Using Watermarks to Combat Piracy

TheEvilOverlord writes to tell us PC Advisor is reporting that researchers at the Fraunhofer Integrated Publication and Information Systems Institute have developed a new watermarking system to help track and combat piracy. From the article: "The system lets content providers, such as music studios, embed a watermark in their downloadable MP3 files. Watermark technology makes slight changes to data in sound and image files. For instance, the change could be a higher volume intensity in a tiny part of a song or a brighter colour in a minuscule part of a picture. Even the best-trained human eyes and ears, according to Kip, can't detect the change."

Comments

This would actually be great

[grahamsz]

MP3's such a universally accepted format that i'd be able to purchase music online and be able to use it wherever i want - be it in the gym, on my ipod, on the tivo, and mac/pc/linux.

Watermarked MP3s would be a way that the music industry could say "look, we almost trust you!"

Re:Human?

[sabernet]

Instant defense: Sony's rootkit allowed a hacker to hijack my PC and steal my files;)