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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.'"
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
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.
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.