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Give Your DVD Player The Finger
sebFlyte writes "Wired is reporting on some scary new DRM tech being developed. From the article: 'At the store, someone buying a new DVD would have to provide a password or some kind of biometric data, like a fingerprint or iris scan, which would be added to the DVD's RFID tag. Then, when the DVD was popped into a specially equipped DVD player, the viewer would be required to re-enter the data.'"
Zonk,
We all know you don't read Slashdot, but we assumed you were at least reading the stories you approved. I guess we were wrong!
RFID Tags for Digital Rights Management Posted by Zonk
Anyone who read Sunday's RFID Journal story and today's Wired story would realize they're about the exact same thing.
If you really did read the two stories, and your memory is this bad, maybe you should see a doctor?
How ironic that www.boingboint.net linked to an article How to fake a fingerprint just yesterday ;)
Perhaps this is being nitpicky, but it's worth pointing outh that "Fair Use" (and parody for that matter) are not "rights," per se. Only authors/creators of the work (not the public) are granted rights under the Copyright Act.
As a dotrine, Fair Use is an affirmative defense to a claim of infringement. This means the person claiming Fair Use has the burden of proving that their actions did not constitute infringement.
The obvious problem, if you are defending an infringement claim is that it is extremely expensive to succssfully raise a Fair Use or Parody defense, which, if it fails, causes the heavy hammer of infringement and all its penalties falls down upon you. Because of this, it's common to hear, "Yes, it's probably fair use. You will spend a billion dollars to get a chance to prove that." Just ask these guys .
Bush Lies On the Record.
Already done. Finegrprints are easily fakeable, another reason to reject biometrics. If someone else uses your fingerprints how can you recall it, change it?
The finger-in-the-food story about Wendy's was a scam. That lady has a history of suing fast food companies for putting body parts in her food. Please don't continue to spread this FUD that Wendy's doesn't deserve.
In order to fake a fingerprint, one needs an original first. Latent fingerprints are nothing but fat and sweat on touched items. Thus to retrieve someone elses fingerprint (in this case the fingerprint you want to forge) one should rely on well tested forensic research methods. Which is what's to be explained here. (Figure 1).
A good source of originals for our counterfeits are glasses, doorknobs and glossy paper. The standard method of forensic research makes them visible: Sprinkling it with colored powder, which sticks to the fat (Figure 2).
Another solution involves Cyanoacrylat, the main ingredient of superglue. A small amount thereof is poured into a bottlecap, which is then turned upside down and put over the fingerprint. (Figure 3).
The Cyanoacrylat gasses out and reacts with the fat residue to a solid, white substance (Figure 4).
The further treatment involves scanning/photographing (Figure 5) and a bit of graphical refurbishment (Figure 6).
The goal is to get an exact image of the fingerprint, for further use as mold, out of which the dummy is made. The easiest way is to print the image on a transparency slide (the ones normally used for an overhead projector) with a laser printer. The toner forms a relief, which is later used similar to letter press printing. Wood glue is suitable for producing the dummy (Figure 7)
A small dash of glycerene may be used to optimize humidity and workability. After thorough mixing, the dummy gets coated with a thin layer of the compound (Figure 8,9).
After the glue has dried (Figure 10), it is pulled off the foil (Figure 11) and is cut to finger size.
Theatrical glue is used to glue the dummy onto the own finger (Figure 12).
The new identity is ready!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
You've spelled out what record and movie companies *wish* were true.
No, when you buy a CD or DVD, you are legally entitled to sell it, give it, whatever. You just aren't allowed to *copy* it. Hence the word "copyright".
my dad's *incenced* he can't fast forward through commercials. when he puts a dvd of cartoons on for his new granddaughter, they both have to sit through around 10 minutes of adverts and trailers before it starts - this is a *long* time to an 18 month old's attention span.
solution? burn an unencrypted copy using dvdshrink, and then they can fast forward to their heart's content - and also it doesn't matter if little'un scratches the disk.
He didn't. Re-read the post. The X is refering to the same value (the less draconian implementation).
While this is an obviuous non-starter, it points up a collision of two trends. First, a limit, the public won't hand over their hard-earned money for an overly intrusive DRM scheme (the original DIVX proved that). Second, the now mature and highly effective P2P distribution infrastructure, which will quickly cut through all non-intrusive DRM.
I don't believe there is a level of DRM, strong enough to work, that the public will tolerate. I don't believe that the *AA will be able to strongarm the market into adopting blu-ray or whatever - they'll just lose so much money trying that they'll have to surrender and release on DVD. I know that politicians, bought or not, don't dare push the public too far.
Sooner or later the only option is going to be: let people copy, because you can't stop them.
What will the *AA do when they realize their bind?
do the studios ever take action to trace ripped copies?
Yes. They can and they have traced them back to the person the screeners were given to (see third paragraph from the bottom). Did the studios do anything?
Yes, they sued and got a default judgement for $300k. Sounds effective to me.
1984 was supposed to be a warning, not an instruction manual.
Excellent point - in sales there is a term for this called 'anchoring' (also used in NLP - Neuro Linguistic Programming) - you first anchor someone at some high price (like the crossed-out prices you see during sale events) and then work yourself down from there (as seen in most informercials). Works everytime - people seem to have a hard time to mentally beat this type of mind-fuck.
1) As someone else pointed out, the end of mailorder DVD sales. Amazon, are you listening?
2) The end of DVDs as gifts. How are you going to provide the recipients finger print at purchase time?
3) The ultimate parental control. If daddy buys the DVD then the kids, and the wife, cannot watch it unless daddy provides his fingerprint.
4) The end of high end home theatre systems that distribute content throughout the house. Do you really want to pick a movie from the comfort of your bed and then run downstairs to the player and provide your finger to print?
5) Forget leaving your media library to anyone in your will, if you don't will them a finger then they will never be able to use them.
6) What about injuries? If you crush your hand you're going to get sent home from the hospital in a cast with a bottle of pain killers. What better way to recover than to lie in bed and watch old movies -- except your finger in now innaccessible!
The issues are already starting to enter the market but most people haven't figured it out yet. Your average iPod user won't really understand Apple's DRM until their device is outdated and they buy a different one and then learn they have to re-purchase all of their favorite music for the new device. The content should be required to clearly print the types of devices that it will work with AND the devices that it won't work with. Unfortunately non-tech savy people are never going to understand these things until they get bitten by them.
What really needs to happen to slow the content owners down is to make it ILLEGAL for them to charge for the same content twice. If someone purchases a movie on DVD and the studios want to release it in another format then the studios should be required to provide a copy of the content in the new format to anyone that has legally purchased the original version. If someone buys a portable music player that is not compatible with their iTunes music then the music studios should be required to offer an exchange of their iTunes music to the new format free of charge. This is not a perfect solution (it doesn't ensure that music purchased for the living room will play in the car) but it should at least give the content owners pause before introducing new technologies.
If a new DVD player has to be online to verify that the certificate in the player is still valid and the content can be played then if that certificate is ever revoked the company that manufactured that DVD player should be required to replace the player free of charge. If they choose to fix it instead then they should have a week at most to fix it. If anywhere along this chain the content won't play on the purchaser's preferred playback device the content owners should be required to provide the content in the format that the consumer wants. Period. If the content owners refuse then the retail outlets that sold the content should be required to provide a no questions asked refund. It should be made easy to win a lawsuit against the content owners and/or the retail outlet that sold/produced the movie/music for breach of contract if any of these things are violated. It needs to become more expensive for the content owners to screw their consumers than it is to the consumers who are getting screwed.
Sadly, this will never happen. The content owners have purchased too many politicians for any laws of this type to
Restore America: Dr. Ron Paul for President!
Boing Boing linked to an article the other day describing how to create a fingerprint prosthetic made from wood glue starting only with a print on a bottle. Also, as I've posted recently, there's the Gummi Bear method and here's the article mentioned by pilgrim23 about the guy in Malaysia that had his finger cut off by carjackers.
No parent will ever buy a DVD like this - imagine having to authorise playback every time your kid wants to watch a moive. Mine sometimes changes her mind 4 or 5 times over the course of an hour. She can swap disks fine herself...
I think you are way over reacting.
The solution is actually quite simple.
Simply select the least valuable finger and amputate it. Leave that finger with the DVD player so that it can authorize all disks you purchase. (Note, you would need to take the finger to the store with you in order to purchase new disks. And during this store trip time, users at home would be unable to authorize the playing of a DVD.)
Now the kiddies can easily authorize playing the DVD for themselves. Any child who can swap disks for herself can surely perform the additional step of using the amputated finger to authorize the DVD playback.
Look at the problems this solves. If the working parent is not at home, the stay at home parent can still play DVD's for the kiddies. Even if there is not a stay at home parent, a babysitter or day care provider can still make use of the DVD's.
Besides that, how would you give such a crippled DVD as a gift? Or order one online, for that matter.
Really, please calm down and don't over react. See above, I just answered this question.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.