Will We Need A SmartCard to Watch Digital TV?

An anonymous reader writes "This story on EE Times points out that Hollywood and major electronics manufacturers are in agreement on a SmartCard requirement for digital video interconnectivity. Note that the article talks about them 'closing the analog hole.'"

Comments

To quote famous phrases....

[SomeoneGotMyNick]

I'm not profoundly religious or anything, but do I need to quote specific verses from Revelations before it's too late?

Or do I just go ahead and get my number and be quiet?

-------
Those who don't understand, will probably vote (-1, Offtopic)

I wonder...

[GMontag]

I wonder if the satellite cracking guys might have a solution to this "speed bump" in, oh, about 45 seconds after release?

Sounds like these folks need to read Cringley's "Curtain Call" article and stop wasting so much effort on things that are doomed to fail.

Probably a stupid question, but...

[SteweyGriffin]

My 35" TV is probably eight years old and ready to be replaced. Is now a good time to buy a new TV, or are there worthwhile developments in the pipeline (Bluetooth?) that make it worth waiting 12 months?

Secure smart cards

[SoCalChris]

I'm sure these cards will be nice and secure, just like the ones that satellite providers use.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to watch free HBO.

Why are they picking on me ?

[AnalogHole]

Note that the article talks about them 'closing the analog hole.'"

Should I be alarmed ?

Dear Hollywood - Get a cluestick

[91degrees]

I am not going to buy any technology that is not at least as flexible as my existing equipment. Flexibility is more important than image quality.

Specifically:

• I want to be able to view anything on any device.
• I also want at least some capability to make a single copy. If this is limited to 1 generation, then this will be acceptable to me, but possibly not to everyone.
• I want to be able to record any broadcast for later viewing. Including Pay Per view.
• This must not be location limited at all.

It is not my concern that the media cartels have a business model that divides the world into regions. It is possible to make a profit without region control. They should adapt their business model to what the consumer (i.e. me) wants.

Re:Dear Hollywood - Get a cluestick

[PurpleFloyd]

I am not going to buy any technology that is not at least as flexible as my existing equipment.

You won't get much out of your old equipment, flexibility or no. In a few years, due to FCC demands, analog broadcasting will go away. Forever. You will either watch nice DRM-enabled TV, or no TV at all.

Personally, I don't think I will get a new idiot box when I am "required" to. These new rules and regulations are just too much. No time shifting? Fine, no TV.

Will We Need A SmartCard to Watch Digital TV?

[Anonvmous Coward]

"Will We Need A SmartCard to Watch Digital TV?"

Will I need to buy a Digital TV if they make it too hard for me to watch? Seriously, all this 'flags' crap makes me want to avoid it all together.

TV needs me, I don't need TV. Without my eyeballs on the commercials, they aren't making money. They should consider that before they try pushing restrictions I don't want.

Yeah

[IamTheRealMike]

Yes, you'll need a smartcard (for pay tv) and yes, it will be cracked pretty quickly. At least, if the experience in the UK is anything to go by.

Here ONdigital collapsed after pirated cards flooded the markets. The Canal+ card/crypto system was broken. There was later a scandal when it was revealed that the team of hackers who broke it appeared to have significant backing from News Corp who operated the rival Sky TV which used its own crypt system.

This article talks about watermarking which is a tad more advanced than what's used here, but it makes little difference. The cards will be cracked, cloned, whatever. They should see what is going on outside their own borders.

Re:Yeah

[swillden]

The cards will be cracked, cloned, whatever. They should see what is going on outside their own borders.

I'm sure you're right. Here's why I think you'll always be right:

Content protection for broadcast media is a fundamentally hard problem. Other smart card systems can make use of key diversification and card blacklists to limit the damage that can be caused by breaking one card. The idea is that in a system where every card has its own, unique keys, stealing the secrets from one card only allows you to duplicate that card, so if the system can recognize and blacklist duplicate cards relatively quickly, crackers will give up because it's just too much work for too little gain.

For broadcast systems, though, there's a problem: every card (or at least large sets of cards) has to have the same keys, because you can't generate a different data stream for each card. At best you can encrypt the datastream with time-varying keys and have a separate keystream consisting of a zillion copies of the current datastream key, each encrypted under a different card key. Scale that up to a large system with tens of millions of subscribers, though, and you either need vast bandwidth just for the keystream (keep in mind that in practice there are a bunch of different datastreams, all of which must be keyed independently so you can sell different channel), or you need to make some cards with duplicate keys (actually, a possible way to address this just ocurred to me... but there's probably a flaw in it).

If some legitimate cards are duplicates, then you can't blacklist illegitimate duplicates without killing paying customers, and pissing off paying customers is very bad business. Not to mention the fact that in a broadcast environment, it's fairly difficult to *identify* illegal duplicates. In most other smart card systems there is a back channel for sending data to a central system where it can be correlated to look for anomalies. Such auditing is a crucial part of most secure smart card systems.

Building secure smart card systems (like building any secure systems) isn't about making smart cards completely impenetrable, because no real-world system or device ever is (particularly not when you place a key component of the system in an attacker's unsupervised hands!), it's about structuring things so that the cost of breaking the card exceeds the likely benefit. In most environments, this is feasible, and, hence, smart cards are useful secure tokens. In broadcast content protection, however, many of the techniques used to limit the benefit of breaking a card are simply unavailable. And where benefit exceeds cost by a significant margin, someone will surely see a business opportunity...

it's more than piracy

[citroidSD]

and I quote: Other problems remain, though. For example, some insiders say Hollywood studios are demanding that the DVB copy protection group consider a way to add geographic limitations to where content, once legally obtained by a consumer, can be viewed. The plan is similar to an unpopular regional coding scheme used for DVD content scrambling

What does this have to do with piracy? Nothing, they use piracy as an excuse (and remember piracy is not a legal term, it's called copyright infringement) to help maintain a failing busines model. They want to control how and when people consume media, under the guise of protecting the consumer from the dangers of pir^H^H^H unauthorized consumption of copyrighted content.

Yet another reason DTV will FAIL.

[sulli]

And fail miserably. Seriously, if DTV replaces analog in 2006, I will eat my hat.

Re:Yet another reason DTV will FAIL.

[Zathrus]

Whatever.

2006? Nah. 2012? Probably. The 2006 figure was never taken seriously by anybody with a clue. Screw replacing the TVs - that's chump change. Replacing every bit of electronics in the broadcast chain, including the tower, in 10 years? When there was absolutely nothing available in 1996? No f'ing way.

But if you think that DTV is going to outright fail, well, you're just as blind as those who thought it would be nationwide by 2006.

To close the analog hole

[Student_Tech]

The only way to truely close the analog hole is to not have any analog information. That means our eyes get pulled out or supplimented with digital receivers because that last step in any system is a analog transmision from the screen to our eyes. Any flags that get set to no copy well not be there in that step and a camera aimed and synced with the TV could record it and turn it back to a digital form free of what ever flags were set.

As popular as the original Divx.

[IvyMike]

"Please, sign me up for this new technology. It offers me no benefits, costs me money, and gives up my rights."
-- You. At least, you in the eyes of Hollywood.

You mean easier free TV?

[rickthewizkid]

Geez when I had cable, I had to tinker around with 75-100 pF variable capacitors, copper wire, and metal RadioShack boxes to get free TV! Then I graduated to sattelite, and all I needed was a smartcard programmer! This is great news!

(Score: 5, Funny)
-RickTheWizKid
(And to think, I don't even _own_ a TV anymore... is this a bad thing?)

Vote with My Wallet and then my Ballot

[awitod]

It looks like I'll just be one of those wierd old guys that still listens to music on vinyl. I also enjoy books.

I bet my kids will hate me for it.

On the other hand, now might be a good time to learn how to fix the current generation of 'disposable' kit and start hoarding parts. It might eventually become a nice little niche market.

Bloody great for society as a whole

[HisMother]

If it gets too hard or too expensive to watch TV, people may be forced to

• Read a book!
• Go outside!
• Participate in democracy!
• Volunteer for charity!

This guys may be the best thing that's happened to western civilization since before Ed Sullivan sucked our collective brains out.

make something to much of a hassle

[the_2nd_coming]

and people will not use it.

I uess paper books will be the next target of this "analog hole"

so once people decide to stop watching TV, and begin to read more books, the publishing industry will begin to fase out paper books in favor of e-books....got to close that analog hole right.

wooo...now we will have a new underclass, those who can not afford electronic equipment...

will content publishers learn that when they try to keep control over the published information that it looses all value becasue no one wants to buy there crap? no, they will not and this is what will send us into the next dark age.

IN SOVIET RUSSIA

[Anonymous Coward]

Digital TVs watch YOU!

Re:Next time they will make you pay for the servic

[MrLint]

This is actually very disturbing to me, looks like hollywood wants to merge its 2 payment models while at the same time removing the consumer decision from the loop. it goes something like this, You pay a monthly subscription for your digital TV signal (probably cable) You pay a subscription fee to use your smart card to wtch the shows you pay for (like satellite tv) Oh and that 'free tv' that gets paid by advertizing,, well that all bonus revenue for the media copmanies because they are just going to *assume* you are a 'criminal' andyou are using your pvr ( that they convienently sell you and chage you a mothly subscription fee to use (because theyhave to off set the prediefined amount of people skipping the adverts, See: the minidisc built in piracy RIAA tax) [and to head you off TiVo provides you with a service for you fee stop shut your whine hole before you open it] So bascially you as the consumer.. you have to buy a big buck digital tv (or a cheaper digital to analog converter foryour old tv, you dont get to control what you watch (really) you dont get to control what you can record and watch later.. and the media copmanies get fatter. and of course the coropratoin friendly FCC doenst seem to mind at all, because even if they get kicked out for conflict of intrst, they get coushy jobs in media. (see: the political/corporate revolving door.) All your money are are belong to us.

Unplug

[Gothmolly]

As long as Americans continue to keep their media-created, instiable appetite for broadcast video and audio, this will work.
Why not unplug? Listen to the radio, read a book, go for a walk..
What's so special about Law & Order, Pay-per-View Heart concerts, and even, dare, I say, the Discovery Channel? Go to a library, INTERACT WITH PEOPLE. The only reason that the population will turn into a mob of wallscreen-watching zombies is if we decide to.

I can live with this...

[roybadami]

Nothing too unexpected or draconian here at least at first sight -- surprisingly reasonable, in fact.

This is very much what the home cinema press (here in the UK, at least) has been predicting for years, and it seems to be an improvement on the current impasse.

Currently, you receive an encrypted data stream through your digital cable or satellite system, and it's decoded by a smartcard, but you're never allowed to get your hands on the datastream at all.

Under this proposal, you'll be able to get your hands on the encrypted datastream, and pipe it around your home network, save it to disk, whatever. You'll still need a valid smartcard to be able to decrypt and view it, but you need one now already. It even sounds like they are thinking about not requireing you to have a smartcard for every TV (or keep moving your smartcard about), but instead allow one card to serve an entire home AV network.

As for 'closing the analog hole' with digital watermarking techniques, this really doesn't sound any different from a souped-up Macrovision. We already have analogue signals tagged with a 'do not record' marker, so there's nothing really new here.

Now, there are still ways they can screw this up; I'd really like them to drop the regional coding idea. And I hope that if I record a datastream for later viewing, that datastream doesn't become inaccessible to me if I subsequently cease to subscribe to the cable or satellite operator it was recorded from.

Overall though this sounds promising, and I feel moderately optimistic that this will end up being a system I can live with...

-roy

Re:I can live with this...

[mrkurt]

Here in the states, this is not how it was supposed to work. The expectation with digital TV was that it would be a broadcast medium, and the spectrum is considered to be operated by broadcasters who are operating as a public trustee. This is how it's supposed to work in theory. We have been promised a range of services, from high definition broadcasting, which is just taking off, to simulcasting up to four channels over the expanded bandwidth (which is what our local PBS station said they wanted to do). Now comes $Hollywood and their demand to be in charge of this technology. If I want just movies and don't mind paying for the privilege of getting them, I'll subscribe to cable and HBO. I don't want that, I want expanded programming choices and a much improved signal. This is what digital TV was supposed to deliver, not another channel for the content providers to extract more quid from viewers.

TV just isn't worth this.

[Asprin]

The day HDTV and SmartCards become a requirement is probably the day we stop watching TV shows altogether, though we'll likely keep the TV around for watching movies and playing games and the like. I don't know who they think they're kidding, but the crap they're trying to protect just isn't worth this kind of annoyance.

Case in point - Why do we need 14 channels of HBO in our cable package -- is it so we have more choice? No, it's because exclusivity deals and vertical ownership mean they have to be a Time-Warner billboard. Oh, that and the movies suck, so they have to have 14 channels of it to make it seem like you're getting your money's worth. When I was a kid, we got 1 HBO channel, but they ran primo movies every night, and it was generally worth the subscription fee. Now, it's 14 channels of Sex&City reruns and crap movies from the 80's and (early)90's. Screw them. Don't **EVEN** get me started on "Slowtime" - the premium cable network for morons and the terminally horny.

Now they want me to get a smart card and an encryption ID key for the priviledge of watching Will & Grace? Sorry. I'll do without - It's more fun playing with my wife anyway.

Congressmen beware

[deanpole]

Americans love their television. Not even
God can save a Congressmen who lets
smartcards come between Americans and their
free television.

stupid question / stupid industry / beware!

[frovingslosh]

Making a move right now would be a big mistake. The problem is that almost all those big screen devices and the fancy plasma displays claim that they are digital ready and that you hook up an external digital tuner to get great DTV, but there are no digital tuners to let the consumer hook up to them and get the maximum high resolution that DTV offers. The industry has been fighting this for years and, as the article cited here shows, will simply not let the high quality high resolution signal be available without their not-yet-available copy protection system and copy protection every step along the way.

What this means for consumers is simple: No matter what the sales clerk tells you, and no matter how much you spend on a fancy digital ready monitor or plasma display today, there will never be a tuner that puts out a signal that your expensive monitor will accept at the high definition resolutions you want and expect. Buy now and you will be screwed! Once they figure out how to copy protection hobble the system, then and only then will you be able to get a display that might someday display the full promise of DTV, but unless you plan on being part of a massive class action consumer lawsuit, stay away from any new equipment until they figure out how they are going to cripple the equipment you pay for.

Competition already here - don't worry. Satellite

[noahbagels]

Hey,
I got satellite TV last week. I won't say the brand (don't accuse me of advertising) but suffice it to say it was one of the two major players.
Picture quality: best I've ever seen. Far better than cable (analog) and far, far, *far* better than the crappy digital cable we here have in San Francisco (Thanks AT&T-crapola).
Restrictions: NONE!!!
I purchased a PVR that has no monthly fee - and I can record to outside devices such as VCR without macrovision - even from the PVR recorded content.

Now - I just got this last week - but must say: I'm 110% very happy with it. So flame away, but I'm sure that as soon as they *force* us on to digital TV, and *force* us not to record shows (hmmm - any TIVO fans???) there will be mass exodus from the evil *them* and people will start using alternatives.

Other thoughts: how about TV via DSL/other broadband in 5-10 years??? I think it's possible. Satellite - definitely possible.

For those of you who will flame that they "don't have access to satellite" due to landlords or physical space considerations - I'm sorry & just like many of us look for broadband with our next apartments/homes, I'll be looking for a clear view to the south :)

Re:Next time they will make you pay for the servic

[JUSTONEMORELATTE]

Radical notion -- opt out.
Step one - realize that you are NOT the consumer for broadcast entertainment -- you are the product. The consumer is the advertiser, the "content" is the vehicle for delivering the product (you) to the consumer.
Step two -- get sick of being sold
Step three -- look at your "favorite shows" in a whole new light

--

Question ....

[ProfMoriarty]

Are the big media conglomerates going to strap everybody into chairs like in A Clockwork Orange to force us to watch their drivel?

And what about all of the current analog TV's that are out there ... will it be illegal to own one? Even if you had a digital converter box, that box HAS to output analog signals to a current (non-digital) TV.

Hmmmm ... maybe time to stock up on supplies for the coming revolution.