Slashdot Mirror
AACS Vows to Fight Bloggers
Jonas Wisser writes "The BBC is carrying the story that AACS has promised to take action against those who have posted the AACS crack online. Michael Ayers, chairperson of AACS, noted that the cracked key has now been revoked, and went on to say, 'Some people clearly think it's a First Amendment issue. There is no intent from us to interfere with people's right to discuss copy protection. We respect free speech.' The AACS website tells consumers how they can 'continue to enjoy content protected by AACS' by 'refreshing the encryption keys associated with their HD DVD and Blu-ray software players.'"
Actually, as I said yesterday, ignore these threats. Go out and blog. Understand that freedom of speech is NOT a government-granted freedom, it is an inherent one that all people of all citizenship must understand. The U.S. Constitution's (Bill of Rights) 1st Amendment does not say "You are free to speak," it says that Congress shall make NO LAW restricting the freedom of speech -- NO law. Discussing encryption mechanisms is free speech, and Congress shall not abridge that. As for patents and trademark and the rest, as long as you do not mimic the mechanism in your own hardware or software, you're fine, Constitutionally. As long as you do not quote verbatim the actual code used to create this mechanism, you're not violating copyright. The DMCA is unconstitional, and regardless of what Congress, the Supreme Court, the President, or any company says, it is non-binding in terms of the moral realization that Congress, and honestly no State organization, can prevent you from freely airing your opinions. You are free to talk, but no one has to listen.
From yesterday's post I made about "legal recommendations for bloggers," go out and blog. Say what you want to say. There are more of us than there are of them -- not only can they not afford to go after everyone, they can not afford to go after even a small percentage. Let some bloggers get caught, and all it will do is show other people that non-violent actions should not be criminalized or penalized.
AACS, your days are numbered. Your salaries will end. Your powers will be diminished. It won't be because of competition from another company (that you are likely in bed with, in terms of promoting the abuse of State power), it will be because millions upon millions of people will ignore you, and all you do, in trying to revoke our inherent (and in my opinion, God-given) right to speak freely amongst ourselves.
Well, he certainly has that part right. What he fails to appreciate is that he will be on the losing end of every single one of those rounds. Even as he tries to downplay the key by saying it has been revoked, AACS has already lost the second round (as hackers have created a hack that CAN'T be revoked).
Always a step behind, buddy. But feel free to keep wasting your money and pissing people off.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
RC4; Base64 Encoding; Key = "09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0"
t Ds1V97iWQxx ySmgi8BdedG AsLVTLLTc0J Yg11Y576o"j Ue7R919DRxl wzs_UvVSRhh nyCcADUH6Gf GSm7HfCs_iy BTwMZnuZYLI Wn1KXh6_Rx2 q3ZzeFJD5MQ nlxHfxzWhlj P8of4TEJU0k Fg3voVVPEpn ceesWk6v0rG oYSEXQH_Bo_ qmXGJlSjF"w wPLEWhn1kzs A1_faWxcxe
mI0mUyOUE8S24UAsIVqR12Z8_P1WveIRFqpBO4FEeH_TPGuc0
QDhXbGpiERffrXz6lvQpcOFlDY_AXJWGw7f9saosuSBDj7c4e
l4APCHQIzYXETWu"xkhR4MNnw7zI_mBf5YJOLJ3DKD6wSQ6Pv
ZAPkCzunB7xarymAJEOOu0fe"tdhy"rZZY5XOSiipi6vf_84x
rPfhQQNneUX"JGXWhN3bgRIZwIOoIUu8c282MQ5_Grb6ALolI
j7cWlf2G2V467N4EjnJbR"9j_4oDCytfpkQBFX0jGOCsjRYcL
HH7DzXzB2tPz7i"L1Unvljgh05d1qoFs2N38qWugtaUMGM9RX
yUXVAbsO9ZcD33UKD80sulFF0FiSxIr4NOiRv4EZBoIU3eY1F
yi4NfhRLz3ai50dbx0CWCJwlvti_gsXgQLJrE70ihDROzdUyj
9AM2M99"s2d"hQxtoj7yTTki2M4dK3Y8_wvSyM8fp5fyyDpJW
z3W8iYIMIObDRG1H914rayBqj3EPhUDsz2NfVhjYBIxHBPgeW
saZXht6YNavXOyFLh24D84kXC4weBrJsI598yUpFhg41NB694
vZaHrMlSDxODtGlaU5rfJkODjrCr99Rr6hgQaegXnHE6Oe6iK
DwDtOw3"khTuVWYDStjRd4w2eOt2wvl24XvC3iDQBIA40uJQh
29XXEh_9hplaGD1YBw6pW2yiuyW8ifdaS4Mm7IGdH"6JMgSFg
k8"H70be7kCOdyDSLX9jLkz"4MF_LD"yaYdWopVnoryVQ9YD5
RqZmxLv2loAoM5WFs2""qGG4yATAMz9zhyuc4wMPZZLiZJhTt
pNNm045ma6vnqBdwtEE00zdjJBhBjz5VMoqPS6EZvQbwbEyiU
KJdzO7ATz47fYRWQZNWjy7Uda1P8RPnhSd2FbrL"aOegRzUX_
Azf
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
I don't care how hard you fight the damn cat, it's out of the bag, and it's not getting back in.
One part of the article I find funny is this:
Isn't that the point? I'm neither trying to justify nor rebuke file sharers, but think about it, man, and be practical for a change. Among those who download and share movies, who really cares about the nitty-gritty details of how keys are cracked, who all gets them, which ones get revoked, what players are and aren't affected, and so on? Most of them only care about one thing: Can I download the HD-DVD of [insert movie titles here]?
And as long as a key out there is cracked enough for the answer to that question to be "yes," the copy protection industry has lost. They can fight all they want to, but the thing is that unless they literally shut everyone down everywhere, they're doomed. As soon as one single solitary person is able to crack a key and unlock the encrypted data, all of their massive—and expensive—efforts will be in vain.
I also thought this was funny:
To Mr. Ayers, I would say this: Get real. For one thing, how many times has it been proven that your technical efforts are futile? How much more time and money are you going to waste developing something that consumers at best don't want and at worst outright resent? For another, what exactly do you plan to legally do to people who live in places where publishing the cracked keys is not illegal? As much as people like you would love to have the U.S.'s misguided laws apply to the whole world, it will never happen, and even if it did, people would still break such laws in civil disobedience.
If only they could figure out how to fight a winning battle for the hearts and minds of paying customers instead of this inevitable losing battle against people who are much, much smarter than they are, maybe everyone could be happier. This industry could sure learn a few things about the direction the music industry is headed, finally dropping DRM after realizing how useless it is.
"There is no intent from us to interfere with people's right to discuss copy protection. We respect free speech."
A comparison comes to mind here. Here's a hint, Mr. Ayers. It comes from a bull and it ain't a steak.
The hubris of thinking they can ban the mention of a number, and then turn around and say they "respect free speech", is breathtaking doublethink. Part of free speech is the right to discuss things you don't like. Part of it is the right to discuss them in as specific of terms as anyone wants. And part of it is being able to mention any number one wants to, from zero either direction to infinity. There's not a bit of respect for free speech here.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
"Read about the trusted industry names behind AACS. "
emphasis mine...
yes, intel, microsoft and sony are three of the eight on the list...
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
I wonder if anyone has told these guys that the idea of an uncrackable DRM scheme is fundamentally flawed. Encryption is about A sending information that B can't read, but C can. In DRM, B and C are the same person.
It's good to see the pretty even-handed way the BBC have approached this whole issue. I fear most mainstream news agencies would probably side 100% with the AACS and their media buddies, not least due to commercial interests and parent company ownership reasons.
I guess its times like these when it is good that there still are some news organizations independent of the big media conglomerates.
I like how they are threatening people with the DMCA over the "09" key, while simultaneously pretending that it isn't a big deal. Maybe they should pick a consistent stance? Also, a better choice of words than "revoked" would be "stopped using", since the "09" key will work always work for any disks pressed before May, but it won't work for any disk made after then. Hm, I wonder how many titles that actually affects, maybe it isn't a big deal after all with such a tiny market :)
we can all 'continue to enjoy content protected by AACS' by 'refreshing the encryption keys associated with their HD DVD and Blu-ray software players.'
we can all 'continue to enjoy being ignorant slaves' by 'reaffirming our desire to be shackled.'
the audacity to think of people as so supplicant to corporate will is incredible
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I know, they should copyright the encryption key so nobody else can post it. Or maybe they could patent the process of posting encryption keys on the internet. I'm sure the USPTO would grant that one.
The bag, upon further inspection, seems to be devoid of any felines! It would appear they have recently vacated said container!
I'm a fiscal conservative, it's a pity we don't have a political party anymore
They make a good point: this is not about people silencing free speech. Posting the crack online is about civil disobedience against the completely unfair DMCA. It's not about copyrighting a number. It's about keeping people from legally using copyrighted material you've legally purchased. This seems to be an important point missed by most people. It's not a First Amendment issue, it's an anti-consumer issue.
Did you ever notice that *nix doesn't even cover Linux?
the **AA will not win. They do not have the resources to win it, will not have the resources to win at this game, and in the end, trying to win at IWaM(TM) will only make them look more foolish than they do now.
... did I just say secure? ooops mea culpa. The reason that MS is working so hard to ensure that you can only use genuine MS OS products is simple, they are trying to not play IWaM, and even this attempt won't work. From what I can see, people who used illegal copies of MS products before ARE turning to Linux now. Even if that is not huge numbers yet, it is happening.
The part where he says over 700,000 pages on the Internet reference the code is fscking hilarious. I want to see AACS group try to sue 700,000 people. Before they even get started there would be 1.4 million more references to it on Google. That is how the IWaM game works and exactly why they can't win. The sheer volume of people working against their worn out DRM business model will overwhelm both their resources and those of the court systems around the world.
In the US it appears that the courts are still willing to waste time on this. Other countries, not so much. Sure, if they find commercial pirates distributing DVDs for profit they will shut those operations down, but there just are not enough law enforcement resources to stop this hack, or any other.
Playing IWaM = stupid and the more you play, the more money you lose. period.
Certainly, some will be harmed, and there will be small wins for the AACS group and **AAs of the world, but in the end all their money will be gone. The DMCA was ostensibly implemented to protect them from exactly this. Legislating DRM doesn't work, DRM doesn't work, and if your business model depends on DRM, it won't work either. It's time that Wall Street and VC groups started to act on this one principle. If their business model is DRM it's a bad investment.
Sure, you might argue that MS is an exception but I think that the sales performance of Vista is going to prove me right on this. MS has been trying to play Whack A Mole with malicious software and spam. Yeah, that has been working out well. Their new flagship DRM laden secure operating system
Back on topic, the lawyers for the AACS group must be staggeringly stupefied. Maybe if they make an example of Digg and Mr Rose they can send a message, and if they try, every new key will be poste in blog comments on every blogging system around the globe. They literally need to surrender and rethink what they are doing. DRM DOES NOT work.
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
The real target of this action is likely a different audience, namely Hollywood. The AACS doesn't have to make their DRM undefeatable. They do need to convince their customers - and remember, that's not us - of the value of their work. And when their DRM is broken and seen to be broken, they need to convince those who want to believe that they at least have not lost faith in the cause.
So we may talk about winning and losing, and people like use may be the targets of lawsuits. But I think we may be giving ourselves airs when we assume that for the other side it's about us. If, on the other hand, we figure out who our real audience is then we have a better chance.
I wonder if he actually believes that people "enjoy" content protection. How could you even say that with a straight face? It would be like a prison warden, after a jail break, saying, "soon the escapees will enjoy protection from the free world once again."
"THERE IS NO JUSTICE, THERE IS ONLY ME." -Death
Slashdotters, please dont get worked up.He knows it is a stupid thing to say to a tech savvy audience. He was talking to the chumps who paid big bucks to have their movies "protected by" the DRM. Some weasel clause in the contract would say something like, "while we dont guarantee that this mechanism will never be broken, all we promise to do is to take vigorous action". He will eventually argue that issuing such ridiculous statements constitutes vigorous action. That is all.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
"There are three things you can do:
1. Kill yourself.
2. Kill your manservant.
3. Kill everybody in the whole world."
Now 2 is fine, 1 is reccomended, but 3?
Patriotism is a virtue of the vicious
That is the part that ticks me off the most. The DVDs already could be copied without the key. Their "technology" is "playback protection", not "copy protection". The only honest sentence in the quote was earlier, where he said, "Some titles could now be played on more than one software player." Yes, THAT is what your evil scheme is trying to prevent. (Not that I will ever buy HD DVDs until I can actually play them whenever/wherever I want.)
As long as "playback protection" is working, you can't actually "buy" an HD DVD. You can only rent the privilege of playing it under conditions specified by the publisher. Whatever happened to laws against false advertising?
Dear helpdesk,
I am trying to ping my server at
09F9:1102:9D74:E35B:D841:56C5:6356:88C0. However,
it seems like the address is in the unallocated space.
Perhaps there's a typo somewhere?
AACS LA:
That's the Processing key. You are not allowed to publish it.
Hacker:
No sir. That's a IPv6 address. Surely you won't deny me to have links on my website? =)
The problem with barring publication of an encryption key, without more, is that it really is impossible--and I don't mean in a "the internet will route around censorship" fashion.
One of the following series of hex values, according to the AACS, cannot be published by anyone besides them:
09-F9-11-02-9D-74-E3-5B-D8-41-56-C5-63-56-88-BF
09-F9-11-02-9D-74-E3-5B-D8-41-56-C5-63-56-88-C0
09-F9-11-02-9D-74-E3-5B-D8-41-56-C5-63-56-88-C1
Trying to bar one of them from publication will necessarily reveal what it is. As Wikipedia is discovering, you have to be able to describe what you're not allowed to publish in sufficient detail in order to effectively prevent its publication.
With other forms of intellectual property, the problem is avoided in various ways: in order to obtain a patent, the description itself becomes public domain. In copyright, the description is bounded by the creative content of that which you create. Trademarks are delimited by "confusion in the marketplace," and trade secrets are delimited by that which is actually kept secret.
The DMCA purports to create a fifth type of intellectual property, not limited in time, that would bar distribution of information (rather than just physical devices), but has no boundaries on the AACS's theory of what constitutes a "part" of an circumvention device. The boundary becomes "whatever the AACS moves to protect as a part of a circumvention device." But in order to enforce that right, we all have to know what we're not allowed to distribute.
So maybe the AACS, in order to avoid the paradox, can seek to protect a *range* of values. The scenario just gets even more absurd.
No. The answer is really that the key, without more, cannot be afforded protection as "part" of a circumvention device. It has to be a accompanied by something more, at the very least a description of how it can be used to circumvent. Otherwise it's just a string of text.
And that's where the DMCA falls apart, as people with an interest in circumventing can always break apart the information to such a degree to avoid any one part being classified as a "part."
It's a tough problem, and it should be brought to a court to evaluate. The court in Remierdes had an easy time, because the circumvention device was whole. Fair use will have to be read into the DMCA at some point when it comes to these alleged partial circumvention devices.
I don't need large brains to have a good time.
(as hackers have created a hack that CAN'T be revoked)
... so the hackers will need to go back and sniff/debug an updated software player to figure out the new Processing Key.
... so if you made a "bit-perfect" copy of a disc, the Volume ID wouldn't be there (because you can't read it and/or because you can't write it to the new disc) and you'd be missing one of the elements required to decrypt.
I spent a while trying to get my head around AACS last night, and the bottom line is that what comes out of the un-revocable hack that you mention isn't the same thing as what's being posted around the internet, and what the AACSLA has the whole revocation scheme for.
Oversimplification ahead, and I may have some of the details wrong or, but this is the gist of it: the content -- the movie itself -- is encrypted with title keys. These title keys are encrypted with a volume unique key (VUK). The VUK is composed of two parts, a media key and a Volume ID.
The Media Key is the thing that you get with the code that's being posted all over the Internet (the Processing Key). Processing Keys can be revoked, but only for new discs -- so the discs that are out in circulation as of the compromise of the Processing Key, are out. They're cracked. However, future discs will use a new Processing Key, and that one that's around on the internet won't work
The "un-revocable hack" you mentioned, doesn't have anything to do with the Media Key, it's all about the Volume ID. The purpose of the Volume ID is to prevent bit-for-bit copying. In a lot of ways it's very similar to parts of the CSS system used on DVDs right now; it's a key specific to each batch of pressed discs, written to the disc in a way that's difficult to read off manually (the drive isn't supposed to let the user see it at all), and impossible to write to a blank disc
So: while the Volume ID hack involving the XBox360 drive is a major step forwards (backwards if you're the AACS!), it's not a silver bullet, and it doesn't make future titles trivial to compromise. There's still going to be a cat-and-mouse game in the near future, where the AACS will try to revoke Processing Keys and try to discourage the publication of new ones as discs are released. (It's been pointed out by several people now, that the AACS' over-the-top reaction to publication of the processing key, may indicate that they've realized that their revocation procedures aren't nearly as fast or as flexible as the people who are going to be compromising them.)
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
But it's not a prime - that's obvious, since the last digit of the decimal expansion is 0.
Oops - have I just infringed someone's valuable intellectual property?
What if I said it's also divisible by 19?
Or that the next-to-last digit is 4?
Could a lawyer please advise how many clues I can provide before I might get sued?
Me: You probably need to refresh the AACS encryption keys.
Mom: *blinks*
Me: Your encryption keys need to be refreshed in order for you to play protected content.
Mom: I don't have encryption keys or protected content, whatever those are, I just have this movie that won't play.
Me: Right... in order for your movie to play you need to refresh the encryption keys that unlock the protected content on the disc.
Mom: I never had to do that before.
Me: No, no you didn't.
Mom: So how do I do that?
Me: I'm not really sure... I heard the assholes that made this all so hard in the first place have instructions on how to fix this mess on their website. I don't know if that applies to your model of HD DVD player though.
Mom: So if it doesn't, then what?
Me: Then you'll have to get the owners manual for your HD DVD player out and look through it.
Mom: Why does this have to be so difficult? I just want to watch my movie...
Or something like that. Then she'd start crying because she's easily frustrated by technology when it doesn't work. My parents have called me from half-way across the country because they didn't know what button to press on the remote to get sound out of the TV. There's no way they'll be able to "refresh their AACS encryption keys" if it's not automatically done for them. It's not like there's a "Refresh AACS encryption keys" button on the remote that I can tell them to press...
DRM = media content + frustrating, crippling, broken security
Now, it may sound as something bad when they start revoking keys. Bah. My hacked key doesn't work anymore.
Kids, the mafiaa revoking keys is a good thing in the fight against DRM. Find more keys and publish them, so they revoke them! The more the better!
What happens when a key gets revoked? Some player stops working. Actually, a whole batch of players stop working. And thus, Joe Shmoe Average might get a clue. It might not matter to him that DRM exists ("Duh, I buy my movies anyway"). It might not matter to him that DRM restricts him ("Duh, I don't copy them anyway"). It might not matter to him that it takes away his ability to actually play that content on other media ("Duh, I only use it in that DVD player anyway, not the computer").
But it does matter to him when that new blockbuster doesn't work in his DVD player anymore.
It does matter to him when his DVD is "broken" and he has to get a new one or has to get his fixed. It is a hassle. He might not know how to update his player. He might have to get a friend to do it. He will get angry 'cause why the heck doesn't it "work" anymore the way it used to?
Maybe, just maybe, it's a wakeup call for Joe Average. And maybe he'll stop buying crap that suddenly stops working.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
He said tracking down everyone who had published the keys was a "resource intensive exercise". A search on Google shows almost 700,000 pages have published the key.
;)
only 700k sites?
come on guys, get CRACKIN'.
if you want to really make their jobs harder, embed that number EVERYWHERE. keep their minions searching for this for YEARS.
afterall, they have nothing better (truely) to do with their time
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
I hope they publish the new keys. I don't want to post some random number and find myself in court because of it.
"Some people clearly think it's a First Amendment issue. There is no intent from us to interfere with people's right to discuss copy protection."
Yeah, we can "discuss copy protection" as much as we want so long as the DMCA and the Sonny Bono Copyright Act still stand, hm?
It's funny how everybody agrees that speech should be free so long as that speech is completely impotent. It's the speech that empowers, empassions, that enables legitimate users to do with their purchased media what they will that suddenly gets declared "unprotected."
"We respect free speech."
This from the same industry that wants to ban cell phone usage from movie theaters not because they annoy the rest of the audience, but because they don't want to let people warn others just how bad a particular movie is?
...when you said "in the present business model".
The present - perhaps "previous"? - business model relied upon scarcity. If you held the negative to a photo, you held the only thing capable of producing a high-quality reproduction of that image. It was possible to make new negative from positive prints, but doing so resulted in a marked loss of quality, and the negative itself was irreplaceable.
Plus there was a certain investment of time, skill, and resources involved with producing a new print from the negative.
If I broke into your place of work and stole/destroyed your negative, that photo was gone forever.
But nowadays, the digital file can be copied without loss of quality ad infinitum. If I make a copy of your raw data file, you have not been materially harmed - you can still make copies - and all that has happened is you have lost exclusivity to that image.
And that image can be reproduced almost anywhere with minimal skill and investment in resources.
Effectively, the scarcity of the ability to duplicate images has been eliminated. There is next to zero cost involved with the duplication of images once they are in the memory card. As such, the image files themselves have next to no actual value.
What HASN'T changed is the necessity for a skilled photographer to take that image in the first place.
This implies - hell, it yells at the top of its lungs - that the business model of selling exclusive prints is now utterly broken, and pro photographers (and other media producers) need to find other business models. If the automobile obsoletes your buggy whip manufacturing business model, you need to adapt.
My suggestion is that you regard photography as a service. You are being contracted for your ability to take artistically skilled photos. You price your services based on the amount of time you have invested and your level of artistic skill, and you sell the customer the digital data files you produce for him.
I know photogs working to this model now, and they seem to be doing well. The days of the reprint gravy train are over, but people seem to be willing to pay for the quality of SERVICE they get.
DG
Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
Every one of the words in your post can be used as a password. That doesn't justify prohibiting their publication.
The AACS key is a password that's, in effect, distributed to everyone who owns a HDDVD and is furthermore useless to you unless you possess an HDDVD. It's an open secret. In that respect it's different from a credit card, and your analogy is inapt.
And it's not illegal to post a string of digits that may or may not be a credit card, without more, and the same should apply in the case of the HDDVD key.
I don't need large brains to have a good time.
I would never say what the AACS key is... I just say what it is NOT (see sig).
The AACS key is NOT 0xF606EEFD628B1CA427BEA93A9CA9773F
How about while we wait for them to get back to me on that we start a little political activism to start bringing consumer rights back to consumers in our various countries? Writing your representative is OK but if you really want to get their attention you need to be wielding a block of about 200,000 voters. Hop to it!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?