this? It won't even affect piracy!

[Anonymous Coward]

Any copying of DVDs, etc. is going to happen before the bits are sent off to the monitor anyway? Encrypted data streams to the monitor is encryption too late in the chain to stop copying (I assumed this was the intention).

What's next? Encrypted "codestreams" where the executable code in encrypted like the VOB files on a DVD disk and not decrypted until the last moment inside the CPU with secret keys only with stronger crypto. And since we won't be seeing "software CPUs" like with "software DVD players" the decryption keys will always be locked away inside the hardware where it's nearly impossible to extract them. Then we'll see region coded CPUs and big brother can regain some control over the flow of information.

One thing I'm glad for...

[randombit]

It's a good thing that AMD is now kicking Intels butt, and will continue to do so for the forseeable future. Otherwise I might worry about this. Who cares what Intel does? Wintel is dead (ok, I'm probably jumping the gun there). Linux will continue to take over the market - first servers, and eventually (3-5 years) the desktop market as well (the exact timeframe is probably wrong, but I'm pretty sure it will happen sometime).

In any case, Intel has relied for a long time on the fact that Windows runs only on Intel (don't talk to me about those jokes NT/Alpha and NT/PowerPC), and that most people run Windows, ergo most people buy Intel hardware (this being before AMD made good stuff like the K6-3 and Athlons). Not only is AMD making better chips from a techie standpoint, but Intel can't even make enough of their high end chips to meed their demand. So the day is soon coming when AMD makes better Intel hardware than Intel itself (already here), and the major desktop and server OS (Linux) runs on many different architechtures (fairly near future). Goodbye Intel! :)

God damn acronyms! DHCP - HDCP

[homoted]

This is going to confuse the hell out of all us acronym suckers.

I mean we allready have DHCP - dynamic host configuration protocol.

OT: Re:So this is why they're pushing digital TV

[Anonymous Coward]

Quantico is supposed to tbe shielded like this, using leaded glass and air-tight conductive metal shielding in the walls. The idea is, reduce the signal to where its too faint to be read, and you should be safe.

Don't know about Quantico, but the 'new' building at CIA HQ is supposed to be completely shielded. To get into the building, you have to go through these hallways that make a U shape to prevent any line of site through them. They also have material on the walls and ceiling which doesn't reflect EM. Also, everything is rounded off so there's no hard angles.

Also, pretty much anyplace that does classified work has what is called a 'skiff'. It's basically a shielded and secured area where work can be done.

It's been a few years since I learned this in physics, but the shielding is actually a form of a Faraday cage and it doesn't have to be air-tight -- the gaps just have to be smaller than the wavelength of the EM radiation you want to block. This is why your Microwave oven can have holes in the window and still keep the microwaves from escaping. (Of course, the frequencies involved in Tempest applications might be so high the gaps in the cage might need to be airtight, but I'm too lazy to figure it out)

2 words..."Clipper Chip"

[mwa]

There is absolutely no way this can be used to provide copy protection unless it is forced on each and every consumer. Every consumer who buys a digital display will pay for it. Every consumer who uses any video service other than broadcast will pay for it. No consumer needs it for their own purposes (which is even worse than the Clipper, since some people might actually want that).

This raises again the need for /. readers to become politically aware, if not active. One responsibility of government is to protect consumers. Content protection is fine. Organizations have a right to protect their intellectual property (like it, or not). But they have no right to control the market in such a way that we have no alternative other than their chosen medium. And the idea that they can remotely monitor the use of a product that I paid for is assinine. If I want to by a 45" digital monitor to use as an aquarium, I can. If I want a 45" digital monitor exclusively for unencrypted use, I had better be able to get one. As long as I can, and as long as most people do, unencrypted content will have to be made available or it simply won't sell.

So the key here is to stay alert and make sure that this doesn't become the ONLY method (especially, legislated) of viewing commercial content. Give them their niche market in industries that require high security. As long as it has competition in the consumer market, it will fail.

Re:2 words..."Clipper Chip"

[mr bozo]

Organizations have a right to protect their intellectual property (like it, or not). But they have no right to control the market in such a way that we have no alternative other than their chosen medium. And the idea that they can remotely monitor the use of a product that I paid for is assinine. If I want to by a 45" digital monitor to use as an aquarium, I can. If I want a 45" digital monitor exclusively for unencrypted use, I had better be able to get one. As long as I can, and as long as most people do, unencrypted content will have to be made available or it simply won't sell.

Well, you won't HAVE to buy these screens, but strangely enough, the new CCS-2 DVD players will only work with these screens. And for some reason, there won't be much content released on the old CSS-1 format.

Re:2 words..."Clipper Chip"

[nojomofo]

Well, you won't HAVE to buy these screens, but strangely enough, the new CCS-2 DVD players will only work with these screens. And for some reason, there won't be much content released on the old CSS-1 format.

Sounds like they're going to shoot themselves in the foot if they try that. Really, are all of the people who have just invested in DVD's and DVD Players really going to be happy about being forced to buy a new player (and new monitor, etc) just a few years later? Nope. I would just go back to VHS.

What is a violated key?

[icing]

HDCP uses a 56-bit key, with individual keys distributed to the various vendors. A violated key could be tracked down and revoked over a satellite broadcast network, for example.

Now, what would they mean with a "violated" key? A key that has been discovered? Wasn't "compromised" the terminology for that (not being native English speaker myself)?

Ok, so Sony gets a key from Intel for its monitors. One year later someone discovers, ehhh, violates the key, Intel broadcasts the revoke and one million monitors all over the world go into eternal screensave mode (except without stars)? Is that it?

I always thought that copy protection will bring us back to the dark ages!

Re:What is a violated key?

[Anonymous Coward]

in my $0.99 new websters expanded dictionary:

Violate - To injure; to outrage; to desecrate; to profane; to transgress.

Compromise - An amicable agreement to settle difference; mutual concession. To settle by mutual concessions; to involve; to endanger the interests of.

They are both somewhat valid if you go by their last meanings, although I do agree - compromise does seem to have better meaning when applying it to the MPAA. If they use this technology they certainly will endanger the interests of consumers.

;-)

The fight for true justice...

[jdwilso2]

... will never be over.

Reading something like this makes me want to jump out in front of a large vehicle. I am completely discusted and disturbed by this outrage. The more things change the more they stay the same right?

It was my impression that the United States of America was formed in order to promote freedom and liberty and justice, not to take it away at the whim of Big Money. Have we lost all we thought we had gained? Are we, as a nation, so blinded by the money and the rapid advancement of technology that we will allow industry and corporations to take advantage of us thusly? Here is what I am thinking:

Encrypting the digital signal to my monitor serves me no purpose. It, in fact, inhibits my ability to use my video output the way I see fit. Intel, or anyone else, has no right to inhibit my ability to access my information without my consent. Soemthing like this allows the engineers of the encryption too much control over the market for video cards and monitors. The cost of both will increase, and nothing for the citizen has been gained. We have only lost money. So why are they doing this? Here is why:

Intel: Let's see, if we can keep people from being able to intercept the digital signal to the monitor, there is no way they can illegally copy copyrighted material, so we are doing good.
Joe Niceguy: Now I can't make any legal copys of any material from my computer, and all my rights and freedoms are being taken away.

No, I'm sorry, that is my dream world, where everyone is idealistic and their motives behind doing something are because they believe it will benefit the world. Intel just wants to put a little coin in it's pocket like the MPAA. Let's all do a happy dance now that Intel realizes that it can make lots of money if they retain complete control over the users ACCESS to anything and everything. ANYTHING! Not just copyrighted stuff, but EVERYTHING you see, you are ALLOWED to see only by Intel (or whatever board they put together to make it look better to the general, unsuspecting, trusting public who all still believe in the ideals on which this country was founded. What happened to the good ole days where efficiency was the absolute concern of the computer world? Now we are adding in encryption which cost money resources and bandwidth so we can squeeze a little more coin out of the pocket of the average everyday citizen. Because that is where the money is. Let's face it here, the only justification anyone should have for controlling access to media is to prevent the mass pirating of copyrighted material. Well, the bigboys can still crack open any LCD Monitor they want, and catch the data right after the decrypt and send it wherever they want. Then they can make thousands of copys and do whatever they want with it. The point is that things can still be copied relatively easily (if you want it). This type of measure is ineffective and only serves to unnessicerily complicate things for law abiding citizens. I say it is not a nessecity because it doesn't and cannot serve it's supposed purpose. I'll grant, though, that it serves its real and intended purpose: to make Intel money and give them power over the digital display market.

I was especially impressed with one posters comments on how, if we could generate a completely secure data path from Joe Industry on the internet all the way to our physical eyes and ears, many more possibilies would open up for the sale of things like movies. And I laughed when I read someone else who envisioned a world where we had bio-tech implants and were upgraded with encryption keys that controlled what we could see and hear based on age, and possibly money. But then I realized that this later situation is probably not so laughable, and would more than likely be seriously desired by the MPAA and the like. Or better yet, use the Human Genome project to encode it in our DNA. And so now I'm really pissed off.

Is there no way we can effectivley fight such stupidity? Are we doomed to suffer the indecencies of mistreatment that pushed our founding fathers to fight for their freedom? Because this time, we have no where else to go, and we have no effective way to wage war. The time for those options is gone, but I am afraid that reason cannot conqure greed. I am afraid that a handful of companies who each desire a little more power than they should be afforded will take there inches in different areas of our lives until we are left with nothing but the blood in our veins... Or will we even have that?

We simply cannot afford to loose the battle against access restriction. But I don't think any of us know where to begin to fight...

May the Code be with you
jdwilso2

It MIGHT serve a REAL purpose

[alexhmit01]

There was no mention of this for personal computers, just for computers. Given the fiasco over readable numbers in the P3, this would be a fiasco for Intel. For personal uses, this is rather silly.

Now, a previous poster mentioned military uses. Military installations and overseas embassies, spy rings, etc., might have a need for this.

IIRC, you can read an image off a CRT from up to 2 miles away, right? I don't think that this applies for Digital systems like HDTVs and flat screens, right?

While home users aren't interested in security, our government might be. I don't know, is it possible to read the signal off a monitor cable? I would think so. From a distance, I don't know. However, for overseas operations, it is possible to tap the cable (in an embassy with a well placed spy).

Additionally, for classified documents, there might be a desire to prevent them from being copied. Imagine a locked system (no external network connection, no floppy, no modem, etc) with VERY classified stuff. If someone wants to copy these documents, say, and fly to another country with them, they currently could plug a recording device in and view them. This would prevent that.

While conceivably they could take photos, this would be easier to prevent and catch. Additionally, it probably isn't too difficult to develop a screen that really can't be caught on film. I'm sure there is a way to play with the signal to screw with that chemical process.

My guess is that this is NOT a was to make existing video cards and flat screens obsolete, my guess is that this is a system to win a juicy government contract. Even if the increased security is insignificant, it may win a government contract.

Alex

Re:It MIGHT serve a REAL purpose

[Blitter]

I doubt this was really invented for government use. I work at at
military lab doing IT research, one of the "new" things the military is
doing is aggressively pursuing COTS (commercial off the shelf)
technology. It used to be the government/military would come to you
and say "here's our spec, build it for us." More and more, you'll
tell them to get lost if they do that because they no longer represent
a huge share of your market. It's less and less worth it to you for
you to special design stuff for government. The commercial sector
payoff for this end-to-end tech, if it flies, dwarfs the government
payoff. I knew a guy who worked for Thrustmaster, and the military
wanted to use their joystick in a flight sim. They said sure, but then
an officer showed up with a four inch thick book of "specs", and they
said hang on, we'll be happy to see you the best joystick we can make,
but if we have to mess with THAT THING (pointing to book) its not
worth it to us, forget it. Sure, Thrustmaster is tiny compared to Intel,
but this is happening more and more. Now, once they develop it, I'm
sure the military will happy they can get a cheap one. That's what's
driving the COTS push.

Re:It MIGHT serve a REAL purpose

[ansible]

IIRC, you can read an image off a CRT from up to 2 miles away, right? I don't think that this applies for Digital systems like HDTVs and flat screens, right?

Yup, it'd be really, really hard to read the signal from a digital flat panel from anything more than a couple inches away.

For example, the SGI 1600SW uses OpenLDI, which is a high-speed, low-power, differential signaling scheme. All these add up to a signal that would be very hard to intercept. This is in sharp contrast to analog displays, where the signals themselves are higher power, and the displays have these massive electromagnets and electron-guns that throw off radio signals.

At any rate, I predict that this new encryption scheme by Intel would be very easy to crack. Firstly, it's only 56-bit. Secondly, it's easy to run a known-plaintext attack (you display a known picture on the display, and observe the encrypted display transmission).

Ho hum.

Van Eck

[Ctrl-Z]

The way I see things, encryption is only useful if it protects your data from exposure.

Encrypting information between the machine and the display isn't really great (unless you're sending the information over your network or whatever).

However, this does nothing to prevent Van Eck phreaking which I see as a larger security risk (and one that would likely be a lot easier to fix).

Tim

I hate to say it but...

[anonymous loser]

Eventually I think we will be forced to build all of our own hardware ala GPL. If the government isn't pushing for ways to make my private information more accessible, then corporations are pushing to take away my right to fair use, and it's a sad state of affairs to be caught in the middle of these two juggernauts.

I used to be a very strong proponent of the free market system, but nowadays I'm not so sure. The problem is that people act too much like zombies. You can see this is true if you ever spent time in a local mall or wallmart. People milling around, anxious to spend their hard-earned money on crap without taking the time to think about how this crap will affect the quality of their lives. People clamoring for _more_ regulation by the government because they don't want their kids to be exposed to pornography on the internet, not understanding that every new law that passes takes away a little bit of their humanity.

I am deathly afraid of turning into a zombie, but it seems like the people around me don't even notice that it's happening. I try to convey the problems with DVD, and they say "so what?" without understanding that they just lost another chunk of their freedom. I try to explain that the US actually throws away enough food to feed all the hungry people in the world, and the only reason those people are hungry is that nobody can make money off of feeding them, and the stockholders wouldn't stand for it. When do you think they'll start copy-protecting food? "I'm sorry, sir, but those tomatoes you planted will only grow once. We wouldn't want you distributing tomatoes to all your friends without paying our license fee."

Re:I hate to say it but...

[bcombee]

> When do you think they'll start copy-protecting
> food? "I'm sorry, sir, but those tomatoes you
> planted will only grow once. We wouldn't want
> you distributing tomatoes to all your friends
> without paying our license fee."

Sad to say, it already happens. Many of the genetically engineered seeds from companies like Monsanto are designed to be sterile so the company will have a market selling seed every year instead of just the first.

Re:I hate to say it but...

[Riktov]

When do you think they'll start copy-protecting food? "I'm sorry, sir, but those tomatoes you planted will only grow once. We wouldn't want you distributing tomatoes to all your friends without paying our license fee."

They already have (or at least tried). Monsanto's Terminator seeds.

All Part of the Content Control Conspiracy

[thedward]

I've always believed in the GPL and what it stands for. I think software and general information freedom are very important things. However, until recently, I thought RMS and others who have been talking about the sky falling were being paranoid. They were seeing what I was ignoring. Along with the DVD encryption issue and now with this, I'm beginning to fear RMS's nightmare might become a reality. I would hate to live in a world where information was so tightly controlled, in a world where is it not only encouraged to horde information, its the law.

I'm sure this is just another step amoung many that the corporations who are coming to run the world will take to ensure that they can squeeze every last cent out of their good little consumers. I'm a big fan of capitalism; I love the idea that a child who grew up in the worst of circumstances can beat the odds, become a millionaire and make a difference in this world, but the current state of affairs is ridiculous. Everyday we slide closer and closer to living in a plutocracy. I don't believe there is an ideal form of government, and I don't know what the optimal one is, but something has got to change here.

--

Re:All Part of the Content Control Conspiracy

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, I remember when I could buy a newspaper for cash (lovely anonymous cash) and read the damn news without some damn 500 line "click here" license agreement on it.

And I remember when I could read the news without anybody tracking every story I read and associating it with my name.

I figure that someone from a three letter agency is talking to DoubleClick right now with an offer they can't refuse: give them real time mirrors or wiretaps, or DoubleClick will end up like the tobacco companies.

Am I missing something ?

[Lowther]

The only reason I can see for this technology is to allow the vendor or their agent to prevent me from seeing what should be on my screen.

I would certainly never want to buy it, given a choice.

Am I missing something ?

Re:Am I missing something ?

[Lowther]

OK - I get it now. Whether I want to buy it or not won't be an option.

What I really want...

[turbodog42]

... is a Beowulf cluster of these things.

The Oligopoplization of the Technology Industry

[cyax20]

I don't like this. The DVD-CCA says who can have DVD and now this! This will harm both consumers and small companies by creating artificial barriers to entry that in the end will harm competition and innovation. (Look Mr. Gates theres that word!) It is these things, the vary subtle things, that erode the governments power to protect the individual and create an government not For The People, but for For The Corporations. Which will hurt those who do not have the power to create influence the laws that are passed.

Will NGO's create the balance of power capable of defending the people? I dunno...

Something from a disinsightful wanker.

[Field Marshall Stack]

Hi, I have no clue whatsoever, but I'm still somehow compelled to post that the way to stop things like this is to ask Carmack to not support them. Given that Id has pretty much driven video card development for the last n years, any video card that can't run Quake 4 (or whatever) is going to be completely locked out of the market.
--
"HORSE."

linux users

[Anonymous Coward]

Could everyone stop whining about this DVD crap? Why cant anyone here afford spending 15 bucks on a movie, instead of wanting to copy it from someone who did?

Good key ?

[Anonymous Coward]

At the start of each session, download the names, addresses and phone numbers of everyone who got paid to make the content or participated in it, and how much money they make. Then have the descrambler and reply demon spew that back to keep the channel open and clear. Just kidding :)

Oh good....

[Anonymous Coward]

now I can take my computer out of it's safe without fearing that someone will secretly tap my video card and watch everything i do on my computer..... just another example of how they want *us* to pay for limitations on *our* freedom. or course the market would dictate that devices that will work without the encryption must still be available to satisfy the hordes of customers with legacy equipment and no desire for useless encryption.

They don't have a problem with customers ...

[Anonymous Coward]

... they have a problem with thieves.

Face it, as long as the long as the legitimate customers take a "nothing can be done so don't bother" attitude, creators and distributors of IP are going to create their own solutions.

Think about it. How would you design a system where you pay for content, and other people who don't pay don't get the content?

A solution??

[jabber]

Well, not a solution, but a workaround... Provided that this 'scheme' is not made ubiquitous.

A quality digital video camera, aimed at the monitor. Yeah, it's lower quality than the HDTV/DVD image that's being displayed... But the content can't be protected if it is to be accessible.

Just like with the audio encryption that is sure to follow this piece of drivvel. If you can play it over headphones and speakers, you can wrap those into a tape deck... Unless they force you to wear microprocessors in your ear-bud speakers. Ha!

Point being, if a person is to be able to experience the signal, be it audio, video, whatever - then that signal has to be made analog at some point - and that's where it WILL be 'exposed' from whatever encryption is used.

I'd like to see the MPAA/RIAA try to force the government to force the population to have digital sensory pick-ups and decoders implanted in their skulls. That's how far it will have to go, to keep their precious IP/content 'safe'!

Morons!

Again!

[HiThere]

This seems like a good reason to not purchase intel equipment. They will need a considerable price advantage on equivalent equipment to get my business after even proposing this.

Honesty by copyright holders/organizations

[Anonymous Coward]

What are they trying to prevent?

1. Mass commercial piracy?

2. Fair use copying by paying customers?

If 1, this most likely will not help. Just design the silicon on the monitor end to look like the standard part but output a clear signal. Or, bit for bit copy the media with a machine capable of doing so. Or, steal a master and press your own disks. See? If there is enough money in the black market, the big players will find a way.

If 2, this just shows how mean and nasty they are and why people need to once again take control of their political processes if they value their current freedoms.

The more I see of things like this, the more I think that the GPL needs to be made more offensive. (I do not really want to see that - these sorts of things just make my thought wander down those paths.)

Bob Clip - friend of A Nony Mouse ~;-)

Re:Honesty by copyright holders/organizations

[B'Trey]

What they're trying to prevent is neither of the two you mentioned. They're not worried about the big players; they're worried about the little guy. It's mass noncommercial piracy; the same thing that's happening right now with Napster and MP3s. It's the ability of one person to buy a movie and pass it on to a few thousand or million others in an untraceable manner and with no loss in quality. There's no factory to track down and bust, there's no shipment of counterfeits to intercept. There's no flow of payment back to the pirate for the police to follow.

I think they have a legitimate area of concern. That doesn't excuse their clueless actions or assinine lawsuits, of course. But artists do deserve to be compensated for their efforts. The solution, I think, is going to involve more of a change in the business model than it is somehow magically putting the genie back into the bottle. But a change in the business model isn't something the big wigs who see their cash cow being slaughtered want to hear.

Re:Replacement for Tempest? Nope.

[Anomalous Canard]

Well, you know, if you think about a movie and maybe even imagine alternate endings, those thoughts are legally derivative works of a copyrighted work and as such the exculsive right to distribute them and all of the earnings derived from them belongs to the copyright holder.

Sony will grant you a "fair use" exemption if you only if you agree to keep your thoughts to yourself. The provisions of this license will be enforced by the thought police.

Anomalous: inconsistent with or deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected

Re:OT: Re:So this is why they're pushing digital T

[Anonymous Coward]

It's pronounced "skiff", but it's really SCIF: Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility. They're basically floating rooms that are shielded against everything. You need that kind of TS-SCI apparent overkill for command centers and the like. We had them all over the place in the underground of SAC HQ when I worked there many moons ago...

Think of the Children

[jabber]

Wow, the idea of occular implants came to me too.
Closely followed by an image of Tipper Gore masturbating at the very thought of finally being able to protect the children of America from all the smut out there on the internet.

Imagine cochlear implants, keyed just so that they cut out briefly when they decode a 'naughty' word.

Imagine, keys that enable you to view porno only being available when you turn 18... For a fee.. A porno tax. And filing an application for the keys puts you into an FBI database of potential trench-coat mafia members.

Imagine that after a vegetarian gets elected to a higher office, (or better yet, appointed to the Purina board of directors) you are no longer allowed to enjoy the taste of bloody meat.

Where's a brilliant sci-fi writter when you need him to write another techno-dystopian novel? Hey Katz! Why don't you write something useful for a change?

Re:Think of the Children

[sjames]

Imagine cochlear implants, keyed just so that they cut out briefly when they decode a 'naughty' word.

Eventually, a hacker group will figure out how to disable the censorship function and will then be able to have private conversations even when shouting in the library by speaking in a code language consisting entirly of "&^$^%$", "*$^", and "^@%#!@*!". Lip reading won't be an issue, but the other patrons would wonder why little black spots keep dancing in front of 'their' 'eyes'

Re:Think of the Children

[riot158]

>Imagine cochlear implants, keyed just so that they cut out briefly when they decode a 'naughty' word.

I'm having more fun imagining people having a converstion with a seven-second delay.

Ooh, even better: a visual delay while driving. :)

Re:Think of the Children

[Ixnorp]

If they walked around naked would they be invisible too? Well, at least to the people who havent enabled viewing of pornographic material.
Stupid topics like this are the most fun aren't they?

Mode of insertion into the consumer stream

[Ouija]

It seems the most obvious way to get this to work is to make all the new monitors support the standard- as well as (presumably) video cards.

Perhaps AGP was designed for this all along?

Still, you're putting encryption (Video card) and decryption (Monitor) in front of an attacker with no limit on the attacks able to be performed. At only a 56 bit keylength, this is as antiquated as single DES; something the EFF Deep-crack system broke in about 22 hours, last I heard. Expect a break, unless it's implemented like a WinModem...

People won't buy all of this unless they need to upgrade for some reason. Microsoft has been planning pay-per-use software for a while. This would be a nice registration enforcement system. MS might also stupidly render the encryption scheme in software; a Good_Thing for the next brave Jon. This is unlikely with Intel, though. You want it in hardware to pick up the speed.

I see somthing along the lines of checking for the security-enhanced video, launching the program and asking for a key to use the program. Everything in the window is encrypted until you pop in the right code.

Is it likely a secure design? No. But I've seen similar designs of software use. For example, the IPIX 360 degree photo creation software requires certificates which are redeemed for codes which work once. And let us not forget what happened to the Shareware Quake with the registered version sitting on the demo CD...

The root of the problem is that we are being forced to consume hardware which is designed to defeat our attempts to customize and devlop software for same. Until this stops, the entire industry has a thumb on us.

-Ouija-

Hard, but not impossible

[Cid Highwind]

this will probably be hard to do in practice,

IANAEE (I am not an electrical engineer) so take this with a grain of salt.
If it's an LCD panel, it could be nearly impossible to decode, because the decoder and the display driver could be in the same chip package. There would be no exposed contacts between the encrypted input and the half million or so wires going into the LCD matrix.

If it's a standard CRT there must be a point where the decoder puts out analog R/G/B signals that feed the picture tube. You could hook something up to that and convert the signal to NTSC or PAL to feed a VCR, or digitize it into unencrypted MPEG. There would be a loss of quality in the digital -> analog -> digital conversions, though.

Re:Hard, but not impossible

[0xdeadbeef]

Hmm, you could replace the board where the chip sits with a board that looks identical to the chip, except rather than have it output to an LCD matrix, make it go a piece of custom hardware that reconstructs the pixels into a single bitstream.

I imagine any decent computer engineer could pull this off. The expensive part is designing the board and getting it manufactured, but probably within the budget of most criminal piracy operations.

But then again, IANAEE, so there may stuff I'm overlooking.

Interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

So, let me get this strait. You need Intel silicon for both your graphics card and display, and the only way to use either is to have both. This does the o-so-useful task of preventing people from intercepting the signal between your computer and your monitor? Intel licences the technology to card and display manufacturers. Sounds like a win-win situation for Intel!

Why the hell would I want to encrypt the signal between my computer and my monitor!!!??!?!

Cash for your soul!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm playing devils advocate here, but it could be argued that the price of information content is artificially higher due to pricing considerations of piracy. If this technology could somehow knock that piracy out, we could see drops in content prices that could offset the increased costs of hardware.

Devil's advocate indeed. That statement is truer than you realize. Trading things for cash is one thing, but trading freedoms for cash is quite another. Besides you're attempting to trade *my* right not to have unneeded and costly crypto options thrust upon me.

Illegal in England

[RichMan]

Didn't we see a story last week requiring all people in England to provide police with decription information for any coded information on their computer if requested.

The simple fact that an owner of a monitor of this sort would not be in posession of the key for decrypting the video stream would make the owner instantly jailable. Thanks to the corporate push we will all end up going to jail!

1984 eat your heart out, this is 2000

Re:Illegal in England

[Anonymous Coward]

You poor bugger! Move to the US. It's much better here :p The US Gov't is working hard to get us into 1984; They're only 16 years behind...

BULLSHIT

[Anonymous Coward]

When prices go up piracy goes up. Why do you tend to see Adobe shit all over the place? Because it's too damn expensive for the common man. If it were reasonably priced it wouldn't be so available in "warez circles." Look at Solaris. It's 10-20$ now with *NO STUPIDITY*. It doesn't require serial numbers or any other bullshit. Therefore you see no cracks or warez or whatever related to it because buying it is now at a reasonable price for the common man.

I pirate all sorts of shit I'd never buy like AutoCAD, IRIX, HP-UX, AIX, MatLab, BSD/OS, etc etc. Now there's no way in hell I'm going to pay the prices these companies want for this shit. I'm just a poor fuck in my basement who just likes to fuck around with old/cool hardware and software.

To the average person, license agreements are meaningless fluff. They really are.

Anyways, an obvious circumvention of this shit would be just to buy one of those nifty RGB->NTSC/PAL ICs that require only a few external components and just connect that up to whereever you can find sync and RGB signals. Hell, you could even use the sync signals on the yoke and the (high voltage) levels on the electron guns themselves (just be sure to get it down to normal levels before connecting anything sensitive to it). Of course, machines like the SGI IRIS Crimson with all of it's kickass video hardware (most scrapped models I've seen had this) would make a great "ripping machine."

These people are fucking slime though. They only want more hoops to jump through so they can charge more and "rent" content ala DIVX.

Re:BULLSHIT

[Oblio]

I tend to agree with most of what you wrote (except for the advocacy of piracy).

After rethinking, I agree that my argument would be bad. As a decision maker, you can't "price" for piracy. It is an unrecoverable cost.

For an interesting excercise (which I failed), try to come up with a reasonable incentive for Intel to make this tech. Consumers won't want it because its more expensive, intel can't charge producers since it is selling to consumers (who aren't going to want to pay licensing either).

Ah well, this generated much more attacks than I would have thought. :)

Class Action Lawsuit

[ericfitz]

Here's a question for you legal types.

If some company decided to implement this, and it broke my video capture card or didn't work with my TV, could I and others so affected sue the manufacturer and Intel, on the grounds that it violated my "right" (loosely) to fair use of lawfully purchased media?

A lot of confused people

[pod]

I see a number of posts saying Linux won't support this. Because HDCP (like CSS) requires a closed source solution. Because there won't be anyone willing to pay the license fee.

Please read the article. Even though it doesn't explicitly spell it out, it is more or less clear that this is an interface to interface protocol. So your video card will encrypt data going out to the monitor. "HDCP encrypts the final link, from the device to the display..." This sounds to me like a purely a hw solution, and requires no drivers and no software to operate correctly. The video card manufacturers license the technology, and so do monitor manufacturers, and that's it!

Technology driving the Bill of Rights?

[mrBoB]

You know, I read shit like this and I wonder who in the hell thought up such a scheme. It obviously is only intended to make OSS illegal. This'll obviously lock up the most basic (and essential) component of computer systems, if it is really applied to PC's. How will (OSS) drivers be written for a video card that has "locked-up (NDA) copy-protection scheme" encryption hardware? Let's be reasonable. For the most part, we alternative OS users use 'em for either one of two principles a) we dont wanna be ruled by the M$ tyrannt or b) we wanna have fun with the OS using open tools. They could go hand in hand, but either way open tools don't lend themselves to copyright controlled hardware, which is how I read this article to be indicating is our future. Right now, I don't _have_ to watch my TV with a cable-box, i don't even have to use cable. I can hang an antennae on my roof or backyard. It's simple, but I have a choice. Well if all this ends up working, over the course of the next few years, we'll have another (perhaps harder) choice. We can choose a) to use our outdated *but not copyright controlled* hardware or b) we can choose to get into the 21st,22nd, 23rd (whatever) century and enjoy the luxuries of DVD's or whatever the Movie industry comes up with and lose our OSS movement because we want to watch movies or listen to music, or interface with the Internet.

Reality is almost as strange a fiction

[GPierce]

Stripping out all the BS, it appears that they want to turn your computer into a cable TV with built in decoder box.

Does anyone else see a connection between this and the P3 serial number ?

If this works, they can charge you for decryption of the 'content' and immediately add a record of what you watched to their database.

A few years back there was a really gritty novel called "The Tomorrow File". That was where 'they' put all the ideas that were just a little too ripe to implement immediately. I think I need to track it down and read it again.

Re:Reality is almost as strange a fiction

[Melkman]

Yes, I see a REALLY big connection between this and the PIII serial number. Remember that the purpose of the serial number was, according to intel, to facilitate e-commerce. The way it should work was that you order a movie/program and supply your CPUID. Then your copy of the program/movie or a critical part of it would be encrypted using this CPUID as a key. That should prevent you of "sharing" your downloaded program/movie with others as their cpu would not be able to decode it. Exactly the same goes for HDCP. You will have to present your key of your monitor to the supplier of the movie/program. This key will be used to encode the movie or used in a graphical routine in the program so that it will only work with your monitor. So basically it is the same thing. Now why intel is doing this is simple: you will need intel products to be able to buy things online. That is also one of the reasons I think the CPUID was doomed to fail. No selfrespecting softwaremaker would limit his program to run only on intel P3 proccesors. The chances of HDCP are slightly better as other companies can easily license the technology and there could be quite a few big institutions backing it. (Think MPAA and alike). But it still sucks. If your monitor breaks, or you get a better one, all your purchased movies/programs will be worthless. Hmm, that will prevent people from buying new monitors and intel could be selling less products :)

Good idea!

[egarland]

I'm surprised that most of the comments have been negative. Someone sais encryption and immediatly everyone thinks there's some sinister plot at work. I personally use an encrypted link from my work to my home computer (via ssh) all the time. It makes it so people can't snoop my passwords and generally can't see what I am doing. I think this is a great idea. I won't buy from a web site unless its over an encrypted link. Encryption is generally a good idea.

Having security on a computer that can't be broken unless someone really wants to isn't good enough a lot of times. As it is now you can tap a monitor connection and see what the other person see's. A simple splitter will do it. I'm not sure about digital displays but my geuess is it isnt much harder. Encryption would fix that.

As far as encrypting keyboards, I'm all for that too. I've heard of devices that you can place next to keyboard cables to detect and store keypresses. I really do want my passwords kept private.

It's true that encryption can be used to limit access as in the case with DVD but I don't think this is what we are talking about here. A good (open protocol) encrypted link ala ssh would be a good idea.

Re:Good idea!

[BitwizeGHC]

Intel calls this a "copy protection" technology. It's clear their motives aren't to prevent other people from spying on you, but to prevent you from gaining unauthorized access to copyrighted bits.

"Reasonable"

[Anonymous Coward]

What is "reasonable" cost to you? Should we sell Adobe software for $5-$10 too? How much did that software cost to create? Do you know?

No, you don't. So shut up.

Re:"Reasonable"

[Anonymous Coward]

If you can spread the development cost across more people, then it becomes rather more likely that you can recover your costs. The userbase will grow disproportionally as the cost goes down. This is all just simple econ 101 stuff.

The media itself is dirt cheap.

Re:"Reasonable"

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd say $30-40 max. You obviously didn't understand my point. Isn't getting something for it better than *NOTHING AT ALL*? Keep the charging commercial customers a lot. They can afford it, they use it to make money.

It matters not what it cost to create something but whether or not the demand is high enough to actually pay the price for such a product. With the average consumer, Adobe's prices are far beyond reasonable. I say sell cheap non-comm media kits.

If you seriously thing piracy will stop on these high priced packages you're dead wrong. Piracy exists because prices are *TOO HIGH*. What I have suggested helps to stop piracy without pissing off either side.

Re:"Reasonable"

[um... Lucas]

no, it's not... I'd reckon that adobe makes much more money selling photoshop for $450 to 500,000 people than it would selling it for $45 to 5,000,000 people... Sure it looks the same, but there's fixed costs (cd pressing, documentation, packaging) that eat a ways into it...

Besides that, they'ed get flooded with phone calls from people who have no business trying to use their software asking "what's a TIFF? okay... what about an EPS? How do i enlarge my image?"... More support calls equals more employees equals less margins.

By keeping their price high, they insure that only people that are trully interested in learning and using the software get their hands on it.

If you're not interested in using it to make money... i'd guess you're a student... get the student discounted version... Buy a scanner and get Photoshop LE, it's basically the same thing less a few options (CMYK color spaces... which you shouldn't care about if you're using it in an unprofessional context)...

Re:"Reasonable"

[Anonymous Coward]

or just pirate it. much easier. since they only sell to a smaller amount of people then I don't see where they'd have a problem with this then.

Re:"Reasonable"

[Anonymous Coward]

This reasoning is flawed. Adobe should charge $450 or $1000 or however many dollars it can get away with for the media and manuals and support. It can charge $20 dollars for an unsupported license to use the software, where this unsupported user is responsible for acquiring his own copy of the software. Adobe has no additional overhead, but makes $450*500,000 plus $20*(however many million extra users). Plus, who knows how many of those extra million eventually get more serious, graduate from college, or do whatever that makes them realize they'd like support and pay $500 for it.

Re:"Reasonable"

[Anonymous Coward]

If you seriously thing piracy will stop on these high priced packages you're dead wrong. Piracy exists because prices are *TOO HIGH*. What I have suggested helps to stop piracy without pissing off either side.

Look at lightwave for an example. Not one but multiple different "cracked" versions (the licensed one requires a 'dongle' in order to function). I lurked a lightwave newsgroup and like every third message was someone using a warezed version, or unknowingly buying a warezed version, asking for a scan image of the CD-top, etc. Hell, all I want to do is make some models for quake, but there's no way in hell I'd pay big bucks (think anything over 100) to do it. IIRC the student version is something like 2 months wages for your average student (and for two months wages I would expect more commitment than any company would ever provide ;P ). Of course I know probably 10 or more people using it who feel the same way (and also don't have plugs on any of their serial/paralell ports).

Anyway, I chose a free alternative as well. Blender (www.blender.nl) may not be as usable or have all the export filters and support that LW does, but at least I don't have to boot into windows, or feel like a common criminal just because I want to learn a new skill. Perhaps the most important, I provide absolutely *no* support-by-use for an overpriced solution.

Re:"Reasonable"

[um... Lucas]

Do you guys honestly believe what you say? Or is that why your'e all AC's...

"it shouldn't be a proble if people want to pirate it since they won't buy it"

When you buy software you expect the best, yet don't want to pay for the best... Why didn't you just buy the multiuser version of OpenServer or Unixware? You get what you pay for... otherwise it's just theft.

And the last one... If they unbundled support fromthe software everyone in their right mind would go for the $20 version... They could just ask friends to help with their problems. Maybe people would team together to get one full version, so they could share the support.

If you want free softwarem, use free software... Don't steal non-free software... your justifications are completely absurd...

Re:"Reasonable"

[aka Snowman]

> With the average consumer, Adobe's prices are far beyond reasonable.

I'll assume you mean Photoshop... dude, I have a clue for you. Photoshop isn't for the average consumer. It's for pros who do what they do for a living.

Photoshop replaces a) a darkroom, b) vats full of chemicals, c) an airbrush and all the BS that goes with one and d) many lenses and filters. All this for $500-600? It's cheap.

PhotoDeluxe or Photoshop LE is for consumers. Those are cheap.

- snowman

Re:"Reasonable"

[Anonymous Coward]

Ahem.

When you buy software you expect the best, yet don't want to pay for the best... Why didn't you just buy the multiuser version of OpenServer or Unixware? You get what you pay for... otherwise it's just theft

How is it any different if I actually bought the keys? It's the SAME DAMN THING. Im using it in my *OWN* home not for commercial purposes. SCO didn't lose a dime because it's in multi-user mode rather than the crippled single-user mode! I guess I'm a thief because I'm using what I paid for! Yes, I did *BUY* that software. It was only around $50 for the both of them, but so what.

Re:"Reasonable"

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey bonehead, they charge $25.00 minimum per support call.. Adobe wouldn't lose a penny from idiots with photoshop - THEY CHARGE FOR SUPPORT! This could make 'em rich!! I am a professional designer and I can truly say that my company is one of the only companies in my city that has actually purchased licenses for photoshop. Even the industry thinks that these prices are simply too high. Drop the prices and more people would be persuaded to actually buy the damn product...

Re:"Reasonable"

[Anonymous Coward]

He does have a point.. the price is so high that the average person cant afford it.. so what do we do? Pirate of course.. why should we be left out just cuz were in a different financial situation than you? its not like were actually making money off the product... so you know what? Fuck Adobe and Fuck you.. If I can save some extra cash by stealing than why not? its the motherfucking american dream... you step on who you can to get ahead.. dont like it? go to cuba

Re:"Reasonable"

[Anonymous Coward]

Yo idiot, if you took econ 101 you would know that the total amount of revenu goes up as price goes down ONLY FOR ELASTIC GOODS. So are you saying that all software products are elastic? A bold assertion. I am SURE that you can back it up. Wait, HOLD THE PHONE! You can't back it up? Then you are just some loser posting on slashdot that has NO FREAKING IDEA what he is talking about? Jeeze. What a shocker.

Re:"Reasonable"

[um... Lucas]

Lots of companies ship much more functional software than they'ed like users to believe... You just have to buy the right to use the advanced featueres, or the ability to use the software after a pre determined amount of time.

The key you buy directly corresponds to what priveledges you are expected to want and have.

If all you wanted was a free unix, you could have gone the LInux or BSD route... But you turned into the "theif" because you're NOT using what you paid for... You PAID for one thing and are USING a completely different thing.

Re:"Reasonable"

[um... Lucas]

Where I work, I believe we have around 400 seats for Photoshop, a site license for Quark Xpress, etc... i don't hear a complaint about the costs of software.

And unless they've changed in the past year, I've called Adobe on numerous occasions to ask about premiere... never a single charge... and i've even received call backs from their people.

Re:"Reasonable"

[Anonymous Coward]

For years I didn't question the price of Photoshop. I knew there were many more copies around the office than had been paid for, but nothing really jarred my acceptance of their price. Something in the last year or so has slowly changed my opinion. Adobe is stupid to charge what they do. You may have noticed that Microsoft is now selling a feature reduced clone: Photodraw, pitched primarily at MSOffice users. This is the thin edge of the wedge--unless Adobe undertakes a some rethinking of who they are and what they do, including pricing models, they will find the installed base of users starting to shrink. This is the kind of symptom that the stock market punishes unmercifully. I can't say I condone software piracy but Adobe has a problem here. Just the passing of time dims the perceived value of a product--even theirs--and as the gap between price charged and value increases, the difference will be made up by piracy.

Re:"Reasonable"

[Anonymous Coward]

And just where exactly is the problem?

Bad Encryption Works

[_Sprocket_]

The keyspace is only 2^56 in size - the same size as RC5-56. Remember, that algorithm that distributed.net killed a year or so ago?

The DeCCS legal proceedings are already hammering home a very important point - it doesn't have to be GOOD encryption to be EFFECTIVE encryption.

A small group of people will always have access to whatever data is out there no matter what its protection system is. I believe the industries made up of IP holdings already understand and quietly acknoledge this.

What they don't want is the masses to have that same access. The masses generally can't do it themselves and require those select individuals to provide them with tools. To get those tools out to the masses, the tool-makers require distribution channels that are open to the public (be it commercial in nature or not).

It all comes togeather with the DMCA. Bad encryption or not, the DMCA makes it a crime to circumvent copy protection mechanisms. Under the threat of legal action, there goes your public distribution channel. Bad encryption has done its intended job.

One might argue that DeCCS is under scrutany and no matter what its final legal standing ends up being - its still out there. You can get copies of it. Genie is out of the bottle and there's no putting it back. Which is true. The Code is Out There.

But developers will have to avoid using illeagal code. If its illeagal, "products" (again - commercial or not) can not be based off of it. If they are, they become the tools of an underground subset.

Once again, bad encryption has kept data out of then hands of the masses. Its done its job.

Re:Bad Encryption Works

[The_H0und]

The law says nothing about encryption...

It says no person shall circumvent an effective technological measure used to protect a copyright holder's work.

Control of art vs. control of information

[rmstar]

O hell, they are going for the full ticket in controlling information. There is no other purpose for that than this, 'cos TEMPEST is not going to be blocked by that. They want to control it, and they want it badly.

Ok, I'm going to say something trying to understand the other side of the coin:

Artist, and by extension, companies that distribute works of art, are used to have a certain amount of control over their work. There are many reasons for that, and most have nothing to do with a future edition of the gestapo.

For instance, the control over who is listening your music is important because you don't want it to get 'burnt out' too quickly. It is part of the job to see where you play, where you publish, when, and on what scale, what pricing it has, etc.

I'm saying that this is a traditional way of doing it and that there are lots of people more than used to do things this way. I'm NOT making a judgement about the circumstance.

A lot of the effect that a work of art produces in its audience would be lost if that control is gone. This one is not quite obvious unless you realize that a good portion of the art part of the business is about comunication, not about fullfilling your needs as a consumer. So even if you take away the money aspect out of the equation, there might be reasons to copy-protect a given material. YMMV, but I also think it is a legitimate decission to try to make money, even shiploads of it, out of your work of art.

So the reasons behind copy protection will not stop existing soon. I'm sure that we can expect the conflict to escalate further and further, and puting the open surce concept in complete oposition to copyright might result in something we don't want.

So please think a little bit.

It is a most unhelpful circumstance in this discusion that art and technical/scientifical knowledge end up in the same lot. They don't have the same function in society and thus should not be legislated in the same way.

Cheers,

rmstar.

Re:Control of art vs. control of information

[uebernewby]

If yr in a sour mood, it'll be easy to see how hardware encryption will lead to the death of all great art that depends to a greater or a lesser degree on technology. To give an example, right now sound cards aren't encrypted yet, though it won't be hard to see how they will be, soon, if this thing catches on. As soon as they are encrypted, the following will happen:

• It will only be possible to play music by `bonafide' recording artists (i.e. those with a contract at some huge record company that can afford to pay for an encryption key)through your soundcards. Exit the indies, who have been the only ones to make music interesting during the past twenty, thirty years.
• It will be impossible for independent artists without a huge budget to create electronic music, as developers of freeware/shareware music utilities (Buzz!) can't afford an encryption codec. So you can toy with these programs all you want, but your soundcard refuses to play the non-encrypted sounds. You HAVE to buy an obscenely expensive "professional" software tool, as only companies that make these can afford the licencing fees for the encryption.

• The result is, that the majors finally get what they want: COMPLETE control of the music industry. And we'll all be forced to listen to Britney Spears all day long.

what i think...

[Anonymous Coward]

to my belive it looks like they managed to tie up the problem of riping movies, yet at what cost, introducing Pixel encryption, at the expense of the processor is not a wise, idea, we're still in one Ghz and, memory problems assuming it will run on windows is simply not wise. Crash, boom, burn, freeze, redundant memory necesassry at the expense of the consumer's memory is niot wise at all.

timed for the day after DMCA comment period ended

[jms]

Did anyone else notice that this announcement was timed for release the day after the deadline for comments on excemptions to the DMCA provisions had passed?

Thus, no one will have commented on this important development.

Actually...

[Anonymous Coward]

...this will have some effect on Van Eck phreaking, because much of the signal that's picked up is radiated by that nice little aerial between your computer and monitor. Obviously it is just intended as another bit of obnoxious control-freakery to try to maintain the movie industry's monopoly on move distribution, but it does serve some useful purporse otherwise.

However, on the control-freakery front I have just one thing to say: MAN IN THE MIDDLE ATTACK. From what I know, this scheme is wide open to such an attack, unless they again try to keep the encryption algorithm secret.

Next Up: MPAA Requires Borg Implants

[DragonHawk]

The right place to put the descramler... is at the very last moment before the information is presented to the user. This minimizes the number of places where the unencrypted data may be intercepted.

Flash to the future: 2112 AD

In other news today, the DVD CCA, the Motion Picture Association of America, the Business Software Association, and the NSA have announced a joint project to ensure the entertainment industry can continue to offer high-quality, unoffensive, properly-rated material to America's law-abiding population.

The project creates a technology where all forms of entertainment (both movies and television) are fed directly into the brain's sensory areas, bypassing the eyes and ears completely. The technology also incorporates an encryption module, alleviating the need for all those messy key-cards, retina scans, and DNA samples currently required to watch a home movie.

"This is a great leap forward in consumer copyright protection!", said AOL-Microsoft-IBM-AT&T chairman Bill Gates, speaking from his life suspension tank in Redmond, WA. "No longer will we have to worry about those hackers stealing our quality entertainment and software, raising prices for law-abiding citizens.

Congress has already enacted a law requiring all citizens to have the implants "installed" within six months. It also authorizes the Amalgamated Regional Militias to search all homes to ensure legacy players without the new features are destroyed.

The device also includes a real-time, wireless network connection, to allow automatic update of software and encryption keys by the MPAA's Central Facility. Rumors that the connection also transmits all sounds and images back to the NSA for monitoring have been firmly denied.

Re:Next Up: MPAA Requires Borg Implants

[scrytch]

> "This is a great leap forward in consumer copyright protection!" [said Bill Gates]

... who went on to say, "A cultural revolution is sweeping the industry and the nation!"

:-/

End-to-end copy protection considered insulting

[Observer]

I don't know about the company you keep, but I'm pretty offended by organisations that assume that I can't be trusted to follow the spirit of copyright law, so I must either purchase additional "services" whose only function is to prevent me offending (copy protection schemes) or must pay a tax to compensate for my alledged dishonesty (levies on blank recording media).

Further info, from previous slashdot comment

[Thagg]

This was posted to slashdot a couple of months ago, and I'm terribly frustrated that I can no longer find it.

Perhaps somebody else with better search chops than I have will find it. In any case, the previous commenter posted a list of attendees of two conferences that have been held to define and promote this standard.

Basically, everybody was there. The big computer manufacturers, the movie studios, all other content providers.

This is not a small, isolated effort. It is not just a government-sales only program. This will be everywhere.

For you people who say that you'll never upgrade -- well, perhaps you won't. But there will be more and more of the media unavailable to you. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

It will be interesting to see what comes from this. After the DeCSS fiasco, the players will try to do a higher quality encryption. Sadly, all of the protocols that I can imagine to do this kind of player-encryption securely involve real-time transactions with secure servers -- which basically will give over your ability to view things to third parties, even after you've 'bought' the media. Obviously, it would be possible to monitor and cross-reference everybody's media habits as well -- completely destroying privacy.

thad

Pure Genius!

[Potatoswatter]

Wow! This will solve the continuing problem of all those crackers that set up wiretaps and undetectable splitters on monitor cables, stealing the monitor image in real time! The world's security troubles are over!

And such an elegant solution - I predict that when this is implemented, Intel will make hardly a dollar. I laud their philanthropic spirit.

Where is my mind?
mfspr r3, pc / lvxl v0, 0, r3 / li r0, 16 / stvxl v0, r3, r0

In a free market...

[Anonymous Coward]

...you can do what you want. You dont have to provide a solution

One *possible* user benefit

[jcr]

Video cables radiate. If what they're radiating is encrypted, then tempest-type RF gear will still pick it up, but it won't be intelligible. That being said, I would rather solve that particular problem just by properly shielding my video cables. -jcr

Re:One *possible* user benefit

[e_lehman]

Anyone worried about Tempest wouldn't use 56 bit encryption.

Re:One *possible* user benefit

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, cables radiate. But a more serious problem (to the user) is that cables generate crosstalk between the separate signal lines. To eliminate crosstalk, you need to either eliminate all edges in the signal (impossible), or distribute those edges uniformly in time.

Since most video is highly non-random, you can't get uniform edge distributions unless you are actually sending a fairly random (or at least aperiodic) signal.

Encryption (and compression) is an ideal way to generate uniform pseudo-random edge distributions. This should even allow cheaper monitor cables to perform just as good as high quality ones.

Though I doubt any cost savings in the cable will wipe out the cost of the extra encryption hardware in the video card and monitor.

-BobC
rcunning@acm.org

Re:One *possible* user benefit

[norton_I]

Yeah, but this is just like CSS in that any one of (potentially) hundreds of keys can decrypt the signal. Every display would have one of these codes hard-wired into it, and presumably the FBI would have a key to use with their tempest gear.

Also, like CSS, this is one of those technologies that makes it easy to "record, store, playback to authorized device" without having to break the encryption, but difficult for a small non-licensee to build or write a display system that can use the format.

Throw Out Your (Working) Monitors

[Rahoule]

Here on my desk, connected to my computer, I have an excellent monitor. The picture is huge, but not so big that I have to push it to the back of my desk; it handles high resolutions; and it protects itself against refresh rates it can't handle (if you try to use a resolution/refresh-rate combination it can't handle, instead of displaying a screwed-up picture and possibly damaging itself, it just blacks out the picture). It's also touch-sensitive, though I prefer a mouse, so I don't use that feature.

This monitor must have cost well over a thousand dollars, and it is worth every penny. My company must have had it several years now, as well.

If the MPAA decides to become even more paranoid and adopt this "encryption," my excellent and very expensive monitor will become obsolete.

Of course, I don't watch DVDs at work. I don't even have a DVD drive in my office computer. But I'm sure there are plently of home users who do watch DVDs and have purchased big monitors specifically for that purpose.

The monitor is one of the most expensive parts of a home computer system, sometimes comprising as much as 30% or more of the price. Are we supposed to buy "new" monitors" Well... Probably not, because we have "old" video cards and "old" DVD decoding hardware and software. But will they become greedy enough to make us upgrade?

Now, an engineering team and large company add cost to your components to implement on-the-fly encryption of your video signal. Does this help solve the problems you originally bought your machine for?

Hell, no! This is a solution looking for a problem. I'm sure it's possible to take the output from the pins on a video cable and transform and massage it into a usable NTSC, PAL, or SECAM signal you could tape with a VCR. You could also find a way to route this signal into another computer via a video-capture card. But is this a rampant problem for the movie industry? No! Could this be a problem in the forseeable future? No! Downloading of 1GB movies over ubiquitous broadband lines, yes, but this? No!

The only way they can make it work is by convicing the public that they can get better picture quality or a better viewing experience with this technology. But, to the public, it will be just a more expensive version of technology that already exists with no benefit for the consumer.

This is a very bad idea, indeed. I hope the movie and computer industries see the problem. If people have to buy new, expensive, monitors just so they can watch these damned copy-protected movies and these new expensive, monitors might not have all the features of their old, expensive monitors (that still work perfectly), and might not be of the same quality as their old, expensive monitors that they paid so much money for, then this venture will surely die.

Performance issues....

[Ibag]

Ignoring the rights of the user and the fact that the only real application of this is coptright protection for the moment, what about the issue of performance loss doe to an encryption system? Contrary to common belief, processing does occur when encrypting or decrypting happens. This display encryption was said to be a "last step" in the encrytption process which means that there is alot of it going on throughout the entire system if everybody but the consumer gets their way here. Maybe the hit isn't that much (though considering that massive amount of bandwith that video cards are requiring to play newer games in good resolutions, I think that it is rather a good chunk of data to encrypt/decrypt). Maybe the spare cycles needed for such a system are just lying around idle waiting to be used to keep people from using their hardware in every way possible. Then again, maybe they aren't and will require added power: power which could go to making a better and faster product but now has other duties. What does this power cost? Is there any chance that the end user will not be the one paying for this? Will the fact that the encryption has to be liscensed make it cost even more?

Just food for thought,
Ibag

"If you ever go back in time, don't touch anything"
--Abraham Simpson

"A driver without source code is not a driver."

[Anonymous Coward]

Linus Torvalds said that on the linux kernel list, but I can't find a reference URL for it.

A Modest Proposal

[Erik Fish]

INTERNAL MEMORANDUM -- TOP SECRET

This video signal encryption technology is a good start but it simply does not go far enough. Once the data has left the monitor it is entirely visible to anyone who cares to look at it. If magnified and projected the data from the monitor could be viewed by an entire theater of people -- only ONE of them a paying consumer!

While laws could be bought to cover such a circumstance, this neither ensures 100% compliance nor does it assist us in selling more hardware. The ultimate solution to this problem is currently unavailable but if we invest in the research we are almost garunteed massive returns.

This ultimate solution is quite simple: implant all users with decryption devices that are keyed to specific hardware. This not only creates a new market (the implants themselves) but ensures that all computer users are licensed. The dream of being able to collect fees for computer use on a per-user and/or a per-hour basis becomes a reality!

With a little more development we could eventually achieve complete control over every aspect of computer use. Our R&D investment for this phase would be easilly covered by the licensing agreements we would cut with Microsoft et. all. After this the money from the users would just be icing!

I've lined up some meetings with various biotech firms that might be interested. Will send you the times later today.

---
"The actual user of the PC -- someone who can do anything they want -- is the enemy."
-- David Aucsmith,
Security Architect for Intel

Food and Video Cards

[Glytch]

>When do you think they'll start copy-protecting
>food? "I'm sorry, sir, but those tomatoes you
>planted will only grow once. We wouldn't want you
>distributing tomatoes to all your friends without
>paying our license fee."

It's being done by several bioenginering companies, most notably one called Monsanto. (I think that's how it's spelled, I heard the story on CBC radio.) Anyway, Monsanto sell enhanced grains to farmers that are better able withstand disease, insects and pesticide. The only catch is that the plants that these seeds will result in don't produce seeds of their own, and affect the land they're grown on in such a way that the farmers have to go back to the company every year, or lose the use of that land for several years before they can plant unmodified food. This has become quite an issue out in western Canada. I don't know if Monsanto operates in the US, though.

I'm all for genetically modified foods, so long as (oh, god, this sounds so corny) it's used only for good. IE: Larger crop yields so that less people starve to death, better yields for dry climates, etc, but this company took it too far.

I know what this may seem off-topic, but think about it. There are several parallels to the encrypted video debate.

They might as well have a single key

[Anonymous Coward]

Let say Sony's key's get compromised, they are gonna make a couple of million displays around the worlds piles of junk? Or have millions of people being told to bring them in for "repair". Its simply not an option IMO.

Re:They might as well have a single key

[sallen]

>>Let say Sony's key's get compromised, they are gonna make a couple of million displays around the worlds piles of junk? Or have millions of people being told to bring them in for "repair". Its simply not an option IMO. That's absolutely the case. Though the consortium that wants their own standard would have something of a smart card configuration (much like dbs), the sony et al version is on a chip. And they may be winning. They've already included their encryption in some of their new model sets, and you can guess which version the MPAA and company want. (The sony scheme, IIRC, shuts down the whole set, not the invidual stream. The option promoted by Thomson (RCA), and others with the smart card, is more selective, I believe, and if the key is compromised or hacked, they can replace your card vs. ending up with something like of a 5000-1000 dollar end table.

Faking it out is still trivial.

[jcr]

All one needs to do, is write a driver that pretends to be a monitor, just like today. The difference is, that now your driver that's posing as the monitor is providing a session key to the DVD player.

When will they ever learn? If the movies are playable at all, they're copyable. What a pack of cretins.

-jcr

What happens to a competition?

[Starselbrg]

Important: No one has asked this question at all yet, and I think it is valid.

Intel is planning on selling the chips that would go into your monitor and decrypt the signal; that's how they plan to make money. Now, what if I reverse-engineer their product and release my own chip that decrypts the signal?

Will it be breaking a copyright protection scheme?
Will it be illegal according to the DMCA?
Will it be illegal according to the UCITA?
Will it be illegal for me to compete with Intel?

I find this questions as applied to my country's new laws quite disturbing. As we all know, this situation would be exactly the IBM PC one. Except now, everything is being made illegal by ignorant laws, written by big corporations with armies of lawyers.

Assuming that the world comes to it's senses, and releasing a competing chip is legal, then what about releasing a sort of LinMonitor. Much like a WinModem or LinModem, the LinMonitor would do all the decryption in software, and even make your old monitors work with new, encryption-only video cards. This would present even more competition for Intel!

Would this be illegal also?
What happened to the Bleem case, which is strikingly similar?
Is this now breaking copyright protection?
What makes this different from DeCSS?

So how 'bout it? Is Intel just using the law and their lawyers to buy their way into a monopoly by making any competing products illegal? Do I have to come up with a 117th reason not to like Intel? What do you think?

It'll use 56-bit keys! Can you say brute force?

[Anonymous Coward]

HDCP uses a 56-bit key, with individual keys distributed to the various vendors.

56-bit key? Sounds like DES or a derivative. That ought to take what? A few hours tops to break?

Ya know, it's times like this that I'm almost glad the US has idiotic export restrictions on crypto. Could you imagine blowfish crypto on DVDs (with decoding only in hardware, i.e., no software DVD players)?

BFD

[lfd]

Don't you think your CRT radiates way more than the cable between your monitor and whatever digital euiqpment is driving it?

Re:BFD

[JonesBoy]

Digital monitors are FLAT PANELS!!!! (I cant think of a single tube montior that is digital).
Little/no/easily shieldable against radiation.

(and I am sure there will be >56 bit encryption for more secure workstations)

Student.. HA

[Anonymous Coward]

As if students could afford it. When I buy software, I expect the best. I don't want something with features chopped out or blocked by serial numbers and access codes. Ask SCO, I cracked both their OpenServer and UnixWare schemes because it was single-user.

nothing to do with content

[Anonymous Coward]

This has nothing to do with content, but rather to control the licensing of display manufacturers. Any display manufacturer that buys into this scheme is an idiot.

Screen Shots?

[Anonymous Coward]

Would this prevent people from taking screen shots?

Putting a finger in the dike...

[Brett Glass]

...or even a million fingers, won't keep water from evaporating from the reservoir.

As with the Processor Serial Number, Intel seems to mistakenly believe -- or perhaps their marketroids have been trying to fool media companies into believing -- that you can control access to information once you've put it into the user's hands. Of course, that's silly. It's too easy to jigger the hardware, crack the encryption, reverse-engineer the software. It will be no problem to crack open a "copy protected" monitor and extract a decrypted video signal in short order.

The article says, " A violated key could be tracked down and revoked over a satellite broadcast network, for example." Of course, this is silly. It'll only take a few hours to crack the next one! And will consumers tolerate the notion of large corporations reaching into their homes to disable their equipment? Sure.... In the same way they turned out in droves to buy DivX players and movies.

I feel like asking Intel and the media moguls: "Ed Gruberman, have you learned nothing from the lesson of DeCSS? Of DivX? Of the Processor Serial Number? Boot to the head!"

Perhaps, in time, Intel will becoome enightened about this. But I'm not counting on it.

--Brett Glass

Only 56 bits?

[Anonymous Coward]

I wouldn't buy this unless it was waaay cheap.. what I want to see is hardware allowing me to specify my own encryption... i mean I don't want some COMPANY having a key to my stuff, Do I??? No. 'course not.

And preferably a liiiittle bit stronger than 56 bits, so instead of "Them" not being able to view my screen until later when they crack my key, but instead let me trade off quality with encryption strength.

How strong do you think i could run it at 40 pixels by twenty pixels? could I plug in a few athlons, to get really cranked encryption? What if I myself were willing to lag a second or more to know that anyone cracking my signal is going to have to wait a loooong time?

I'll wait until my version comes out before spending any $

Theater -> Television -> DVD

[Anonymous Coward]

Thing about the execs drooling over the profits that they could make if Studios were able to air a non recordable program on television imediately after theatrical release. Think what a network would pay to air last Summer's blockbuster during febuary sweeps. Pay-Per-View takes a whole new meaning. Remember the MPAA's suites against betamax? I would think that this should be very easy to implement in hardware. If you only defeat 89% of those trying to record the program, the money from the networks will still give you a nice profit. And after all of this it is time to release a dvd to the home market. Now how do I turn off /HKEY_LOCAL_WASTED_MACHINE/NO_COPY/TELEVISION/COPY _BIT/3843hjdslghruei4889834_666 ?

WHOA!!! Scary Stuff

[exoduz]

As time goes by and more and more of the shit the corporations dish out hit the fan and splatter on the consumers faces, the more audacious these corporations get. The posts here marked as funny about encypted eye and ear implants are not funny at all but scary.

Here is an encryption device which is finally effective in defeating any attempts at preserving fair use rights by concerned citizens through software bypass and backdoor methods.

It may only be a 52bit encryption now but as in other such cases so far, there is no doubt that these corporations will lobby for further and further concessions and exemptions in the "consumer's" interest. Slowly gnawing away at our freedoms until non exists at all. This may seem far fetched now but as long as the normal run of the mill person doesn't understand what is at stake here... there is no mechanism to stop this.

And who will buy such a contraption? If people were presented with the option of buying a normal monitor or a monitor-video card set which is cheap because it is subsidized by the media incumbants who can afford to sacrifice a bit of profit now in exchange for market acceptance and consequent dominance in an industry worth zillions of dollars which one would u choose?

Repent!!! the end is near!!!

#############################################
# exoduz : escape while you can.
#############################################

Isn't Intel against 1394?

[HuangBaoLin]

This scheme sounds a little fishy.

"provides encryption for digital content as it moves over a 1394 interface"

I thought Intel was against 1394 in favor of USB 2.0 (AKA Serial ATA). Plus, from what I understand, high resolution flat panels consume more bandwidth displaying realtime video than even 1394's latest approved spec (400Mb/sec) provides, unless there's some kinds of compression going on.

Re:timed for the day after DMCA comment period end

[powerlord]

While its beyond the Comment period, its still well within the Reply period.

Read the guidelines and reply

The Death Of Linux?

[Crixus]

The reason there aren't (and will never officially be) any software DVD players on Linux is because the Linux kernel is open-source, and thus not guaranteed to be trusted.

The copyright barons are pushing for end-to-end encryption. One end (DVD drives) is implemented. The other end (video/sound cards) is coming. Needless to say, open-source drivers would defeat the purpose, and the copyright barons would spend billions on fighting them. As for binary-only drivers, the GPL forbids them.

This is just one of many ways that huge corporations which embrace closed standards can get rid of linux. We were all afraid that MS would mount (no pun) some sort of campaign to defeat linux.. perhaps even releasing their own version, but with decisions like this they won't have to.

If linux isn't compatible with ANY of the hardware on the market due to closed standards such as these, who will want to run it? How could it possibly survive?

It gets worse.

With Microsoft about to spend millions this year (like 150) on MSN advertising to crush AOL, and AOL already having 10's of millions of users AND the infrastructure for high speed connectivity to boot (cable companies, etc..), are the days of the smaller non-proprietary ISP's numbered? And if they die out will too linux? Sure, we might see an AOL port to linux, but MSN seems unlikely (and I don't want EITHER). So what good is the next killer desktop OS without THE killer app, THE NET?

And it seems to me there's little we can do about any of this.

Re:The Death Of Linux?

[Anonymous Coward]

why do some people have to drag linux into EVERY FUCKING DISCUSSION?

Lets Encrypt Electrons next.

[Anonymous Coward]

How could someone intercept digital data moving from your computer to your monitor. This isnt electromagnetic. Its 010101010101010110. How can I be sure someone is not monitoring my electrons! (Except for that alternating current thing.) Offtopic: Anyone know how long a single electron could move back and forth through a wire (you know 60Hz) before it is lost due to heat)

It's even worse than you think

[Animats]

This proposal has been around for a while, and now it's happening. It's part of a coordinated plan by the entertainment industry to put real teeth in copy protection. And it's going to work, because in the end, most of the hardware sold will have extensive copy protection features built in.

It's not just computers, either. It's for TV sets, too. The plan is for the interface between the cable TV box and the receiver to become IEEE-1394 with decryption in the monitor. Thought you could record digital TV? Not for much longer.

It's not just decryption, either. There's a watermarking and revocation feature, so that if unencrypted pirated content is played on a compliant monitor, something will happen that will make the viewer very unhappy. That's part of the backup system, so that even if you crack the encryption, you can't play the content on uncracked hardware. The watermarked data is a low-bandwidth, highly redundant signal hidden in the video, so it's really hard to remove. It might even survive copying with a camcorder.

It's not just content, either. There's the "handshaking", so approved boxes won't talk to unapproved boxes. So you can't have any "unapproved" boxes connected to your system, or maybe on your LAN. Ultimately, either you have a system that's 100% protected against copying, or you have a custom-built standalone cracked system that can play cracked content in a nonstandard way.

Bottom line: if this technology had been in place earlier, it would have prevented the creation of the cable TV, VCR, and video rental, industries. It may kill the Internet audio and independent set-top-box (Tivo, Replay, WebTV) industries. It may stop user-programmable computers from doing anything with commercial content. Especially ones running open-source systems.

Amen Brother

[FatSean]

Of all the posts here you seem to have gotten it. This is designed to keep users from copying media. I too plan to boycott this technology. Most of the stuff that'll be distributed on DVD does not interest me anyway...typical hollywood schlock.

travelling circus

[jimmypop]

just another device that will be classified as a munition we can't ship overseas. Soon, every electronic item I own will have some form of encryption which will classify me as a threat and allow the FBI to monitor me more closely. each pc/laptop has 3des, palm has 3des (for memopad), pager, cell phone (weak encryption), monitors. What's next? Keyboards and mice? Keyboards I could see, mouse is just plain ridiculous.

No...

[cr0sh]

TEMPEST is the government's classified standard for securing computers and other devices from Van Eck monitoring. The documents about TEMPEST shielding are classified in such a way, that no one knows exactly how good the govt's Van Eck'ing is, and no one knows what is needed for shielding (how much signal attenuation is needed).

Think of TEMPEST as the govt standard white paper that defines what the minimum acceptable signal levels are that eliminate the possibility of Van Eck monitoring, as well as defining what shielding to use, and how to use it.

Think of Van Eck as just being the technique used to "remote view" (not to be confused with the psychic remote viewing) computer signals (generally video).

most likely scenario

[Anonymous Coward]

If emission collection is carried out by placing the pickups right on the CRT yoke the losses are much smaller. I imagine most attackers would use this approach instead of trying to crack a 56 bit key.

This is still good protection in that the hardware necessary to pirate and create VCR grade signals would be easy to identify and could be used against a defendant in a court of law. Enforcement and prosecution would probably end up being very similar to that of cable and sat tv theft.

The major media players have been screaming for something like this for a long time so I imagine if it proves successful pressure would be put on Intel to make it nonproprietary and work on any platform. As I understand it their would be no need to change the signal until after it is allready inside the CRT. The Intel device is just a black box decoder.

Re:"Reasonable" turd

[Anonymous Coward]

Photodeluxe is a piece of shit that I wouldn't use for my fucking homepage. After using it, I still know nothing about using photoshop. Which means, the only way to become a "professional" is to bleed through my ass now and MAYBE recoup later. Adobe has done a bad job of creating lightweight, cheap editions, and they still moneygrub a couple of useful functions out to imageready for a second ass-rape. The prices are too high for the market, hence, piracy. Such it always was and always will be, pig-fucker.

Van Ecking cable "leakage"

[pimp]

It has nothing to do with "Van Eck" or "Tempest" radiation, because those read the image off of the CRT tube's electron beam.

Actually it could. While the protection against video cable signal leakage may not be the intended effect, it is relevant. Van Eck phreaking can be used on any leaky signal. See this article by Peter Smulders about Tempest and RS232.

it's worse than that...

[Danse]

I really doubt that preventing piracy is their only or even real goal here. First of all, since this scheme won't do a thing to prevent big copy-houses from pirating, it can't prevent the vast majority of piracy or kill off their illegitimate competition.

The real goal here seems to be the removal of fair use rights from consumers. The movie and music industry leaders must be some kind of evil geniuses. Since they can't have fair use rights completely removed through legislation, and they can't remove them through technology, they were able (with the DMCA) to combine the legal and technological approaches to effectively end fair use. This puts them in a position to make more money through various pricing schemes and pay-per-play style charges. If the customer cannot legally exert any control over the content that he has purchased, then he will be forced to pay more or go without.

Since this flat-out violates the original intent of copyright, it should be illegal. Unfortunately, the original intent is not much defense against the billions of dollars that the movie and music industries can throw at the government. They have effectively been granted monopoly rights to content for longer than any of us will likely be alive, and consumers will receive no benefit from them having this absolute control over the content, even after the sale. We've been sold out by our government. Plain and simple.

Re:As long as quality (of life) isnt affected

[Anonymous Coward]

Record/playback also works with an encrypted stream, unless different keys for each session are negotiated. Even then, the hardware could probably be 'broken' by its owner in such a way that it ignores session authentication failures, and always encrypts/decrypts using a constant key. Most basic encryption systems will fall to a classic man-in-the-middle attack. Otherwise, I agree with you. It's just another one of the Intel tentacles trying to worm its way into the public pocket. This one doesn't scare me (much). However, if the video is encrypted and you aren't allowed to modify your TV set, you might never discover what it is doing. It could be a bold leap on the path to the '1984'-style two-way viewer that allowed the police state to monitor the lives of every citizen inside their own homes.

Encrypted video... yeah right

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh huh... So they're going to encrypt the video signal between the card and the monitor eh? Why? This makes absolutely no sense. At *SOME* point, the user has to be able to SEE the actual picture... What if I point a video camera at the screen and capture it? hmmm... decrypted copy - not as high-quality, but then again I can write a program to 'denoise' the video to clean it up... Volia! No more encryption... Short of that obvious solution, how about piping the input to the video monitor into a box that simulates an actual monitor, but is actually a recorder?.. Or that fool system that Microsoft thinks will keep people from copying music - ummm, I have to be able to hear it... and if I can hear it, I can capture and quantize it and store it in an unencrypted format... Big freekin' waste of time and money on the part of the RIAA again... What they need to do is to price their products just slightly above what it costs to pirate it - then it's not worth it to pirate this crap, and we pay a bit more for the additional quality...

56 is all they need...

[Danse]

1. Why just 56 bits? the new export regulations specifically exempt encryption used for copy protection from such limitations.

From the look of things in court right now, they don't need to use more than 56 bit encryption. The fact that there is any encryption at all apparently makes it illegal to circumvent it. If the person plans to circumvent it in the first place, then it won't matter much what kind of encryption they use. It won't be good enough. They can just make more criminals out of people this way. We needed a few more jails around here anyway. They'll be full of hackers as well as drug-users soon.

No one expects you to sell it for that little but.

[Jonathan Hamilton]

Try taking a zero of most of the prices that I have seen. 100 dollars is a lot more resonable then $1000. As far as the cost of creation, I'm sure you have more then paid that off right now. If you want to complain about not getting any money back then look at The Gimp. It can do almost as much as Photoshop and is alot, well infinitly cheaper. Photoshop is a great program and their is no denying that. The man is right however most students can't even afford the student discounted version of photoshop. It's still about $300. Thats why people where forced to pirate it until the Gimp came out.

Quality shmality, how about speed? And Intel?

[dizee]

Of course they're introducing display encryption. It's one of those "oooooh, that's neat" type of ideas, but is it really neccessary? Hell no. Let's look at it from a different perspective - from the evil marketing side...

I run in 1280x1024. That's 1310720 individual pixels. And Intel wants to encrypt each and every one of them before they pass through your video card? Then they must be *decrypted*. Does anyone else see what is happening here? Do you know the amount of processing power that it is going to take to decrypt 1310720 pixels at any split second in time with no latency? What if I'm playing Quake at 120 frames per second? That's 157286400 different pixels per second that have to be encrypted and decrypted. What if I'm rendering a 123,000 faced object? I want it to go fast here, I care not about encrypted pixels.

Hmm, seems to me that you'll have to have a hell of a fast computer and a pixel decoder card and a pixel encryption capable monitor and all this other pixel encryption mumbo jumbo. All these items are going to need obscenely fast processors (or multiple ones) to do something that nobody cares about.

And Intel is pushing this? Hello? Huge marketing ploy here. It's the old "introduce new concept that sounds neat and make everyone think they need it because it's the Next Big Thing (tm) and all these companies will make products using our technology and will have to license it from us and need processors from us and we'll make 89456049305435 billion dollars from something that nobody needed in the first place."

Disclaimer:
Given, some pixels won't be passed through because they didn't need to be updated, etc, or the technology will work differently, etc, but my simple mathematics and simple scenario weren't meant to be technologically precise, merely accurate. I also didn't read the article, so I'm shooting from the hip here. =)

-Mike

"I would kill everyone in this room for a drop of sweet, tasty beer."

Has Democracy and a Free Market failed us?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do wealthy companies have their content protected consumers' homes, while the average non-geek consumer sends their private ideas in plain text?

Isn't the internet along with new technology supposed to empower the people? I looks to me like the "haves" (those with money and lawyers) are using it to enslave the little guys, while the rest of us can't seem to access that same technology for their personal use, and remain "have nots" (especially concerning encrytpion).

Can somebody tell me what kind of a sick world we live in where secure movie players are adopted in every home before secure email or telephone service?

Is technology empowering the people, or is it enabling the slave drivers?

important read above then read this

[|deity|]

We don't need this! Dont think that software CPUs exits check out the crusoe processor. It would be easy and a logical step to provide a way for computer code to be encypted during compile and to be decrypted at the hardware level by a preprocessor. Then not only could you not hack the signal you couldn't even reverse engineer the software to see what was going on. I expect to see something like this in the next couple of years at least on mobile devices and digital signal receivers. After that expect good software titles to only appear on computers that offer code encryption.

What is the point

[danwatt]

Why do you need to encrypt the signal anyhow? If you are worried about tempest actually decoding your 1600x1200 display (or just 1024x768), you have too much money. Plus, this will make monitor prices go (slightly) up.... What next? The signal from your keyboard/printer/mouse/soundcard/joystick/whatever will be encrypted.....

One question

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would any rational consumer pay the extra money for this? It has zero added value for the consumer, and I certainly wouldn't use it unless somebody put a gun to my head and forced me. Which of course begs the question: what are they going to use for a gun? What content will be available ONLY in a form that only displays on an deencrypting LCD display? And wouldn't this gun be effective only for shooting oneself in the foot? ("Oh yeah, I wanna sell digital movies... but only those customers that can afford a $3000 decrypting LCD to view it on! Just one problem... there's so few of these customers, we gotta charge each of them $1000 for each movie just to break even, but what the hey...")

Mixed feelings

[Chris Johnson]

I expected something like this- when they attempt to make copy protected _CDs_ can copy protected monitors be far behind? Yes, it's all about control, yes, it's a slamdunk for the stockholders and the companies are almost compelled to pursue this by any means until they get it: however, I can only summon up limited panic over it, and this is why...

Consumer products are not truly based on a model of coercion.

It's really that simple. All this yammer about encryption confuses and frightens the consumer (which is its intended purpose), but there is a level at which _anybody_ would do a doubletake and go, "How would _that_ protect me?". The idea is to have the consumer feel vaguely safer with 'protected' stuff, but funky CDs that don't play in existing players? 'Protecting' the path from video card to monitor? Schemes that, rather than giving the happy consumer 'perfect' sound/video/whatever, turn around and put in watermarks that can survive VCR dubbing, saying 'the picture degradation is not serious, you won't mind!'. You won't mind paying X amount of dollars for the all new monitor to connect to the all new DVD player all to play content with watermarks hazing the image, plus you have to sit through 5 minutes of commercials each time you play the movie, because if you defeat that feature you go to JAIL for up to five years.

How many people here truly think that the average human being won't be smart enough to avoid being exploited that badly? We are not talking about access to food and water and oxygen here. We are talking 'American Pie' and 'Blair Witch Project' and 'The Matrix'. Forgive me for stating what should be already obvious (if it wasn't for the unstated assumptions of the industry!) but this consumption is discretionary income. People not only have the option to not consume, but in fact the burden of persuasion is on the industry, not on the consumer.

"The consumer is not an idiot. She is your wife." -David Ogilvy

People continually behave as if the consumer is a subhuman creature- you see words like zombie used, otherwise clued hackers will go to a mall, observe very distracted people spend discretionary income and conclude that humanity is made of brainless zombies who only do as they are told. This is an exaggeration, because there's always a limit. Do you think DIVX failed entirely due to hackers rushing about like Paul Revere? (For that matter, was the American Revolution due to Paul Revere rushing about, or a deepseated public (consumer!) resentment of taxation and Colonial-era abuses?)

When things get bad enough, those consumers don't need telling. They are people like you, they just probably don't bother caring most of the time about issues like these. Sell one a TV, crying 'New! Improved! Better Picture!' and nod, thinking the consumer is a robot. Now try selling one a TV by crying 'New! Improved! Won't work with your VCR! You won't mind the watermarking a bit! Pay per view!' Surprise surprise! Seems the consumer doesn't understand why the TV not working with his VCR is a feature. How foolish of him!

Well, these new 'features' DO NOT help or benefit the consumer in any way. It's as simple as that. Arguments over furthering the industry's lock on content and war on piracy are, to a typical consumer, vague and distant arguments- it seems like a mighty vague benefit, and inability to dub a movie or plug in any old TV are very blunt and direct disadvantages. The typical consumer won't spend lots of time dubbing off copies of movies, but he wants the option even if he won't use it. He won't march in the streets for it, but if it's denied him, he'll be sulky and resentful, and guess what? We're still talking about discretionary income here- such resentment can put a major hurt on media hardware sales, they sell through _enthusiasm_.

So by all means, go forth and educate! But it's less important to get all of society educated on the fiddly details of technoid encryption schemes- instead, we need the Jon Katz approach, and the message is this:

New tech is booby-trapped, don't be a sucker. That's in general- don't trust it. You can buy software that turns itself off or deletes itself, you can buy CPUs that track your movements, you can buy DVDs that are no good if you move to another area, you can buy CDs that don't play in CD players, soon you can buy monitors and video cards that won't work with regular video cards and monitors, and all of this is against YOU the consumer. It's not helping anyone but the manufacturers! So be sulky, give the new hardware a suspicious resentful look and DON'T FSCKING BUY IT. It's expensive anyway, and your old VCR still works! We'll see if they still want to stonewall after a few crappy holiday seasons.

The people doing all this stuff are all titans of industries based on DISCRETIONARY income, however little they want to admit it. They are vulnerable to a general consumer chilling effect towards their new exploitations, like DIVX and pay-per-view media. It's not necessary for the consumer to be up in arms and march on the manufacturer- all that's needed is for the consumer to be sulky enough to not buy. That money could go for a lot of nice evenings out, or a new car, or mortgage payments or nice clothes or steaks or whatever. The money that's confidently expected to go to DVD players and encrypted monitors is discretionary, it's being competed for by everyday things. Help the everyday things win. Tell someone to not bother upgrading their computer, monitor, VCR. It's not that difficult.

the consumer has to pay

[fips]

The only purpose of this is do deny the
ordinary consumer make digital copies
of what content ever.

long time ago we all dreamt of digial technology
(especially digial TV and displays with high resolution)
now, we still dontt have fully digital equippment.
the connections between devices are still analog. (video especially)
but, i never dreamt of digital technology where all content is encrypted and only selected pepole (companies) have access to the technology and control the market.

AND who is gonna pay for all this sophistication ??

its the ordinary consumer, again...

Devils advocate

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm playing devil's advocate here, but it could be argued that this "improvement" would make the price of hardware artificially high due to added computational complexity and licensing fees. Right now, we don't need a Pentium-class processor in our display, but to decrypt 1600x1200x32bitsx60fps=3.6Gbits/second, it seems like we would. If this technology could somehow be forced on an unsuspecting public, we could see drastic increases in hardware prices that would more than offset any imaginary "piracy" costs of software, as Intel laughs at us all the way to the bank.

Yes, "drops in content prices" is a metric buttload of... er, something, and may be beleived to by economically possible only be those that have smoked a metric buttload of crack.

problem solution

[seregmcw]

buy vinyl or go to shows
watch movies at the theater
though theoretically possible, encrypting vinyl, live music, and film just ain't gonna happen.
or even better, just make your own movies and music.

Chicken and egg

[Anonymous Coward]

This points out a classic chicken-and-egg problem. What content provider is going to provide content only in a format that can be displayed on this? And why should any consumer may the extra money for display-side decryption if the content doesn't require it? How many consumers are foolish enough to replace all their existing equipment just to be able to view a few more movies or still pictures? Finally, since MPEG2 decompression is about the most compute-intensive thing your computer can do, any computer sufficient to software playback DVDs will require a processor upgrade to do the encryptions of several gigabits per second (do the math!)... which explains why Intel is pushing this in the first place, doesn't it?

Go for it!

[bcilfone]

The decision to encrypt video signals out of black box X and into black box Y will have no effect on me at all.

What? Copy protection... information control... blah blah blah.

What the posters in this thread don't seem to understand is that this is all just smoke and mirrors, my dad can beat up your dad as far as my rights are concerned.

The economic evolution of stupid decisions like this would go something like:

1. Everything everywhere is encrypted
2. Increased cost of everything that is "copy protected"
3. Decreased sales of those same things
4. Someone somewhere figures out how to decrypt
5. That someone makes reasonably priced "illegal" "pirate" copies and makes a killing

I'm sure someone will say that that is illegal and would never happen, but you have to understand that nobody cares if it is illegal. It's illegal to speed and everyone does that. It's illegal to do drugs, drink or smoke underage, or even to gamble in most places. Yet... hey, look at this, everybody is doing it! You have to realize that it was THE MOB whose brought about the end of Prohibition, not the good will or common sense of the powers that be.

The end result will not be restricted access for the masses, but rather increased piracy and lower revenues for the studios.

That sounds like a great plan to me! Go for it!

Jesus may love you, but I think you're garbage wrapped in skin.

Is DVD equipment chain a public broadcast channel?

[Anonymous Coward]

Transmitting live music via plain old FM requires a chain of equipment between the musicians and your ears which comprises a channel.

Is the DVD equipment chain a public broadcast channel? In a sense, yes. So how does encryption modify that?

First, I am saying that all channels that can connect the example musicians with your ears have something in common. The question is, when should a particular channel be regulated to prevent monopoly and associated abuses?

One answer is, when the channel is effectively a scarce resource, and the public choice is limited, as with the scarce number of FM stations in the standard FM band.

A mass distribution market can only exist based on de facto standards for the equipment chain in a channel. Only big players can introduce new product standards. So, by the nature of the process, the choices are limited.

I would argue that a new mass bit-distribution channel should have minimum competition-friendly (and therefore public-friendly) properties, or it should be considered an attempted restraint of trade. That's where encryption comes in.

At a minimum, I think the channel should have an open mode along with whatever restricted modes it may have. That means I should be able to use the channel to communicate open content freely, and I should be able to create "plug-compatible" software and/or hardware for either end of the channel operating in open mode. The restricted modes can restrict access to content as much as they like, but should not have an artificial tie-in with non-encryption features of the equipment, e.g., high-quality anti-aliased rendering, or other functionality. (If functionality is not equivalent for open and restricted modes, then the restricted "mode" is effectively a different channel with no open mode, and that would be against the rules). "Freely" means without fees or other indirect restrictions.

I would support an open-channel law that would guarantee an open mode for free flow of information over new mass-distribution digital channels. (I think existing law regarding use of electromagnetic spectrum under FCC control will eventually have to operate under unified concepts of digital data transmission parameters instead of analog bandwidths, and issues of public access will also have to be expressed in terms of the digital infrastructure. IMO/IANAL).

How will they maintain backwards compatibility?

[Rakarra]

Somehow, I would think they would have to maintain backwards compatibility just so that people with monitors bought without this encryption can use it. I just bought a new 21" monitor recently that I fully expect to last for five years, most likely a decade. Would it be incompatible with this new standard? Would Intel manufacture decryption modules that could be attached to a standard monitor? (IE, some device placed between the monitor cable and cable-port on the monitor) And if it were so, I would imagine someone could easily capture the video that way. Wishful thinking, I suppose. :) I just like to be able to take screenshots and occassionally capture video.

BZZZT

[Anonymous Coward]

If the companies don't want people to be able to use the extra features then *THEY SHOULD NOT SELL IT THAT WAY*! I have the right to use the fucking thing however I fucking please. If some company gets "ripped off" with a crack or serial number that's been distributed then *TOO FUCKING BAD!* They shouldn't have shipped that functionality if they wanted to keep it seperate from other versions.

By the way, I already run many free unices, it's interesting to be able to fuck around with other things though. However, when I do put something on a machine I expect it to be functional and worthwhile. A single-user Unix operating system is practically worthless. Not to mention, I learned a bit about licensing daemons and the sort while crafting the crack (which is funny, because I modified the files on a DOS box). Saying I'm a thief isn't correct. If SCO didn't want me to have the extra functionality then they shouldn't have sold me the means to do it.

Re:"Reasonable" - but not relevant

[sallen]

The 'reasonable' stream of messages really isn't relevant to this conversation. The cost of software (be if free, $10 or $1000) being discussed is for production of content. The intent of the encryption to the video is for the dissemination of content. And that's ALL visual content, not your PC. As noted in the article, this is meant for pc's and hdtv's which will be replacing our sets in the future. There's a big difference.

Another plot to take over the world ;>

[Sharki]

What a dumb idea.. Why in the world would anyone want to encrypt video signal between a video card and a monitor??? If I am able to gain access to someone's video cable, you can be sure I will be able to gain access to his hard drives by popping the case open... Anyone ever heard of video signal snooping? Why, you might as well snoop the keyboard, thats where the passwords are typed in unless of course we got a case of a windos user copying and pasting his password from say character map... Hmmm good idea ;)))))

I mean this is great for intel, they already got their chips on majority of our motherboards, now they want them on every video card and in every monitor... Another plot to take over the world, this time by Intel ;)))

Instead of this why don't they encrypt signals from wireless keyboards and mice, I am tired of watching my neighbor type...

This is just a scheme to sell more CPUs

[Bald Wookie]

That's right. This has nothing to do with copy protection or secure distribution of digital content. Pretty much all copy protection schemes are damned from the beginning anyway. So what is Intel up to now?

They want to sell more CPUs to the people who want to try to brute force the keys. Here you go, buy our monitor and video card. Now you need a brand new Itanium XXX with the special Decrypticon instruction set so you can make a fair use copy of your movies (wink wink). Searching the entire keyspace has never been so fast...

-BW

Cryptanalysis of HDCP

[Vryl]

Does anyone have the spec? Is there any cryptanalysis?

In the absence of the spec, I make these comments:

What prevents spoofing the screen in either hardware or a low level device driver?
How is the encryption handled?
Does the screen have the key of the player, or does the player do some sort of key exchange with the screen?
In either case, if I have physical access to the hardware, I should be able to extract the keys in one way or another.

I can't see it working, even with strong cryptography, basically variations on man-in-the-middle attacks or spoofing the identity of the screen should work.

Maybe I'm the naive one, but. . .

[Garund]

What I don't get is this. . .

The tech boys working on designing and implementing this lame CPU-to-monitor encryption technology probably played with Leggo, and had inquisitive minds in their youth. . . They must understand the kind of forces at work in the world. I'd not be surprised if they read at Slashdot! So at what point in the chain does one sell out to work on this kind of 'weapons' technology used in the war of Greed v.s. Culture?

I mean, it obviously happens all the time, so I realize that I'm the naive one, but I really have trouble understanding. Does anybody know any of the jokers working on this foul-hearted initiative? I can understand the motivation of the Suits & Haircuts, but the Labcoats. . ?

--Fume--

Re:where good software will appear

[Anonymous Coward]

No. you will see shitty monopolistic software on encrypted processors. The best software will always be opensource.

Re:Big time bootleggers

[Anonymous Coward]

The big time bootleggers are running the DVDCSS cartel already.

How to design a system where I pay for content

[Anonymous Coward]

No thank you.

Gotta get our own hardware manufacturer

[mOdQuArK!]

I mentioned this in a previous thread, but it was at the tail-end of the discussion so I guess nobody read it.

Basically, we're at the mercy of these large companies because they control all of the manufacturing facilities necessary to create the tools that we use to create & view all this content. As long as they cooperate with each other, they can force anything they want down our throats because we don't have the ability to create hardware which ignores their restrictions.

If they keep pushing this, then the only way we will have tools which behave the way WE want them to, is to figure out a way to build them ourselves.

Re:Gotta get our own hardware manufacturer

[Garund]

I don't think it would be impossible.

All you'd need to do is design boards using CAD software. We've had manufacturing machines for years now which you literally put parts into at one end, push a 'Go' button, and then have finished cards spit out the other end.

I don't know what the costs are like, but I expect they would follow the standard rule of, 'Setup is expensive. After that, they're pennies a unit.' --Or rather, 'The cost of buying parts in bulk'. Products with memory chips or CRT's and such would likely be more expensive, but all in all, I bet it'd be surprisingly reasonable once you cut out salaries and a promotional department, not to mention the million dollar salaries of the one or two Uber-Suits & Haircuts at the top. Basically, the same force of GREED which causes industry to implement A-hole standards, like CPU-to-Screen encryption, also drives companies to make their manufacturing technology available to anybody willing to pay. (Especially on well established and prolific manufacturing technology.)

So I'm POSITIVE equipment could be made in a co-op kind of manner. All you'd need are enough initial investors willing to back a good 'open-source' design.

While you might run into certain committee-type thinking difficulties, I bet those forces could be managed, and as long as the co-op charter states implicitly that the point of the project is to provide reasonably priced, well made, 'open-source' hardware, then I'm sure it could be done and the big boys could be walked away from.

So sure. Why not?

Heck, it'd be fun to do just to send a bug up the collective butt of the Greed-driven hardware establishment.

-Fume-

Re:Gotta get our own hardware manufacturer

[mOdQuArK!]

That's along the lines I was thinking of.

Re: the initial startup cost

I'm sure there's at least a few engineers on the net who would be willing to donate some effort to designing equipment. And, using the usual "industrial engineering" viewpoint, you don't necessarily build the final product directly - you can design machines to build the product, or design the machines to build the machines to build the product, etc.

As far as investors are concerned, I've been seeing regular stories about people willing to donate money to legal defense funds, public relations efforts, the EFF, etc. If you can make a convincing case that you will be able to make hardware free of "establishment" constraints (and that you just aren't trying to steal people's money), you could probably get a lot of people to seed such an effort.

I think you'd still need a few full-time people to make sure everything was running smoothly.

Re: charter

The charter would be very important - making sure that the goal of the organization is to produce hardware for the community, at cost. You could probably just throw up the accounting books on the web so that anybody could audit the books at anytime.

By creating solid products which just perform their basic function & "ignore" all of the crap which the big consumer-electronics firms put in to try & control how people use their products, such an alternative might be very appealing to a lot of people.