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DVDs w/ Built in USB Ports for Copy Protection
An anonymous reader writes "Aladdin has come up with a new way of restricting the data stored on optical discs. It's 'XCD' format has a chip built directly into the disc and which fits into a USB port. So, a user needs to plug the disc into their computer to access a cryptophic key before being able to use the data stored on the disc (presumably in some sort of proprietary player)."
With USB memory keys now containing more data than a cd or dvd, why not just sell the program on the key itself and stop messing about with systems that might break peoples hardware?
The software could run, detect its host key is plugged in (hell, they could make a custom key with an encrypted read only block if they like your software can try to write to that area, and if it managed it it knows its fake...).
The data can be protected by cryptographic magic and the shareholders are happy.
Whilst this won't stop all forms of hacking, it will certainly stop the normal folks from having a go and ensures that the hardware isn't broken by putting unbalanced pointy edged crap into the dvd drive.
I'm not even considering how you would get this "key" into a computer with cramped usb slots.
The only thing a key that looks like the one described should ever be needed is for a petrol station toilet key.
liqbase
Why not place a giant padlock and chains all over it?
My prediction is that it's going to be just as successful as UMD.
Someone please tell me why they don't just put the damn movie on some sort of USB storage to begin with, and avoid borking up our perfectly good normal DVD drives?
"I think an etch-a-sketch with an ethernet port would beat IE7 in web standards compliance."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dongle
we don't need them back, they sucked originally..
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
Okay, this one's hilariously bad, to the point of hurting anyone that even thinks about trying to sell it. I can only presume this might be intended for some sort of distribution of classified... no, that doesn't make sense either. But it's just a patent application, a good example of people throwing every idea against the wall to see what sticks. Hint: This won't.
why don't they just ship a damn dongle with everything that can be possible used with a pc? rip the cd/dvd/game/movie all you want; it won't work without the dongle. as a matter of fact, give the fucking media away. charge for the dongle. been doing this shit for thirty years now.
It seems to me that it would make a lot more sense to put a RFID chip embedded in the disc and force you to purchase a usb based rfid reader.
The market will dictate whether these things will be around for a while or not. Most likely, people won't buy them, and they'll go the way of the divx disc.
With irresistible consumer benefits such as this, I'm rushing out to buy one as soon as they become available.
Funny that breathing new life into something that works means restricting it, and then packaging it up as a benefit.
If the computer reads it, then it can be cracked. Probably with a seven-line PERL script, no less.
Do you like German cars?
Different organizations working to prevent the erosion of the distribution based market. I have a hard time that this will ever catch on.
1) It adds no value to the content of the delivery.
2) It makes it more difficult for customers to use the product.
This might hit some nitch market. It might work acceptably for software sales (infact, the dongle trick has been used for years on software), where the interface and consumer expectations differ. But this will never work in the entertainment industry with out industry wide adoption (read: will never happen).
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
I know I want to buy a movie format that I:
a. can't play on my existing PC (running Linux)
b. can't play using my existing DVD players
c. will lose the god damned dongle for
d. will not obtain any benefit from. In fact, I'll LOSE my fair use rights.
Thanks, but after thinking it over really hard, I decided to pass on it.
Hint: drop the DRM.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
... that nobody will buy... *sigh*...
"Was it a millionaire who said 'Imagine No Posessions?'" -- Elvis Costello
Every once in a great while, something comes along that is such a mindbogglingly stupid idea that there's no need to even comment on it. I'm not even going to dignify this idea with an explanation of why it's so stupid; I think it speaks for itself. I will say, however, that anyone who actually buys one of these things should be shot in the head to make their death quick and painless, because at least that way, we won't risk their idiocy potentially harming one or more of the rest of us when they tell their friends, "Hey, watch this!"
Mental note: Never buy stock in a company named Aladdin...
A DVD with a USB dongle. It's bad enough that I have to break open the shrink wrap, cut open the security tape on three sides, and undo the pair of latches on the case to get to the DVD. Now they want me to plug in the dongle?! I don't think so!
I'm gonna go trademark the term DVDongle right now!
This guy's the limit!
How amazing!
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
seems to me like a chip and a big usb on a disc wouldnt really make it all that balanced, nor easy to put into a disc drive
For about a second.
Except for the fact that I'll simply refuse to buy any DVD's with this feature on it, instead simply downloading the cracked version of them that will inevitable pop up giving me a more functional copy for free.
MP3 players, iPods, media centers (and the soon-to-arrive Apple "iTV")... We don't want to handle media. When I buy a DVD, I rip it in H.264/AAC and add it to my "movies hard drive". The last thing I want is a media that makes me handle it twice to watch its content, not to mention the software compatibility issues (I run OS X, not Windows).
Another case of "just because you can doesn't mean you should".
Goddamnit. They've done it. They've ended DVD piracy.
Attention deficit disorder is a complicated issue, spanning several major... HEY LET'S GO RIDE BIKES!
Looking at the image in the article... good luck trying to fit that thing in most USB ports. Just looking at my PC here, it couldn't fit in any of its 6 ports (front or back).
Isn't the general idea of selling things to make thigns that people like? Seems like they are trying to sell people things that they themselves like, not necessarily the consumer.
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft
"Funny that breathing new life into something that works means restricting it, and then packaging it up as a benefit."
If it worked, then they wouldn't be doing this?
Just Imagine the weird and wonderful tech we could be using if things were designed to work, rather than being designed from the ground up NOT TO WORK.
Well, Bart, your uncle Arthur used to have a saying: "Shoot 'em all and let God sort 'em out."
"Hey Bob? I know how we spent millions of dollars developing this technology and all. But the cryptographic key that's in the USB part of the disc is data right?"
"Yeah... and?"
"Well... They can't change the key that's on the USB part, because the encrypted data itself on the disc will have to remain static right?"
"What's your point?"
"Then wouldn't we have saved ourselves millions and millions of dollars by just having that key on the optical disc part to begin with?"
"..."
As much trouble as it would be to have to plug your CD into USB before putting it in the drive, if you can even fit it into your USB port with all the other stuff that's probably plugged in around it, having one end that pokes out in an odd shape, and no real reason to have it to begin with other than to "prevent piracy"... I'm pretty sure this will never make it to the hands of any real end-users.
UMD was actually sold in stores, you really could go by UMD movies. This stuff? No way.
Why not just bring in unemployeed people to distribute with each disk. They stand by your keyboard and slap your hand everytime you try to do something with the disk that manufacturer doesn't like. Bring them in on H1B.
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
My company invested in the Aladdin dongle technology for one of our main software suites. It created a major support nightmare when the dongle failed, didn't release the proper license, didn't read the dongle during application launch, etc etc etc.
It lasted about a year, when our marketshare shrank to the point of near death did they finally realize that people liked the software, but couldn't overcome the licensing problems that came with it. In my opinion, we haven't recovered from it since...
Now, to use this DVD, you must put it in your drive like normal, plug in a dongle, unplug it within 3 seconds and plug it back in again, type in a 50 digit code, then download an application to report back to the company to make sure it's a genuine dvd, then type in the 14th word on the back cover of the dvd case, scan your reciept and email it to the verification address, run around your house 3 times (to control stress levels), and then mail in your proof of purchase and you can start using the program in 6-8 weeks. ...or you can crack it.
We've heard of DVD with a protection RFID tag and it was a bad idea, but a possibly working one. This one is both bad and stupid, I bet Sony will use it.
if you can read it you can copy it - you can only make it less easy - up to the point where it becomes such a hassle to the user that they actively choose 'alternate' media - even if is at the same or greater price.
I'm not hugely familiar with this sort of stuff but wouldn't this significantly cut down on the amount of space available on the DVD?
Wow. I really want to crawl under my desk and find a free USB port on the back of my computer where there is enough space for something the size of a CD not to run into the cables back there so that the disc can exchange keys, then undo it and stick it in my CD drive. That sounds like a lot of fun. Why didn't I request this feature before?
Oh, and binding the disc to my computer that I'm about to replace is definitely a good idea!
"Now they want me to plug in the dongle?! I don't think so!"
You're a guy. You should be use to plugging in your dongle.
The device is not really practical for the entertainment industry as millions of existing DVD players do not support it and next-gen Blu-ray / HD players are already loaded with all sorts of DRM crap. Could be used for sensitive / classified data - but why not simply encrypt? Might be used for software license management, but it ties up an optical drive, when a separate USB dongle would be just as good (or bad depending on your viewpoint).
[Insert pithy quote here]
I can just imagine the noise generated when that woer-woer is spinning around.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
Some experiments with DVD (then CD) drives from my younger years:
... those seem stupid right.. Why do stupid shit and waste your drive. Well, look at this and tell me if you feel safe putting it in your drive.
1. put on top stickers of pokemons you obtained from chewing gums
2. crack a disk and see if it plays
3. stuff two disks at once
4. have you noticed small cd/dvd-s are more expensive than full size ones !? what's with that. chop pieces of a large CD/DVD to create a home made small cd/dvd and record stuff on it
Now,
But I bet kids will love playing with it.
4.
because it will take no effort at all to hack it.
Actually, I think it's becase a whole bunch of companies want to invent the "holy grail" of copy protection schemes (the connotation of the word scheme makes it fit well here, I think), so they run around making up wildly rediculous stuff that either doesn't work, noone wants it, or is easily bypassed (using magic markers, the shift key, etc.). In the end it just annoys people, but these companies must be getting paid by the so-called content providers, because they never stop trying to think of silly new ways to do things, not realizing that their complicated schemes just annoy legitimate consumers and barely begin to challenge the "pirates".
I doubt this thing will ever see the light of day in the real-world marketplace... People only like change when it is elegant and offers an advantage... this 'device' has very little appeal to anyone other than the copyright holders who are looking for yet another way to protect their intellectual property... the consumer will look at this thing and laugh... when will these people learn to leave well enough alone and stop trying to fix what is not broken... CDs and DVDs are a good enough format already, and any changes to the basic design of this media will be met with resistance and will likely end in abject failure.
Wouldn't be much easier to put the data in a RFID chip? That could be easily integrated in a reader, and from the point of view of the user the only difference would be that the "new-improved" DVD would simply only play in the "new-improved" DVD-Player. Enough of a hassel, certainly, but if they started selling all new DVD players with that RFID-reading technology some years _before_ they brought one DVD film with the protection, then they would certainly have a chance. Spceially if they do that with Blu-Ray and HD-DVD players. As the format is just-born, the people will just identify High-Definition-DVD with Copy-Protected-DVD.
Of course all that is moot, because you only need one person with a compliant DVD reader to extract the film data and compress it into a 4 Gb MPEG-4 film that will fit in a standard DVD, and then share it away.
Rome taught me patience and assiduous application to detail. Virtues which temper the boldness of great, general views.
So, it's a DVD with built in USB ports? So I can use it like a hub, right? Or is someone confused with the difference between a port and a plug?
This guy's the limit!
This gets my nomination for most useless patent of the day. Oh no! It's now a 2-step process to rip the data! And the disc's capacity is halved... maybe that's their strategy to lower piracy.
http://kitties.b-log.ca
That I can't help but wonder if some tech company wants to hire some seriously able encryption dudes and as a recruitement aid they shoved this crazy thing out to make everyone mad to inspire them to break the encryption. Whoever gets there first gets the job.
Stranger things have happened..
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
This is pure genius! They HAVE solved the problem of DVD piracy for good! Here's why:
...profit!
1. Company sells a DVD that won't play in 90% of peoples existing players. It'll also be a major hassle to use in the players it DOES work in
2. People will stop buying DVDs because they're a godawful waste of money, since chances are high you can't even play them.
3. People start pirating, and thus depleting all of Hollywood's funds.
4. Hollywood goes bankrupt, no more movies are produced and thus the problem is solved. If there's nothing to pirate, piracy has lost.
ps.
5.
ds.
Blog -
Couldn't the PC itself be considered the dongle? You might point out that "clones" (the term has pretty much lost meaning) break that consideration, but dongles can be cloned as well, can't they?
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
I'm sure they thought about all of the potential "down-sides" of this innovative technology and found that the concerns are not valid. These people are professionals. They get paid to develop these ideas for a living. They aren't just going to do something that isn't going to be profitable. And to be profitable, normally there needs to be a market. Consumers drive the market, thus, this must be seen as a benefit to the consumers. If it weren't, they wouldn't be bothering with this. You are not acting rationally about this. Trust them, they know what they are doing. They are professional engineers! Sheesh!
Does anyone else see this disk going into an older player accelerating to its normal play speed, catching a corner, and disentigrating inside the player ruining both the player and the disk. WOOO, $200 worth of damage just to protect their movie which is just going to be recorded and distributed on the internet anyway.
Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity
Yes, Another Root Kit in the horizon.
And on every Disney dvd's , we are bashed with 30 o more minutes of crap-ads. We want to play the movie in 3, 2, 1!
Just think how much fun this will be for those with no front-mounted USB ports; reaching behind the computer case, trying to plug a DVD into the back while not to scratching it. Yes - I know - extension cables, but not everyone has them.
Any sufficiently advanced bug is indistinguishable from a feature.
Although it breaks mass production, if I put my Dr. Evil hat on and I wanted to track who was copying CD's I'd have them burned custom at the place of purchase.
In order to have this work. I envision the following system (as a brief thought experiment...there are holes probably)
1. CD's/DVD's are encrypted using public/private keypair.
2. When you buy your DVD player you stick a USB stick (which comes with the player) and a public/private keypair is generated (this is happening AT the store before you take the player home). The public portion of the key is sent via network to several sources (MPAA, RIAA, Store database, ect). The private key is written to write once rom in the player (that could only be removed by opening up the box and pulling it out of the socket).
3. When you want to buy media to play on that player the vendor with the content burns a custom CD/DVD for use on your player only.
Of course this would'nt work probably on PC's (once you decrypt it you can rip it). But it would certainly make playing stuff on your set top DVD player a lot harder to use and harder to use these DVD's on other units. But then again as Dr. Evil I could charge you to "enable" other devices with your private key.
My first thought when I read this was that this might be good for some kind of secure data transfer, but they can't seriously be considering this for consumers. Then I realized I was an idiot, and lots of games either are or will eventually be shipping on DVD, so maybe that's the target market. It'd probably still have to be PC-only games, though, as I can't see someone slotting a disk on their console and then standing there plugging and unplugging a dongle. Maybe if there was a USB port on the controller, but that seems like a classic chicken-and-egg situation.
If the encryption's sufficiently hard, and the key length is sufficiently long (and with even a 256MB USB key, that shouldn't be too difficult), then maybe the military or intelligence communities would be interested, but I'm guessing they already have something similar.
Just junk food for thought...
What difference does it make where you put the key, you have to ship it with media or the player so people can actually watch the movie. It doesn't matter how many layers of bullshit you wrap it in...protected software layers... obfuscation...hardware decoders...dongles..the key is still there. When are they going to get this into their thick overpaid fucking skulls? If it can be played it can be copied.
You cannot stop DVD piracy via technical means. Period. Give up. Go home. Throw the money back in the pot and find ways to lower costs and making DVD's cheaper for everyone and we will fucking buy them.
Another feature of Vist@!!! ... Time to switch to LINUX
Considering Alladin is a company that makes stuff like FlexLM dongles I don't think this product of theirs is intended for general consumer use in dvd players or anything. It is probably another method of software license control.
I think the only thing people have to fear is more shitty license servers that never work the way their supposed to.
Can we download an image of the cryptophic key via bittorrent yet?
The day I find something worthwhile on a copy protected medium is the day I will buy
the super-duper encrypted media and the military-grade protected cryptoplayer to view
it on my remote controlled (remote controlled by the TV station, that is) HDTV set.
How they fit a DVD with a crypto dongle, especially the clunky shit from Aladdin, without
tearing the disk apart once it spins up to a couple of thousands rpm is beyond me.
But then I don't really care.
Trouble is, I can't watch CNN for more than say five minutes before I start laughing.
If you ask me, they show CNN at the airports to single out those that don't react
"properly" to it, but hey I just can't. Same thing goes for the shit they have at the
video rentals. The only stuff worthwhile watching there is pornography, You can only
wank yourself ever so much often and for only so long, so it doesn't steal you time
like all the other "entertainment" (haha) does.
Taking a hard look at the word "entertainment" and you can find out what its ulterior
purpose is: "enter" in latin means "to try, to attempt to do" ("the entrepreneur")
and "tain" comes from latin tenere, to hold to keep ("retain"). So basically to what
entertainment boils down to is "Stuff to try and hold you/keep you" down and dumb.
Which is exactly what it does.
So... you tell me. Why should I pay for this? More important, why should anybody want to
hack whatever "unhackable" scheme they come up next?
This is Slashdot; geeks live here. More specifically, geeks that have computers (with USB ports even). Consider the market for this though! What about those people that watch DVD's and don't own a computer? This technology must list hardware requirements for use just like your favorite new fangled game. Sigh.
I really have to wonder what the Return On Investment for these new Copy Protection schemes really is. About the only people these schemes will affect are the ones that copy the dvd's because it can easily be done. What percentage is this?
The people that copy DVDs for a living will find a way to get around ANY protection that is created. They are the ones that tend to hurt the Business Model more than the other group of people anyway.
Scott Carr
plug it in the USB interface,
authenticate the disc,
place it in the drive,
burn dvd to hard drive.
upload torrent file.
snub MPAA,RIAA
lather, rinse, repeat
Okay, judging from that crude diagram, they've left, at best, 33% of the radius of the disc's usable media surface intact (the dotted line, I presume). Let's do a little geometry, accounting for the unusable portion in the center of the disc at around .4r, and the usable portion extending to, let's say, .6r.
.16(PI * r^2)
.84(PI * r^2)
.36(PI * r^2) - .16(PI * r^2)
.20(PI * r^2)
.20/.84, i.e. about 24% the storage space of a normal DVD. Maybe a gig at best?
A normal disc:
PI * r^2 - PI * (.4r)^2
PI * r^2 -
The new magical disc:
PI * (.6r^2) - PI * (.4r^2)
So in other words, if my math is correct (and it's entirely possible that it's not), you'd be looking at
And I'm sure these guys will go so much trouble to balance these things properly! Even a well balanced commercial disc in a very high speed DVD drive creates an unnerving amount of noise and vibration. I shudder to think of what would happen with the center of mass potentially thrown way off center from the cuts and the electronics, and the tremendous amount of air turbulence you'd end up with from the shape of that thing. You'd be lucky if it didn't destroy itself and/or the drive within seconds if the motor tried to crank it up to full speed.
In short, there's no way in hell this will ever make it to market, for these reasons, and reasons others have already stated.
...but doesn't April 1st come before October?
Stasis is death. Embrace change.
It won't work.
The USB part is easy enough to replicate; you can just get a USB protocol analyser and work out what's going on. Also, the code that talks to the USB device ought to be easy to isolate. Since the disc can't be in both the drive and the USB port at the same time, the authentication must necessarily be a one-time process rather than a continuous process. This should not be at all hard to spoof.
You have to wonder whether this wasn't deliberately invented on purpose in order to fool media companies (who see a pirate lurking behind every bush) into handing over stupid sums of money for a useless "copy prevention" system that will not, in fact, prevent anything from being copied.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
That USB scheme really expensive... and quite likely to damage the drive if the disk isn't manufactured perfectly. Heck, I have some perfectly round CD's that make my entire computer whine and vibrate in a rather anxiety-provoking way.
Why don't manufacturers take a look at the various systems deployed in the heyday of MS-DOS? Vault's PROLOK system involved a unique, laser-etched physical hole in the diskette. It was used by Ashton-Tate, IIRC. It would have to be a better idea than this one.
Of course, if manufacturers really took a look at the various systems deployed in the heyday of MS-DOS, they might notice that all of them added a burden to the cost-of-goods, none of them worked, all of them were cracked, all of them created ill-will among honest customers, and all of them were abandoned after a few years.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
"...plug the disc into their computer to access a cryptophic key..."
:) ...doesn't sound nearly as cool as 'krrrrip-TOE-fiqk', now does it...?
'cryptophic' -- crypto~phic: (OS X Dictionary) No entries found
They weren't secure enough in the raw marketing power of their product on its' own, so they tried to find a more traditional means of making it sound hi-tech and all...which indicates they went the 'Super-Duper Asstonishingly Boss!!!' route and elected to dazzle w/bullshit instead.
If anything, 'cryptophic' seems redundant. 'crypto(phic) key' -- 'crypto key'...which is just a bs way of saying 'key'. And 'phic' is just...well, p h i c.
Yep
Anyone else remember the good old days of C64 games when copy protection was handled by a special page of codes that could only be read by placing a sheet of red plastic over them?
Honestly that seems a lot more sensible than digging though a drawer full of probably identical looking dongles trying to find the one that works with your DVD.
Three Squirrels
the price of media goes up, but the protection stays the same?
However, if the hardware is closed, you no longer need the USB-scheme anyway, so what's the point?
What happens when you lose your dongle? Do you get a replacement or do you have to buy the set all over again? What happens when the dongle fails but the DVD still works? What if your DVD is lost or damaged but you still have the dongle. Will the dongle work with ANY DVD of the same title? If not that could be a nightmare for places like Blockbuster or Netflix that would be forced to keep up with matched pairs.
Dongle systems work for expensive limited production software packages like autocad. The system isn't a good idea for every $10 DVD produced.
Ninjas don't carry tic tacs
So a key needs to be installed before a CD can be read. How will this solve any copy protection issues once it is "unlocked"? Despite the probable DRM; a way will be found to somehow copy the data. The only purpose it will serve is an extra hassle to the average consumer and yet another reason to download illegally.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
This copy protection scheme was obviously developed by someone who hasn't seen or heard of teh interweb.
Er, no.
That's like saying "eh, that DMCA bill is just a bunch of Congresscritters doing some research into ways to make a buck. Until it's on the House floor for a vote, it should just be considered interesting thoughts."
By the time Hollywood is trying to push something down your throat, it's probably already too late. This sort of stupidity needs to be nipped in the bud; the idiot executives who spend millions on these systems and millions more buying laws to force them on us, need to learn that no DRM scheme will last against the concerted effort of thousands of people. It's fundamentally flawed, irretrievably broken, and it doesn't matter if they put the decryption key on a USB dongle, or a special sector of the disc, or over the Internet.
All DRM is broken, it's just a question of how obnoxious it is to legitimate users. Systems that just reek of stupidity, like this one does, should be killed quickly before they can gain any traction.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
...and it is the most convenient way to utilize iTunes.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
5 years ago.
I banged the isea around with some engineers.
It won't work for the same reason other attempt don't work. At some point people ahve to be able to see/hear/use the media in a way they understand it.
So even if you included a special plug on the DVD/CD player with firmware that can't be upgraded, someone can still capture the data, and store it locally.
BUt even if it was perfect, it would ultimatly fail because the market wants to store media on there computer and take it with them where ever they go.
I think they worry too much about individuals pirating there software/movies/etc.
90% of the pirated material I have seen has come from source near the creation process - long before any copy protection is implemented.
The other 10% of pirated material is the person who copies it and gives it way (or trades it).
Rarely to I see a copy that has been produced by little Billy in his back room and re-packaged for sale.
how about this for the perfect distribution system.
1. build big hall, line with seats
2. install projector, aquire legal rights and film
3. charge for access to the 'hall' and display film on large screen.
4. ??? Profit
security through obscurity, no one without access to the original film gets a lossy analog copy and even better add security guards with infrared glasses to catch records and prosecute for a new revenue stream.
Karma whoring, I feel better already.
ERR 411[Max number of witty sigs reached]
I have an iPod, and can't utilize iTunes.
But then, I run Linux. As far as I can tell, Apple's attitude towards Linux is "thinly veiled hostility".
Looking at the picture, it would seem that this device is going to have a tough time staying stable at higher rotational speeds. DVDs have ben known to have problems if a lable was applied too off-center. I can only imagine what a whole USB connector hanging of one end is going to do.
--Aaron Greenberg
I thought this up a while ago, for some strange reason, after reading about all the steps companies are going through trying to secure High Definition Signals from HD DVD's on PC's. 1.What if some smart scientist/engineer type came up with a chip that can receive it's power from intermmittent exposure to the DVD laser. 2. Imbed/surface mount the chip onto the DVD's near the center hole, but still in the normal readable area of the disk. 3. When the DVD is inserted the laser scans across the chip, thus powering it up, and providing a crypto key, or data stream, or some short "okay this is legit" packet back to the player. Maybe you have two chips linked together somehow (cost prohibitive?) and the second one responds with the passcode. Or maybe you stop being money grubbers and charge a nominal fee and people don't even bother trying to pirate you stuff r
Spelling matters.
The BEST copy protection system would let the user do anything he wants with the data except give it to someone else. This might work:
1) User goes to web site decides to buy a file of data (music, movie, porno, software....) so he enters his name and credit card info.
2) vendor encrypts the data using the above supplied infor as a key
3) Ecrypted data is downloaded to the users PC where user is free to make as many copies as he wants
4) User can give away a copy too if he wants but when he does his name and credit card info will also have to be given away too if the data is ever to be used.
Users like the idea of being able to move their data from device to device and make backups. This will let them do this. All the DRM does is permeinently tie the owner's name to the file. So now if he gives it away it will be easy to know the source and who gave it away and catch the guy. This is kind of like what you can do with a movie script to make sure it is not leaked. You don't print them with a Xerox machine. You print them one at a time with a laser printer and use software that insures that each copy is unique The software can introduce an added between space two words or change the font on a few characters. Make 3 or 4 of these changes at random on every page and then print a serial number on each page and sign out the scripts. Same idea here. Illeagal copying happens because you can't trace the source. If every CD and DVD was unique people would not put there copy on the Internet. OK you can't do this with physical media but now that we are moving to digital downloads each CAN be made unique.
This is doomed to be a pain in the ass if people actually start shipping products based on this.
Dear Hollywood.
I met a video 'pirate' the other day while doing my laundry. He was offering current-run movies for $5 a disk. But wouldn't sell them to me, in fact, wouldn't even let me look at the stack. "You know English, you can go see these in the theater."
He said that he downloaded them, and subtitled them in Spanish, then made DVD's. He said that he started it by getting frustrated that his family wanted to go -legally- patronize the theater, but they can't, because they do not know English well enough. And said he'd close up shop, when there was a theater his family could go see new release movies.
(Admittedly, I'm new to the San Francisco area, so I've no idea if there -is- a theater like that, and he's bullshitting me. But it -sounded- good.)
---
In my own way. I'd buy more DVDs if they would put out more movies that I'd -want- on my shelf. Simple as that. Hell, I had a friend who downloaded a copy of "The Core" and said he -still- felt ripped off at how -bad- the movie was.
"Oh yay, full seasons of 'Full House' on DVD... yeah, they'll blame -piracy- for the bad sales."
Stop making shitty movies. You want my stupidly high ticket price, and DVD sale? (And CD purchase and...) stop cranking out stupid shit.
Why not have a decryption chip that talks optically? Have a photovoltaic arc that the drive tries to "read" to charge a capacitor, "talk" to the disk by seeking in and out of a sensor's arc. You can then read some bits back off by trying to repeatedly read a block; success is "0", the disk will use an LED to blind the optics for a failed read, aka "1". It's simple(not), cheap(hardly), and in every way better than what they propose. Hey, at least it's nowhere as easy to crack as having an RFID emulator next to your case.
You mean kind of like a dongle? Everything can be broken if one spends enough time on it, take for example Cubase SX and it's dongle. Supposedly one of the most advanced cryptography dongles out there, same technology used in banks, etc. Guess what, took 'em half a year, but a group of hackers released Windows Drivers that emulate the dongle.
>it's mathematically impossible. Not just supremely difficult (like factoring a multi-digit number) >but actually impossible (like creating energy out of nowhere).
Don't confound math with physic.
We may perhaps discover one day a way to create energy out of nowhere.
Who can pretend to know all the laws of the universe ?
"Only God knows God."
Contrary to the responses I've seen, I like dongles.
I use a program called Chief Architect. This program requires the use of a dongle.
First, the company replaces broken (but not lost) dongles.
Second (and far more important) - I can install and use the software on as many computers as I want - as long as the computer has the dongle plugged in. This means I can use my old laptop for site visits, my computer in my main office for day-day use, and my computer in the other office (in another city) for my weekly trips there.
Honestly, of all the DRM options, dongles are the best that I have seen. They allow installations on multiple systems; broken discs (or even dongles) aren't a problem; the only problem I've seen (other than not being able to pirate as easily) is that lost/stolen dongles aren't replaced.. but then again, you couldn't use a book (or car, or computer, or anything else) if it were lost/stolen.
Dongles are a hell of a lot better than (say) Starforce.
Incidentally, the hardware key for Chief Architect is made by Aladdin.
Anything on a disc, can be removed from the disc...If it is media, it has to be played and therefore can be ripped. If it is software, there are plenty of better ways out there to protect one's IP...like say...putting massive glaring security flaws in the software requiring constant "patches" that are only released to registered users...
And they will rebel against this DRM attempt.
It sounds good. And then what happens is everyone has a dongle or USB device, and you find all your four USB 2.0 ports are taken up by dongles and you can't print or use your wireless mouse any more.
Consumers rebelled against dongles, and copy-only-three-times software protection. They hacked copies of software disks and refused to buy dongle software - or large corporations would say "give us the non-dongle version or we'll buy 10,000 copies from your competitor and tell the media WHY we did it".
They will react similarly to this. This is one of the reasons the Wii has mindshare - they don't region-encode their games, but Sony and Microsoft do.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Ya, except a slot DVD player, like most cars and ALL Mac Minis. Microsoft must be behind this...
First post! (just in case I am...)
There is no such thing as unbreakable DRM.
Just like there is no such thing as an unstealable car.
All you can do is delay them, but sometimes that'll be enough for them to choose another target.
The differance is, cars can't be duplicated once broken into.
Ed Felten recently pointed out something that's stuck in my mind.
Everybody knows DRM does not stop piracy. Every time you see a headline about something "cracking down on piracy", substitute "customers" for "piracy", because that's really the effect it has - pirates crack it and supply the underground all the same, and customers are inconvenienced and soured.
As Felten points out, however, DRM is not actually useless - it's just useless for stopping piracy. What it's really useful for is controlling markets. And "speed bumps" that inconvenience legitimate customers are actually great for that, because while pirates can operate perfectly well if they give away data, taking money leaves a paper trail a mile wide. This is the trail wide enough to legally obliterate any significant commercial piracy operation within the proper jurisdictions.
Of course, there are plenty of "speed bumps" out there that are easier to use. This is just useless.
Do they even SELL a 4 gig flash drive (the only thing that would compare to a DVD)?
Where were you when the voynix came?
They'll use this protection method combined with sealing the disc in a portable CD player.
(sorry, can't locate the original article.)
ALL YOUR DONGLES ARE BELONG TO US !
..!..
Narrator: In A.D. 2006,'XCD' format was beginning.
Management: What happen ?
Tech: Somebody set up us the USB.
Tech: We get signal.
Management: What !
Tech: Main GUI turn on.
Management: It's you !!
Aladdin: How are you users !!
Aladdin: All your dongles are belong to US.
Aladdin: You are on the way to data loss.
Management: What you say !!
Aladdin: You have no chance. Make your format.
Aladdin: Ha Ha Ha Ha
Management: Take off every "Hack."
Management: You know what you doing.
Management: Write "crack".
Tech: For great justice.
End of Line.
It will.
5 3/ )
I suspect it's mean to dissuade any uptake on Linux. Since Mandriva is already including a legal copy of LinDVD
( http://www.softwareinreview.com/cms/content/view/
with Mandriva 2007 Powerpack edition, the hollywierds must have known it ahead of time and felt a need to use the DMCA and DRM and other tools to harass, confute, confound and stymie Linux users. I wouldn't even be surprised if some good o'le msoft R&D money went a long way toward making this possible. I could be wrong, tho...
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
Just out of curiosity, I always rip mine using DivX / MP3 (since I remember the ffmpeg options in my head); what sort of quality do you get with H.264/AAC, and what sort of file sizes do you get from an average length film (say . . . 1:30:00), and is the quality noticeably different?
I've always wanted to try another codec but my computer is quite slow (a DVD rip normally takes overnight and then some) so I don't want to waste time.
"What if original media were sold cheaply enough that it would not be economically viable to make pirate copies?"
You wouldn't have movies like LoTR, or games like HL2. One of these days I'll figure out were the education system failed slashdot, because economic 101, nor psychology is that hard. Besides piracy no matter how many times slashdot repeats the lie is a matter of charging a cheaper price because someone will ALLWAYS pirate no matter what. Game companies GIVE AWAY demos so people can try-before-they-buy and yet people still pirate. Software companies do the same AND offer cheaper versions and PEOPLE STILL PIRATE. You all want economically depressed media? Then I suggect creating it yourself. But of course that would bring to light the lie that media is easy to create (as witnessed by the "ask slshdot's" asking artists to create free graphical content for your software).
Yeah. But looking at it, I bet it is similar enough to the same of a regular CD that most mechanisms would *try* to load it...
If properly encoded, H.264/AAC beats DivX/MP3 hands down. H.264 is "part 10" of MPEG-4, so it's like the latest version of MPEG-4. You wouldn't believe the difference if you're using the same bitrate for both.
.avi files aren't even valid as far as specs are concerned (VBR MP3 breaks the specs, or so I've heard). Trying to play most .avi files (DivX/XviD) on OS X is like trying to play Quicktime on Linux (I guess). Too many CODECs, too many versions of DivX, etc.
.mp4 files, even though it can take about 12 hours to rip a 2 hours movie from DVD to H.264/AAC (quality setting 60 in HandBrake) on my G4/1.42GHz. I don't care about the encoding time, in the end it's the playback quality that matters.
There's also the fact that nobody uses DivX/MP3 in the media, but H.264/AAC is being used today by broadcasters and the television industry. Never mind the fact that there's a lof of DVD players compatible with DivX, they exists only because people illegally download movies from the net.
Not to mention the fact that most DivX
I'll stick with H.264/AAC
The thing that really gets me about these ridiculous attempts to lock down media is that the people who are pushing this technology never realize that even if it is a perfect scheme it will fail without sole distribution in that protected format. The problem is that it can't be perfect because we can experience it, which means we can see and hear it, which means we can record it.
Assume a piece of protected media is a house, and each way to view it is an entry way. So a DVD is the front door, a VHS tape is the back patio door, TV is the garage door. These people are busy putting a 3-foot fault door with a 10,000 number combination on the doggie door and expect that people won't be able to get in without the proper unlocking mechanism. Even if we do get in we'll just video tape the place and distribute that or break out through a window and let everybody else in. It's beyond ludicrous to the point where it's not even amusing anymore. It's fucking stupid. There are actually suits out there meeting with each other, having conference calls, staying up late making powerpoint presentations, flying across the country, taking each other out for sushi and coffee, patting each other on the back, and investing large sums of money into these hopelessly flawed technologies.
If people are willing to download and watch a copy of a film that was recorded in a public theater by pointing a camcorder at a silver screen then they will be equally happy downloading and watching a copy of a film that was recorded in a private home under optimal conditions by pointing a camcorder at an LCD monitor.
I think another post in this thread by ajs318 had a very succinct summary in it: If it can be rendered perceptible, it can be copied. It really is that simple.
One more thing that I will not be buying because they turned something as simple as putting in a disc and pushing play into a 5-step process. I'm still waiting for the EMP bomb prerequisite where you must prove that a computer is not even activated in your house just for the dvd to play.
Yeah, hollywood is out to get you and your Linux Desktop. For too many years the Linux user has plagued the multi-billion dollar film industry, acting as a thorn in their side. But now, victory at last! Finally, hollywood will be free of the great Linux threat!
It's not about copy protection... it's a competition to see who can get the most ludicrous drm scheme past management while still keeping a straight face. Suddently it all makes sense!
So - why did they make this device like this? I would have designed it to be all optical - imagine an optical waveguide molded or embedded in some way into the surface of the disk. One end would terminate in a custom device (not even sure if it could be built - but I bet it could) - some tiny SMT-like LED/photovoltaic device - thus that it could communicate with light, but also recieve light pulses for power and communication. I already know that an LED, with a high enough reverse-bias on it, can act similar to a phototransistor - so it is only a step away from making a combo device that can turn the light into electricity to briefly power the chip, much like passive RFIDs. The waveguide for the light acts as the physical communication channel while also providing power. Probably need a small capacitor to hold the charge briefly as well. Put the communication end of the waveguide on the same area as a "non-standard" track, and have the laser/optical assembly of the drive (with extra firmware and processing on the drive, of course) communicate with the chip.
Heck, aside from the funky LED/photovoltaic device, the rest is mostly off-the-shelf - just the drive firmware (or a new drive design) would have to be developed. The system I have just described would work the same as the system described in the article, you wouldn't lose disc space due to chunks cut off, it would be less likely to shatter at higher rotational speeds, and the reader and the drive become one.
Yes - I realize I just described a way the "man" (*IAA) could use this - but I am not anyone special - if I can think of this, I am sure somebody else already has. Furthermore, if not, I could now use this post (right) to block any possible patenting attempts on such a device, since it represents "prior art"...
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
My wife has trouble keeping the disc and the box together, let alone a dongle as well. Now I'll have one extra thing to find every time I want to watch a movie.
If my call is important, why am I talking to a recording?
So, what's to stop people from plugging a cable into the DVI output of the computer, and hook that to a digital receiver that can output a healthy DivX/XVid stream to a computer? If it can be seen, it can be copied.