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DMCA Means You Can't Delete Files On Your PC?
DragonHawk writes "According to Wired, John Stottlemire found a way to print duplicate coupons from Coupons.com by deleting some files and registry entires on his PC. Now he's being sued for a DMCA violation. He says, 'All I did was erase files or registry keys.' Says a lawyer: '[The DMCA] may cover this. I think it does give companies a lot of leverage and a lot of power.' So now the copyright cartels are saying that not only can we not copy things on our computers, but we can't delete things on our computers? Time to buy stock in Seagate."
yet another abuse of the DMCA and its way too much power to copyright holders that the general public won't notice or care about. It's enough to make me want to stop being an obssessive nerd.
DMCA should not cover someone deleting their files or registry keys. But his excuse that "All I did was erase files or registry keys." sounds like a false pretense. He did it for the purpose of printing duplicate coupons, and that is fraud.
I'm much more funny, interesting and insightful than the moderators think
Bureaucrat Ferris: "You honest men are such a problem and such a headache. But we knew you'd slip sooner or later . . . [and break one of our regulations] . . . this is just what we wanted."
Rearden: "You seem to be pleased about it."
Bureaucrat Ferris: "Don't I have good reason to be?"
Rearden: "But, after all, I did break one of your laws."
Bureaucrat Ferris: "Well, what do you think they're there for?" Did you really think that we want those laws to be observed? We want them broken. You'd better get it straight that it's not a bunch of boy scouts you're up against . . . We're after power and we mean it. You fellows were pikers, but we know the real trick, and you'd better get wise to it. There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them."
A guilty person will do anything to avoid guilt/prosecution, including accepting an ever-increasing set of restrictions on their remaining freedom. This is like open container laws, speed limits, and marijuana bans - useful when the State needs to enforce _something_, and pretty much ubiquitous, so they're guaranteed to have it over pretty much everyone.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
If I remove DRM from a file on my computer such as a MP3 I'm also breaching the DMCA, this isn't very different. Can we have less knee jerk reactions from slashdot over anything that remotely looks like we can complain about the DMCA? Articles like this just make us look bad and uninformed.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Could it be that maybe, just maybe, that the writer just quoted from the lawsuit? It's totally possible that the "copy protection" was nothing more than a registry entry, and his "code and instructions" were merely a REG file that removed the registry entry. If so, should that constitute a violation of the DMCA?
It appears that you have to install software that only allows you to print so many coupons. This guy developed software that erases the tracking thing that limits you and allows you to take more then they gave you.
I would say yes there is fraud going on here. When using this program you are intentionally misrepresenting yourself to the suppliers of the coupons after already agreeing to their terms for receiving them. The DMCA part comes in because he wrote a program that allows you to defraud the providers by bypassing their technology that allows them to control access to the coupons. Not because deleting things are illegal. You could delete the stuff and not use the program to get coupons again and never run into this DMCA problem.
Note, this isn't an endorsement of the DMCA. It just isn't the problem in how the story represents it.
Now I'm not a fan of the DMCA, but this seems like another case of computer geeks missing the forest for the trees. However you end up circumventing the DCMA, it's going to come down to a set of simple, technical, legal steps. Similarly, a gun is fired using a set of simple, technical, legal steps. Whether these steps constitute a legal or illegal actions depends on situation and intent. If I shoot somebody, frankly it doesn't matter how legal it is for me to retract my index finger half an inch. And, as the law is written, if you're circumventing the DCMA, it really doesn't matter how legal it is to delete a file on your computer.
Where exactly does circumvention of copy protection begin and end? If a person had deleted the data but not printed more coupons, would it still be circumventing copy protection?
What if they had to format the filesystem?
Or for that matter, what if he had bought a new computer? Can we now not buy things because it circumvents copyright, albeit inefficiently and in an extremely costly manner?
And yes, I realize he actually got busted for posting instructions for circumvention, even providing software that does it, but they probably are charging him with the greatest charge they believe they can get a conviction for, or possibly planning to settle out of court, cause this does sound at least a little bit invasive even for the DMCA.
In fact, lets take this a step further and make it more like what the guy did. I know I'll probably get troll flagged for this, but this is a matter of morals now.
Anyone wanting free unlimited coupons from Coupons.Com can do so by buying a new computer for every set of coupons they create.
There, I just told you how to circumvent it. Thereby violating the DMCA, for all of slashdot (that reads this far down) to see. Don't like it? Then sue me.
Is _THAT_ suddenly a DMCA violation as well?
Then wouldn't it also be illegal to sell any tool that enables one to do such? Like Windows itself?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
That is the thing with EULA's. With a law, we assume it needs to be fair and consistent. Rules should be the same for software across the board, right, or it should make sense in some way. However, a software company can basically put whatever terms they want into a EULA and get away with it, because 99% of people never even read them.
If I were a programmer, I'd hide crazy stuff in the EULA just to see if people catch it.
"On the third Thursday of August, if you happen to be sleeping with your significant other, you must satisfy them no less than 2 times, and no more than 4 times, each time making them call out my name. If you are not engaging in such activities on that date, you may substitute a fan-fiction of no less than 1,500 words which must be posted to 3 separate social networking sites and USENET."
"Technical assistance will only be provided after we finger each other online.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
What if I got a coupon first using a virtual machine, then got a second one by using my actual host? What do they do then? Sure it seems like he did it deliberately, but what if I accidentally get a coupon from a guest OS, then the host OS thinking that I accidentally threw out the first coupon, but then use it? I can see that this kind of thing could happen on accident. I've never used coupons.com, and have no intention of going there and risk random crap getting installed on my computer.
Sorry, but an anti-circumvention argument is a stretch.
Now, is a technological measure that can be defeated by merely deleting files or removing registry keys "effective"?
I think not. The real gem is why companies would prefer to use the DMCA: fraud is a civil matter requiring them to pursue the case on their own dime. Conversely, the DMCA allows for criminal prosecution. Whether or not the government is likely to play ball, the threat of such action improves the likelihood of "fear-for-your-life" settlement from the defendant.
There was no key (no lock).
Mere files and registry entries don't represent an effective encryption algorithm.
So he didn't bypass any 'security measures'.
What else comes next?
They write passwords plaintext in dont_read_me.txt ???
Patents Drive Free Software as Hurricanes Drive Construction Industry
Submitters should more accurately reflect the content of their stories rather than creating a misleading teaser that doesn't represent the core issue being debated here.
It's a coupon... and giving someone the ability to print their own, and they go ahead and print too many (there is no "protection or encryption" here) is not a copyright violation as it stands, I don't think. Nor is it a circumvention either. If there was some super hash table digital key watermark CSS scrambling whatnot on there, perhaps... but a registry key is _NOT_ a copyright protection measure. It's just not.
And the coupons, if I'm guessing, have other copyrighted imagery from the company authorizing the coupons, yet I don't see them suing this guy.
Taking the Harry Potter book to kinko's is not the same as someone saying "you can print 2 copies" of something that you can only use two in the first place... (subsequent copies are rejected at the time of sale, and there has never been a problem with someone going through the line with the "limit two" multiple times at multiple locations... no one's gone to jail "yet" for going to Wal Mart A and getting their 2 limit... and then going to wal Mart b two minutes later and doing the same thing...)
It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.
Indeed they did. But Nooooo, Bush just HAD to push the wrong button on "The Weather making machine". Obviously, the staff needs better training on how to use this thing properly...
"DMCA Means You Can't Delete Files On Your PC?"
/., I expect to NOT see it on /.
I expect to see that kind of amateur, fact evading, OMYGOD hair-on-fire hysteria from WIRED. I don't just not expect to see it on
STOP IT. Use some sense and have a little editorial integrity, will you? If this is the result of lack of submissions, consider whether perhaps having fewer stories is not less damaging to your reputation than having this sort of asinine crap. I hope the reason this article was used was that you knew it'd result in a lot of sparks and smoke in the discussion, because the alternative is too depressing to contemplate. If it is, it's still not good enough.
We really, really need the ability to mod parent articles.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
I know most of us here generally use operating systems that do not require regular re-installation. However, in the Windows world, an annual (or more frequent) re-install is par for the course. If the DMCA requires that certain registry entries and files be kept, this would presumably make such re-installation illegal. Does anyone here on /. have a good method for identifying if protected files and/or registry entries exist on a machine? Does the DMCA basically mean that, in the event of virus or other malware infestation, you must buy a new computer as reformatting the old one is not permitted? Do the standard TCO calculations for Windows machines take this into account?
If the license on the work says that you can only print it once and you print it twice then, yes, it is copyright infringement.
Since when is a coupon copyrightable?
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
You mean that copy protection crackable by magic markers is 'effective'? I think they mean 'effectively' in the sense of 'in effect', not 'with good performance'.
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
It appears that you missed the whole part about intent.
Yes, you can delete whatever you like on your computer, but if you delete it with the intent of and for the purpose of breaking the law, you break the law. You can delete the same parts for other intents and purposes, but once it's in order to break the law, you can't use your ownership as a successful defense. I have a feeling that metaphors and similes from the tangible world are lost on you, but I'll try again with another example: You're allowed to throw away (delete) the battery from your smoke detector and empty the fire extinguisher, but if the reason you did so was to burn down the house and cash out on the insurance, that action in itself becomes illegal (even if you never got around to burning down the house). Or how about another computer example: If you delete all your tax files from your computer because you suspect you'll get audited, you're also breaking the law.
If the intent is malicious, the action is malicious, no matter whether the same action can also be done legally.
In this case, the intent was crystal clear. The user deleted the very specific parts that would prevent the user from printing out more copies than the copyright holder allowed, and nothing else. Please explain how this could possibly not be with bad intent.
The DMCA probably also comes into play because it would be hard to identify just which parts to delete without unauthorised reverse engineering.
It doesn't have to be there. It's not a contractual obligation you agree to -- it's copyrights, which are legal whether you agree to them or not. If I say you can make a maximum of N copies of something I've written, that's my prerogative as copyright holder.
There's diddley squat you can do about it -- if you make more copies, and it's not for fair use, library preservation or any other purpose specifically exempted by law, you can not legally make more copies than what I permit. Your agreement is not required.
Legislature: "From now on, it shall be illegal to run somebody over with your car."
Slashdot: "OMG! Did you see this new law? It will prevent us from driving our cars!"
Sane person: "Um, no. You can drive your car all you want, you just can't drive it over somebody."
Slashdot: "OMG OMG OMG! We can't drive our cars! Freedom is dead! America is now officially a totalitarian state! There is no superlative too hyperbolic to describe this fascist Nazi situation!"
Give me a very large break, with a side order of fries. "DMCA Means You Can't Delite Files On Your PC?" Um, no... DMCA means you can't delete files (or create files, or modify files, or take a nice long piss all over your files) with the intention and effect of circumventing a mechanism designed to protect copyrighted content. Poor you. Boo hoo hoo. Man, those people living behind the Iron Curtain thought they knew what oppression was... but at least they never had to undergo the horror of being legally forbidden to steal coupons!
Intent: if I delete something off my computer, YOU have to prove I intended something "nasty" by it. I do not. They ALLEGE that it's to break the law... and well, it's not breaking any CRIMINAL statute, in case you were noticing. And since nothing is proven here at all, your speculation as to the guilt of this person is just that... pure speculation. And his intent for distributing a free program to do just that is speculation. You seem to be ready to convict this guy based on your own bias regarding copyrights...
:) Simply by putting a key in your registry "don't delete"... Nice, huh?
Deleting tax files is NOT deleting from your own registry, and that's destroying EVIDENCE and is not part of this at ALL. Talk about missing the point. The registry key is just that... a key on the system that you can delete, maim, and otherwise do what you want with because it's on your machine. Trying to do that with the key and repackaging the software to sell it or give it away would indeed be a problem... that is not what occurred here.
And it's only UNAUTHORIZED reverse engineering if you TELL someone how to do it. And since you can decipher registry keys WITHOUT reverse engineering, telling what ones to delete is not "harboring circumvention and piracy". So the DMCA would NOT apply. And if you think it does... get ready for lots of programs on your computer that you can't remove...
Hope you can get your head around that... because regardless of the application of copyright law in this case, THAT is what this will boil down to in the long run... something I mentioned early on, but it got missed...
It's the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.
Sorry, but an anti-circumvention argument is a stretch. Now, is a technological measure that can be defeated by merely deleting files or removing registry keys "effective"?
Imagine you sit on a platform. That's legal. I have scissors, of the paper kind, not with sharp edges. That's legal. I've placed the scissors around the rope that holds the platform, I'm trying to measure something. That's legal.
Now an accidental twitch, I close the scissors and cut the rope. You tell, how could possibly an involuntary twitch end up as me being a murderer?
Shit, I'll need a really good lawyer on this one...
Oh please. Open container laws have nothing to do with public safety.
You don't want the drivers to be drinking? That's what DUI laws are for.
You don't want the passengers drinking? Why? WTF does that have to do with public safety?
I am absolutely against driving under the influence, but open container laws are all about giving the police an excuse to search a vehicle without probable cause.
The federal highway fund linkage is just a way of (illegally, IMHO) forcing Federal authority over the States. The citizens of the states paid the taxes, but the benefits of those taxes don't go to the citizens unless the states give up their constitutionally-guaranteed sovereignty.
A house divided against itself cannot stand.
Copyright is designed to protect artistic and scholarly works. Not coupons. A few generic phrases used in millions of similar forms would not be protected by copyright. Possibly if there was some elaborate artwork included in the background that might be copyright. But damages would be difficult to assess, if any.
I think it's an abuse of process. If he's guilty of anything, it's fraud, and they should try to make that stick instead of using a law that was never designed to apply in this situation.
God, what an awful law.
I believe the US running definition of an "effective" technical protection method... and a definition I believe US "Free Trade" efforts have been forcing other countries into literal the text of their DMCA-style laws, is pretty well circular. That an "effective" technical protection method is one that has the intended effective in the normal course of operation... essentially one that does something unless it is circumvented by any means. So you can circumvent something that doesn't need to be circumvented, but you cannot do anything (like deleting some file) to circumvent anything something if need to, because the fact that you need to do it by definition makes it an "effective" system.
As a reducio-ad-absurdum example, one could almost argue that shipping a product with the power switch in the off position is an "effective technical protection method". Having the power switch in the off is indeed "effective" in prevent the copying of something, and you do indeed need to "apply some process or method" (i.e. switching the device on) to circumvent the technical protection method and copy something.
I for one am thrilled to see this particular case go forward. Thus far in the US no court has ever actually faced and upheld the DMCA in any criminal circumventuion case. I am thrilled to see a court have to actually directly fact just how insane the DMCA is, either to shoot down the DMCA entirely or to make some ruling inventing some "reasonable" retraction or limitation in the scope of the DMCA (and the DMCA is insanely broad exactly because virtually any limitation at all in the DMCA punches a hole so big you can drive a truck through it making the law worthless and meaningless), or to actually go ahead and get stuck making a blatantly insane ruling that this really is the insanity that the DMCA means... the sort of simple clear insane thing that you can say in under 30 seconds to a computer illiterate grandparent or a computer illiterate and brain-damaged legislator and have them understand and agree just how stupid and broken the DMCA is.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Windows
Always going forward, 'cause we can't find reverse.
You're right, he's not running afoul of the DMCA just for deleting some files.
(1) He's running afoul of the DMCA for deleting some files; and
(2) also running afoul of the DMCA for telling other people how to delete some files; and
(3) also running afoul of the DMCA writing/distributing software that could be used to delete some files.
The argument here is that the act of deleting a file is criminal under the DMCA, AND that telling people how to delete a file is criminal under the DMCA, AND that distributing software that could be used to delete files is criminal under the DMCA.
And as far as I can see, they are right. The DMCA is an insane and warped law. The problem here is not the claim that deleting a file on your own computer could be criminal, the problem here is the DMCA itself.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Sec. 1201. Circumvention of copyright protection systems
* (a) Violations Regarding Circumvention of Technological Measures.
o (1)
+ (A) No person shall circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title. --DMCA
That's why it's illegal, because he's circumventing their anti-copying measures. The article title is pure troll.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
That was how copyright was intended. But copyright law as its currently written and enforced in the U.S. is diametrically opposed to the original intent of copyright. A half-second blip of sound is considered protected under the current copyright climate and can't be sampled without permission. You can't sample a single recorded note played on a piano without permission. Given those standards, I doubt a court would look upon claims of creativity in the layout of a coupon unfavorably.
This space available.
The DMCA isn't about copyright, it's about circumventing copyright protection mechanisms. It is entirely possible to be guilty of violating the DMCA, but not guilty of copyright violation. Consider this:
1.) It is legal to make a personal backup copy of a DVD that you own.
2.) It is illegal to bypass copy protection on a DVD that you own for the purposes of #1.
It's basically a law that makes you guilty of "breaking and entering" into your own home. It's worse than redundant.
http://www.mhall119.com
What happens if you use a virtual OS session which resets to the same status each morning?
This technology is monumentally stupid, and there's no way that he'll be "convicted", assuming he has the funding (EFF?) to go to court.
Otherwise, he just has to settle to try and save his finances.
WhiteWolf666 an exBush supporter. All you new-school,compassionate,save the children Republicans can rot in hell
I think the complaint is that the act of deleting files on your own computer should not be considered an act of circumvention. It borders on making it illegal to uninstall software. I can see the next round of spyware/adware claiming that anti-malware software violates the DMCA.
Now, this idiot went and posted a program to do all this on the internet, and so he'll probably get nailed with distributing a circumvention mechanism, which is completely different than you personally deleting files, so the article is still pure troll.
http://www.mhall119.com
Untrue. It would only be illegal if you were deleting them for the purposes of circumventing copy protection, which would not be the case if you were simply removing the software from your hard drive.
It's an anti-circumvention clause...If there is no circumvention, then you haven't done any thing to violate it.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
Here's a HACK for you:
Re-image your PC. Or better, image it, install their crapware and print coupons, immediately re-image and repeat.
Granted it's a little more time consuming (15 minutes for a ghost image if you do common OS+apps and leave the heavy data on another partition) but this has the SAME EXACT EFFECT as the "hack".
A bigger issue though, it's my PC. My property. Go F yourself if you're going to tell me what to do with it.
An even BIGGER issue is, once again, criminalizing simple knowledge. They're prosecuting someone for basically sharing information that's freely available to anyone who wants to look for it. Yes, he wrote a program to delete the files for you automagically. But really, changing the mechanic of the action does not alter the action.
Telling me how to do something vs. telling me to 'click here' and the steps all happen at once achieves the same end result. If the end result is illegal, how you get there should not matter.