Newest Audio CD DRM Proves Ineffective

The Importance of writes "As noted previously, a couple of weeks ago BMG released a new CD by Anthony Hamilton that included DRM. Slashdot readers speculated that the system wouldn't work. Now there is a report proving it doesn't work by Alex Halderman, a graduate student at Princeton's computer science department and the author of an earlier, definitive report (PDF, HTML version) on first generation CD copy protection. Famed computer scientist Ed Felten asks: "Is this the end of the road for CD copy protection?" His answer? "It ought to be.""

Comments

For those too lazy to RTFA

[Anonymous Coward]

Start with a Windows 2000/XP system with empty CD drives. Be sure to reboot the computer first to ensure MediaMax is not running.

1. Click the Start button and select Control Panel from the Start Menu.
2. Double-click on the System control panel icon.
3. Select the Hardware tab and click the Device Manager button.
4. Configure Device Manager by clicking "Show hidden devices" and "Devices by connection," both from the View menu.
5. Insert the Anthony Hamilton CD into the computer and allow the SunnComm software to start. Observe that the SbcpHid device driver is added to the Device Manager list when MediaMax runs for the first time.

At this point you can attempt to copy tracks from the CD with applications like MusicMatch Jukebox or Windows Media Player. Copies made while the driver is active will sound badly garbled, as in this 9-second clip [10].

Next, follow these additional steps to disable MediaMax:

1. Select the SbcpHid driver from the Device Manager list and click "Properties" from the Action Menu.
2. Click the Driver tab and click the Stop button to disable the driver.

With the driver stopped, you can verify that the same applications copy every track successfully.

And oh, yeah, this work is a blatant DMCA violation.

Re:For those too lazy to RTFA

[cpeikert]

Or, to avoid these several steps, simply press and hold the shift key for a few seconds while inserting the CD into the drive.

This prevents the SbcpHid driver from being installed in the first place.

Re:For those too lazy to RTFA

[Jucius Maximus]

"Next, follow these additional steps to disable MediaMax:"

Or just hold down the shift key when you put the disc in and the autorun won't install their mediamax trash to begin with.

Or do what I do. Just get TweakUI and prevent autorun for CDs to begin with. It is quite useful when you don't want your new game or whatever to autorun its installer when you put the disc in.

Re:For those too lazy to RTFA

[Dragoon412]

Better yet...

Run -> gpedit.msc -> computer configuration -> administrative templates -> system

In the right pane, double-click "Turn off autoplay" and set to enabled.

Auto-running CDs is a security problem waiting to happen.

Bundling Extras

[floppy ears]

I believe anti-copy CD technologies will prove unfruitful, and will therefore eventually be abandoned by record companies. There firms may take a cue from the movie industry and increase the value of CDs by bundling interesting bonus features rather than restrictive copy-control software.

An interesting New York Times article today about exactly this can be found here. The article even mentions a band that includes a PlayStation 2 game on a DVD with their CD. Which just goes to show that CD prices have absolutely no relationship with marginal costs.

That's why i get my music from....

[zapp]

MagnaTune

I believe they were mentioned a little while ago, but they're the
"We're a record company, but we're not evil" people.

Seriously. Asside from a few artists I absolutely love, I have started getting my music fix from mp3.com and magnatune. If you're gonna listen to them though, please do help them out financially. It takes a lot of bandwidth to stream mp3s.