Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Doom9 Researchers Break BD+

Posted by kdawson on from the blue-hooray dept.

An anonymous reader writes "BD+, the Blu-ray copy protection system that was supposed to last 10 years, has now been solidly broken by a group of doom9 researchers. Earlier, BD+ had been broken by the commercial company SlySoft." Someone from SlySoft posts a hint early in the thread, but then backs off for fear of getting fired. The break is announced on page 15.

104 of 345 comments (clear)

  1. Congratulations! by symbolset · · Score: 5, Insightful

    A hearty congratulations to the brilliant programmers of Doom9, including Oopho2ei - who claims not to be a "professional programmer".

    --
    Help stamp out iliturcy.
    1. Re:Congratulations! by impaledsunset · · Score: 2, Informative

      And thank you. As long as the DRM continues to be broken quickly as this, we will be able to exercise the freedoms that it was designed to take away from us. Yes, it doesn't solve the problem, but it brings a relief, when the unpleasant possibility that the DRM scheme might actually work this time is crushed. DRM or not, you will still be able to exercise your right to play the movie you bought, your fair use rights or whatever you believe you are in the right to do.

      I don't think this is so much of a bad news for the MAFIAA, as their benefit from the DRM scheme will still be whopping, but it's good news for everyone that would have been hurt by it.

    2. Re:Congratulations! by TubeSteak · · Score: 4, Interesting

      What's more impressive is that the thread was started August 24th,
      which means it took them 5 weeks and a few days to break BD+.
      Kudos to them.

      Is this just for MKBv7 (Media Key Block) or is BD+ permanently broken?

      --
      [Fuck Beta]
      o0t!
    3. Re:Congratulations! by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 5, Informative

      Is this just for MKBv7 (Media Key Block) or is BD+ permanently broken?

      For the most part it is permanently broken. BD+ is just a very simple virtual machine - these guys reimplemented the virtual machine. So the disc publishers can write all kinds of new copy prevention code in the BD+ 'language' but the doom9 guys' VM will be able to execute it pretty much like any sanctioned BD+ VM would. The disc publishers might start exploiting non-standard or undefined behavior in the BD+ VMs (presumably most hardware players all just run the same BD+ VM from macrovision, so any bugs in it should be the same across most if not all hardware players) but such shenanigans won't be too hard to reverse engineer and include into the clone VM.

      Now when the publishers switch to MKBv8 that will be a new set of AACS keys that will need to be rediscovered, but that's independent of and in addition to BD+.

      --
      When information is power, privacy is freedom.
    4. Re:Congratulations! by Goaway · · Score: 2, Informative

      Sure, congratulations on getting this far, but the Slashdot story is entirely exaggerated. People are working hard on BD+, and it'll probably fall sooner or later, but it certainly isn't "solidly broken" yet.

      To quote Oopho2ei himself:

      The whole project consists of three major tasks:
      1. vm instruction processing (95% done)
      2. trap implementations (80% done)
      3. event/callback processing (10 % done)

      I'm sure they'd be happy to get some help, though. There's a lot of programming gruntwork to be done.

    5. Re:Congratulations! by Goaway · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It's not broken yet. The work is still very much ongoing, and this Slashdot story is an exaggeration.

      There's great work being done for sure, but it's not FINISHED yet by any measure.

    6. Re:Congratulations! by Kjella · · Score: 4, Informative

      It's not broken yet. The work is still very much ongoing, and this Slashdot story is an exaggeration.

      There's great work being done for sure, but it's not FINISHED yet by any measure.

      They have a BD+ implementation that works perfectly on many BD+ discs. It doesn't cover every corner case of the VM yet, but I would consider that pretty much broken. At least you're down to the publishers playing new tricks, find the corner case, update decoder and it's done. It means that once this gets coded up into a real player, I expect that within a week or two of any BD release it'll almost certainly play on Linux. I'd call that good news.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    7. Re:Congratulations! by Goaway · · Score: 2

      Yes, I didn't read quite all the way to the end of the thread (I blame the interface, of course). They got it far enough to decode some discs.

      I'm sure there are quite a number of kinks to work out yet, though, and then the cat-and-mouse game starts. Currents discs already do some checks to see if they are running on a conforming virtual machine and lock up if they don't, and that'll only get stricter from now on. Shouldn't be too big a problem, though, as long as enough people put in the effort to work on it.

    8. Re:Congratulations! by squiggleslash · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I understand where you're coming from, but it probably will make Blu-ray less attractive.

      The issue with BD+ is it's the equivalent of the hacks game writers used to put into games for 8-bit computers in the 1980s that would do little timing loops and check various memory locations to make sure that nobody's plugged in any hardware they shouldn't. These hacks were almost always universally awful, with users having to screw around trying to find combinations of things that'd work to play games afflicted with these "copy prevention" methods. And, whenever Commodore or Sinclair released an updated computer, it'd break a certain percentage of those games.

      Right now there are tens of models of Blu-ray player. BD+ has posed to be a problem even so, but for the most part the problems have been "containable" with manufacturers releasing firmware updates to fix the issues as they've come up. Another thing that's made this containable has been the fact that the system hasn't been universally deployed - indeed, the vast majority of discs do not have this ACM applied - and where applied the hacks have been simple checks of the "I run, therefore I am" type. The only VM they've been looking for is Slysoft's.

      Now two things are going to happen. The first is that the BD+ scripts are going to get ever more complicated. This increases the number of Blu-ray models that'll get false positives. Worse, the false positives will increasingly be because of a bug in the script, not the player, which will make player manufacturers a little less happy about patching their firmware to fix the problems.

      The second - unrelated to BD+ being cracked - is that the number of Blu-ray player models is going to increase, and the number of manufacturers involved in Blu-ray will start to become somewhat greater than the "We're all a bunch of happy Blu-ray supporters" group that currently make players. Virtually everyone making Blu-ray players today wants Blu-ray to succeed enough to be prepared to do anything to do it. This is unlike, say, DVD where most player manufacturers know that DVD has succeeded and therefore just want to make money.

      Taken together: we're looking at increasingly unreliable scripts, with many, many, more opportunities (player configurations) to fail, and consumers rioting because they're finding the only way to watch every movie they buy or rent is to own two or three players, or a Playstation 3 (which'll probably be the only Blu-ray player everything gets tested on.)

      CSS was a predictable algorithm that could only be implemented one way. When it was cracked, that was not a disaster for DVD, indeed it probably helped the format.

      AACS is a predictable algorithm that can only be implemented one way. When it was cracked, that was not a disaster for HD DVD or Blu-ray, indeed it probably helped the HD formats.

      BD+ is an unpredictable algorithm based upon technologies that have failed in the past, will continue to fail, and which have failed for Blu-ray already. The ONLY way the Doom9 crack is going to be helpful for Blu-ray is if it convinced Fox et al to drop the technology. As for me, it's on my list of reasons why I'm not going to get Blu-ray. If the BDA removes BD+, and works on Blu-ray's other flaws, I might reconsider my stance. But everything's going to get worse, and Hollywood will blame pirates in the same way as some idiot who accidentally shoots and kills his wife because he didn't expect her to enter the house via the backdoor blames "criminals" for making him scared in the first place.

      --
      You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
  2. Unfortunately by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Unfortunately this will probably just mean that a ton of consumers will be SOL when they implement new encryption schemes on BluRay that aren't supported by some existing players.

    1. Re:Unfortunately by Wuhao · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Wonderful. Finally, people won't look at me like I'm from Mars when I tell them that DRM affects legitimate paying customers like them.

    2. Re:Unfortunately by Lumpy · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Oh I hope so. I hope that Sony and the rest of those idiots over-react hard and screw most all customers with BluRay players.

      Disrupting the consumers from viewing the new shiney will actually make them sit up and pay attention. I hope this screws a lot of people really hard to the point they say "HEY! WHAT THE HELL!"

      Now they need to crack HDCP.

      --
      Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
    3. Re:Unfortunately by Firethorn · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Disrupting the consumers from viewing the new shiney will actually make them sit up and pay attention. I hope this screws a lot of people really hard to the point they say "HEY! WHAT THE HELL!"

      I think this has actually happened a couple times. My first negative experience with DRM was as a kid - I bought a video game that kept insisting I 'insert the original disc'. Turns out they fubared the pressing such that even the original disc was seen as copied - didn't impress me with the quality control. It was something where pulling even a single disc and trying it out would have found the problem.

      My second was with an E-Book program. I decided to check out this 'ebook' thing, downloaded the one Stephen King wrote years ago - the idea was that if you liked the book, you paid for the next installment. While I found the installment nice, the reader broke so many things that after reading it I uninstalled the reader and therefore the book. Never again. For example, it mostly broke copy/paste, as well as various other things in attempting to stop screen captures.

      I mean, if I had wanted to copy the book, it would have only taken a few hours of my time to [i]retype the bloody thing[/i] using dual screens or even two computers. It wasn't a hugely long book, and I am a trained(if out of practice) typist. If I wanted to do a lot of books, some sort of OCR system would work.

      Or just find & download it off the internet today.

      Especially with the popularity of MP3 players that are quickly turning into media players, the 'average user' is seeing the effects of DRM more and more. Especially when they buy that DVD duplicator and discover it won't work for 'copyprotected' discs.

      --
      I don't read AC A human right
    4. Re:Unfortunately by init100 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Unfortunately this will probably just mean that a ton of consumers will be SOL when they implement new encryption schemes on BluRay that aren't supported by some existing players.

      Good! Maybe then the consumers can start to understand why DRM sucks, especially systems where their decryption keys can be disabled after the purchase. It's unfortunate that they'll have to learn this the hard way, but there is not much we can do about that.

    5. Re:Unfortunately by Whiteox · · Score: 2, Interesting

      While I found the installment nice, the reader broke so many things that after reading it I uninstalled the reader and therefore the book.

      Same for downloaded mobile games. Pay $ for a game then find a few months later that you have to master reset the mobile as it's gone funky. This wipes out the game as well. Consumers can't backup the game or other purchased content so they are screwed. Why do they do this? Because no mobile game company wants their product transferable. Same with your ebook content. That's the real problem with DRM. You don't buy content these days, you buy content with DRM which effectively means you don't own the rights to it. 90% of the consumers out there don't know this and don't care about this until they want to rip it or copy it so they can archive the original somehow.
      But for DVD, that doesn't matter anymore as the proliferation of the $2 DVD shows. A piece of plastic with some shiny foil is much cheaper to make than reels of mylar, casing, mechanisms and assembly that VHS requires. So they pound out these DVDs for almost nothing and they are winning, because it's a lot more convenient to buy the package= disk+shell+pretty pictures, than download it and set up equipment/software to see it on screen.
      With multiple TV/monitors in homes nowadays, it's much easier to move a disk from player to player than network a home.

      What is more apparent to me is that there is a stratification between DVD and BluRay.
      Sure, if you want top viewing experience on a large screen, then go BluRay. If you just want to watch the movie then DVD is fine.
      Archiving BluRay isn't going to make a huge world wide difference in how the general DVD viewing public react to that. They'll still be watching cheap DVDs.

      --
      Don't be apathetic. Procrastinate!
  3. cool! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The best part of all: the DMCA makes it perfectly legal to use with Linux since OEMs don't provide linux codecs.

    1. Re:cool! by cp.tar · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Now, that sounds interesting. I would like to hear a legal opinion on that matter, though.

      OTOH, wasn't there something about this kind of hack making copy protection "inadequate" and therefore unenforceable, i.e. legally circumventable in Finland?

      --
      Ignore this signature. By order.
    2. Re:cool! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      Since the court of appeal thinks CSS is still quite adequate I'd say no for now.

      See http://www.turre.com/blog/?p=156

    3. Re:cool! by repvik · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Fortunately, citizens outside the United States of Asshats* doesn't have to bother with this whole DMCA crap.

      * Referring to lawyers et.al.

    4. Re:cool! by russotto · · Score: 3, Informative

      You're joking, right? Digital broadcasts are just the start (and required by law). Soon, all broadcasters will be foregoing "regular" digital for HD broadcasts complete with broadcast flag.

      The broadcast flag was defeated (which isn't to say that it won't be resurrected in the future, but there's way too much silicon out there which ignores it for that to be a practical matter for a long time). HD broadcasts are just as open as analog; they're just an MPEG-2 transport stream with AC3 audio (usually).

    5. Re:cool! by evilviper · · Score: 2, Informative

      HD broadcasts are just as open as analog; they're just an MPEG-2 transport stream with AC3 audio (usually).

      Why do you say "usually"? To the best of my knowledge, AC3 is the only supported audio codec in the ATSC standard* (defined in A/52). MPEG-2 is similarly the only supported video codec.**

      *To be pedantic: 2-channel AC3 is actually called AC2, but nobody cares, and even Dolby screws up the notation on a regular basis.
      **Also being pedantic: MPEG-2 decoders are all backwards compatible, so a broadcaster could conceivably choose to use MPEG-1 video.

      --
      Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
  4. Freedom Fighters by PenGun · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Well done.

  5. Kudos to them by Enderandrew · · Score: 4, Informative

    That being said BluRay burners are expensive enough, and the blank media is expensive enough that I'll probably still buy my BluRay movies on Amazon.com (where I routinely find cheap deals as opposed to retail stores charging $35 per movie).

    --
    http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
    1. Re:Kudos to them by jmorris42 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      > That being said BluRay burners are expensive enough, and the blank media is expensive enough that I'll probably
      > still buy my BluRay movies on Amazon.com.

      Which is perfectly good. I didn't buy my first DVD though until the protection was broken and I have no intention of buying anything BD until it is broken. I'm sure I'm not alone in this. Who wants to buy a BD movie until they can pull a copy to a DVD for portable players off in the rest of the house, the in car players, etc. Until we can yank clips out of one. Until we can play then on our non-Windows machines.

      Once stable build of mplayer support this stuff and the battle of key revocation settles down I'll think about investing in the stuff. Not before.

      --
      Democrat delenda est
  6. Obsolete the installed base? I think not. by symbolset · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Sony isn't having a ton of luck building an installed base of users of BD, even after buying their competition into submission. If they obsolete their installed base they have to start over again with thet negative examples of HD-DVD and the additional strike of cyclic obsolescence against them. It would be too obvious that the purchase of their content is actually a short term lease. That would be the death of BluRay before it's even well started, and it wouldn't even buy them an additional year before it was cracked again.

    It's more likely that we're nearing the end of this DRM nonsense forever. Finally!

    Or am I too optimistic of their intelligence? History does weigh heavily against my hopefulness here.

    --
    Help stamp out iliturcy.
  7. last barrier by peas_n_carrots · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Looks like the last barrier against BR adoption has been bypassed. Cue the cheap players and burners and BR might actually rise from its coma and take the market from DVD.

    I'm hoping that won't happen because a world ruled by Sorny is surely worse off. But don't fret, Sorny will do everything in its power to prevent mainstream adoption.

    1. Re:last barrier by sjames · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Samsung has a $200 player which comes with 4 free movies. Given that the movies retail for $35 a pop, that is $140 in free movies with a $200 player. The rumors is said player will go for $150 on Black Friday. A player for $150 with $140 in free movies is a pretty good deal.

      The biggest problem with BluRay is retail stores charging $35 for movies. DVDs are often selling for $10 or less. Knock BluRay prices down to $25 a movie or less and I'll bite.

      Gotta be careful with that math. The movie is WORTH $10-$15 (based on DVD pricing and people's apparent willing to pay that), so it's $60 worth of movies claiming to be a $140 dollar value, just like the blue-screen commercials where they give away the '$100 value' worth of the stuff they couldn't sell in the last blue-screen ad and really just don't want cluttering up their warehouse (here, you throw this away!).

      Millions bought our "shiny penny" for $100 and millions more bought our "crisp 10 spot" for $150, but if you act RIGHT NOW, you (yes, you) can have BOTH for the low low price of $99.95! You know It the deal of a lifetime BECAUSE I'M SHOUTING!

  8. And YET AGAIN... by Khyber · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The common man proves that if man can make it, man can break it.

    This is a lesson companies will NEVER LEARN when it comes to DRM.

    --
    Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
  9. As the article says... by Angstroem · · Score: 5, Informative

    ...start reading on page 15, it'll discuss (a) what they did and (b) how resistant it is against potential counterattacks by the BD+ people.

    Mind you, the idea was not to break the underlying encryption scheme (breaking AES could still turn out being hard for the next couple of years...), but rather disable the BD+ security layer.

    1. Re:As the article says... by IamTheRealMike · · Score: 5, Informative

      As far as I can tell, it wasn't actually disabled though. What they guy did is write his own BD+ VM. An impressive feat for sure, but that attack was always anticipated. As the dude says later,

      Apart from that the purpose of the program (called "content code") running inside the player on a virtual machine is to detect any known compromised players or known unlicensed emulators (like ours). The content code is give a wide range of opportunities to do that. For example it has (limited) access to the player memory and can even execute arbitrary code on the machine though we haven't seen that yet and our emulator doesn't support this either.
      As long as we have access to a working (licensed) players all these measures are useless as we can record traces from this player and adjust the data "injected" in the virtual machine address space by traps or events to perfectly match our recordings. Even if whitebox attack resistant AES or ECDSA algorithms are used and nobody manages to break them we can still use the obfuscated algorithms and their keys.

      So basically the disk authors can keep up for as long as they can trace the VM of an existing licensed player. They don't need to do that currently because no publishers are searching for their VM specifically.

      They'll probably be able to do this for as long as publishers want their discs to be playable on software players, simply because it's quite easy to reverse engineer x86 code on a PC, when you have a debugger and plenty of Jolt. I don't know what the BluRay player market looks like. If most BluRay players are hardware based, then as a movie studio I'd be tempted to simply write some BD+ code that looked for existing software players and banned all of them. Then the "trace a licensed player" step outlined above suddenly turns into a silicon reverse engineering problem instead of a software reverse engineering problem. Much harder.

      That said, I doubt they'd actually do that. Presumably they allowed software players for a reason, despite knowing they were way easier to hack than hardware players.

    2. Re:As the article says... by squisher · · Score: 2, Insightful

      ...
      Presumably they allowed software players for a reason, despite knowing they were way easier to hack than hardware players.

      Uhm, you do realize that actually watching a BD movie on a laptop or computer is done in software? Obviously this has to be supported, even big companies are not that dumb. Heck, I bet BD is decoded in software on the PS3.

    3. Re:As the article says... by c · · Score: 4, Interesting

      > If most BluRay players are hardware based, then as a movie studio I'd be tempted to simply write
      > some BD+ code that looked for existing software players and banned all of them. Then the
      > "trace a licensed player" step outlined above suddenly turns into a silicon reverse engineering
      > problem instead of a software reverse engineering problem. Much harder.

      Even then, you can still run the BD+ code in the VM, and trace it under the VM, and figure out what makes it fail, and ensure that it sees a VM environment which doesn't look like an existing software player. Or any kind of software player. And you may have the ability to modify the software player to explore what triggers the problem (a lot of people who's software players no longer play the latest releases would be rather thankful for a patch).

      Harder, but a boatload easier than tracing silicon.

      The BD group pretty much has to outlaw software players entirely to avoid this kind of attack.

      c.

      --
      Log in or piss off.
    4. Re:As the article says... by IamTheRealMike · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Yes I know. What I meant was, what proportion of BluRay watching people watch the movies on their laptops or desktops, vs a dedicated hardware player or PS3. And yes I expect the PS3 does a lot of it in software too. Point is, I also expect tracing the BD+ VM in a PS3 to be quite hard.

    5. Re:As the article says... by ceoyoyo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      "can even execute arbitrary code on the machine"

      Oh excellent. I think I'll skip BD, thank you.

    6. Re:As the article says... by IamTheRealMike · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I agree that the BD group may eventually be backed into a corner over software players, at which point it'll boil down to pure economics. I read that the vast majority of BluRay players in the world are PS3, although of course, that doesn't mean the vast majority of used BR players are PS3s.

      I honestly have no idea what proportion of BluRay watchers watch via their PCs, but the equation is simple - take a graph of disc sales. Presumably at some point its BD+ program is cracked and sales will fall as high quality rips show up on the internet - I'd imagine the graph looks like a sharp rise upwards on release week followed by a gradual decay into nothingness over time, with a sharp drop around the time the BD+ program is cracked (assuming it lasts long enough that you can even get a sales baseline, ie, not within a few days).

      Now let's say 10% of BluRay watchers use a PC, so reduce your project sales by 10% but remove the sharp drop due to piracy, take the integral of both graphs and see if the difference is positive. If it's big enough it might be worth abandoning PC playback to avoid the piracy (or shift that sales cliff to a point where sales were low anyway).

      If the economics don't look like that, then the BD group needs to try and get PowerDVD and friends seriously buffed up, security wise. It's certainly possible to make x86 code annoying and difficult to reverse engineer, but very few people can do it well. I'd imagine most of them don't work for BluRay player software companies.

      I'd be very interested in a chart of every BluRay title released and when it was cracked, but I doubt such information is publically available.

    7. Re:As the article says... by Constantine+XVI · · Score: 4, Informative

      The PS3 can run Linux. Stock PS3s run Sony's XMB OS, not Linux. I wouldn't doubt the Blu-Ray player using a hardware decoder, or at least the RSX (graphics) chip.

      --
      "I think an etch-a-sketch with an ethernet port would beat IE7 in web standards compliance."
    8. Re:As the article says... by Briareos · · Score: 2, Funny

      ...start reading on page 15,[...]

      I only have 9 pages, you insensitive clod!

      --

      "I'm not anti-anything, I'm anti-everything, it fits better." - Sole

    9. Re:As the article says... by squiggleslash · · Score: 4, Insightful

      And here's the hilarious part: as soon as they (the movie publishing industry) do start trying to be clever with BD+ attacks trying to find the Doom9 VM and variants thereof, they'll screw up discs so they're unplayable on numerous legitimate players. Pretty much the only thing that hasn't sunk BD+ so far is the fact that there are very few different models of player in circulation. As it is, it's still fallen over before.

      --
      You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
    10. Re:As the article says... by aliquis · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Uhm, does it? I know you can run Linux on it, but does it really use Linux for basic usage such as running a game or the media players?

      Use the word Cell multicore processor if anything because it's not multiple PPC cores, just one.

    11. Re:As the article says... by aliquis · · Score: 2, Funny

      "lol, you don't even trust Sony!?!"

    12. Re:As the article says... by Paradigm_Complex · · Score: 4, Informative

      Presumably at some point its BD+ program is cracked and sales will fall as high quality rips show up on the internet

      Or, ya'know, the opposite. True, there are those who want the copy protection lessened so they can pirate - but there are also those (including myself) who want to be able to do things like play the disk on Linux, make legitimate backups (fscking kids keep scratching my disks), and ripping the movies to play them on portable devices (at lower resolutions, anyway).

      Yes, yes, I know I'm part of a sufficiently small minority to be largely ignored by people who impliment things like BD+, but there has got to be plenty enough people out there like me to make your simple equation far less feasible. No sharp drop if the crack leads to a somewhat counterbalancing increase in sales.

      --
      "A witty saying proves nothing." - Voltaire
    13. Re:As the article says... by swillden · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I honestly have no idea what proportion of BluRay watchers watch via their PCs, but the equation is simple - take a graph of disc sales. Presumably at some point its BD+ program is cracked and sales will fall as high quality rips show up on the internet - I'd imagine the graph looks like a sharp rise upwards on release week followed by a gradual decay into nothingness over time, with a sharp drop around the time the BD+ program is cracked (assuming it lasts long enough that you can even get a sales baseline, ie, not within a few days).

      By this theory, you should see DVD sales drop to nothing almost instantaneously.

      Even if Blu-Ray copy protection were as utterly broken as DVD copy protection is, the disks would still sell fine. Of course, then there are the people like me, who don't pirate anything, but refuse to buy media they can't copy at will. I'll stick with DVDs until the Blu-Ray cracks are so automated and key distribution infrastructure so well-developed that I can do what I want with Blu-Ray media.

      --
      Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
    14. Re:As the article says... by Jorophose · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Um, wat.

      I'd expect bluray sales to start skyrocketting soon. At least for blank media and burners/drives, and a lot of people ready for bluray as long as the players are not overly restricted (ie think a bluray player in your car limited to today's grade restrictions).

      Right now I'm willing to buy a bluray burner when the prices approach 50$-60$ for a drive. I'm sure I'm not alone, and plenty others might go for 100$ drives.

      Now, the question is, do we play the nice card, and buy up bluray drives to drive down the price and make them more popular compared to players... Or do we play the evil card, and refuse to buy into bluray and simply start organising "darknets" based on a bunch of people with eSATA hard drives, killing off whatever chance they had of us buying bluray like we did DVD? I could easily imagine a whole bunch of people getting together, sharing their rips of movies in get-togethers, passing them along. Internet speeds may not be fast enough but cars are.

      Personally I'd go #2. This time they can go fucking die. But I don't know. And should they decide to be dipshits and break compatibility for more restraints, #2 is definately the way to go.

      It would be nice, for once, to fuck them over. But if they don't harden encryption, if they leave it as is, I think it's fair to buy burners; if only for data.

    15. Re:As the article says... by meimeiriver · · Score: 2, Interesting

      BD+ was itself a 'firmware' hack. They try to cover that up a bit, putting texts on your Blu-Rays, like: "Even though Blu-Ray gives you the highest definition video, your player may need an update to play properly." I reckon you can do this exactly once; but I doubt they can pull that stunt again: people pay good money for their players, and want to be able to play their discs sans having to do firmware upgrades, or running back to the store every six months to get someone else to do it. So, yes, I think they're pretty much stuck with BD+ for a while.

    16. Re:As the article says... by kitgerrits · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Yes, the PS3 decodes BD in software (they used it as an example of parallel processing on the Cell).
      Unfortunately, the PS3 runs -either- Linux -or- the BD decoding program (inside its own O/S).
      This makes tracing the BD program from inside Linux impossible.

      --
      "I was in love with a beautiful blonde once, dear. She drove me to drink. It's the one thing I am indebted to her for."
    17. Re:As the article says... by RCL · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I think it's more about fear of losses than actual losses itself. Most people who buy pirated stuff cannot afford buying (the same amount of) legal stuff, so it is incorrect to count all the counterfeit sales as "losses".

      As an example: people in Russia earn about $400/month on average - do you think it increases the chances for Linux/free software popularity? No, everyone just buys counterfeited Windows, which costs about 2-3$ in semi-legal shops. You can even find custom Windows "distros" on the net. Does that count as "loss of sales" for Microsoft? I doubt that.

      --
      Coding etudes
  10. Not quite the last barrier for linux by morgan_greywolf · · Score: 4, Informative

    For reading BD+ BRs on Linux, the problem is they had to use patched firmware. This doesn't bode well for widespread adoption on Linux by non-technical users. Patching firmware is scary for most consumers, who will face the possibility of bricked drives.

    The key will be to either bypass the drive's firmware with virtualization or to somehow have the firmware patch to happen safely and automatically on as many drives as possible. Hopefully something that could be done in the Linux kernel drivers for the BR drives and/or the SCSI drivers.

    --
    My blog
  11. As always with DRM by symbolset · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The content must contain sufficient information for the content to be decoded. Anything one software can do, another software can do (see Knuth, et seq). Therefore if there's an available software that can decode the encrypted content it must be possible for open software to decode the encrypted content. Removing the encryption using open software eliminates the protections against copying provided by the closed software and the game is over.

    Thus DRM is a fool's errand. It always has been.

    The illusion of protectability is however easy to sell for vast sums of cash to content owners who desperately want it to be possible.

    --
    Help stamp out iliturcy.
    1. Re:As always with DRM by Bender0x7D1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Therefore if there's an available software that can decode the encrypted content it must be possible for open software to decode the encrypted content.

      Possible != Feasible. It is possible for me to brute force AES-256 but it isn't feasible for me to do so.

      --
      Reading code is like reading the dictionary - you have to read half of it before you can go back and understand it.
    2. Re:As always with DRM by thaig · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Sure, but if your blu-ray player can decode the disc then there must be a fixed key stored in it's memory. It would have to be the same key for all players too. That would mean that one only had to find the key once to be able to play all discs.

      It would be rather nasty if the players didn't store the keys but downloaded them. It will probably be a long while before consumers are prepared to accept a player that has to have a net connection to work.

      --
      This is all just my personal opinion.
    3. Re:As always with DRM by sjames · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Therefore if there's an available software that can decode the encrypted content it must be possible for open software to decode the encrypted content.

      Possible != Feasible. It is possible for me to brute force AES-256 but it isn't feasible for me to do so.

      The point is, the 'legitimate' (w/ DRM I use that term loosely) doesn't brute the key, and the legitimate software can be watched in action. That means that reverse engineered Free software can be created to do the same thing.

      Hardware trickery to make it harder to do that also increases the incentive to find a way. Somebody somewhere will find a way to dissect it.

      The job is even harder since it will always be a plaintext attack.

    4. Re:As always with DRM by evilviper · · Score: 4, Informative

      It would have to be the same key for all players too. That would mean that one only had to find the key once to be able to play all discs.

      Completely wrong.

      There are innumerable different player keys, which can be individually disabled on all future discs. Every different brand of player uses a different key, and presumably, different models from the same brand likely use separate keys as well.

      It's a fairly simple trick to do. The disc is encrypted with a "disc key". That disc key is stored on the disc, but AES encrypted, using millions of "player keys"... Your player uses its player key to decode the disc key, then uses the disc key to decrypt and play the disc.

      When Sony notices that your player key is being publicly distributed, they stop using your player key to encrypt the disc key... Your player (or ripping software as it were) then can't play any future discs, until you upgrade it to a new key.

      --
      Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
    5. Re:As always with DRM by IGnatius+T+Foobar · · Score: 2, Insightful

      The content must contain sufficient information for the content to be decoded.

      People do not buy "content." They buy movies, music, software, etc. "Content" is a weasel word that transforms someone's potentially beautiful creative work into a mere commodity whose purpose is to fill a box and generate revenue. For more on this, read the FSF's "Words to Avoid" document.

      --
      Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
    6. Re:As always with DRM by Mistshadow2k4 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      A single, random good movie (Dark Knight) will not be enough to get people to move to this quagmire of technology.

      Very, very aptly put. There are far too few good movies out on blu-ray that aren't available on DVD for me to make the move. Even if you gave me a blu-ray player, I'd still buy movies on regular DVD when possible. Why? Because the studios have made such a mess of this, with the heavy-handed DRM and high prices (blu-ray is high considering how not-so-hugely-better than DVD it is), that I'm not even convinced yet that blu-ray is here for good, not matter what corporate execs claim. To most geeks that sounds like an old fogie griping about new-fangled gadgets, but blu-ray isn't better enough to warrant upgrading and there is simply not enough good content available only in blu-ray to make enough people upgrade. It doesn't occur to most geeks that a new format that actually is superior might tank, but I'm starting to wonder. I think maybe the only reason it has survived this long is because of Sony pushing it so hard. Will that be enough three years from now, when people are still buying DVDs and downloading movies to their computers? I guess we have to wait to see, but I'm glad I don't have any money invested in blu-ray.

      --
      I dream of a better world... one in which chickens can cross roads without their motives being questioned.
    7. Re:As always with DRM by supervillainsf · · Score: 2, Informative

      The PS3 has firmware updates. If you read this page: http://www.us.playstation.com/PS3/About/SystemUpdate they are quite upfront about the fact that without updating there are features which may be unusable. They will have no problem changing the PS3 BD+ key and pushing it out if that means shutting down undesireable software players

    8. Re:As always with DRM by __aagmrb7289 · · Score: 2, Funny

      "Thus DRM is a fool's errand. It always has been. " The purpose of DRM isn't to stop copying altogether - it's to increase the difficulty to the point where the amount of copying is trivial. "Thus DRM sometimes works - and certainly can work. It always has."

    9. Re:As always with DRM by davolfman · · Score: 3, Insightful

      So what you do is shotgun it. You hack away at memory until you find the player key for every software player you can, and see if you can get a few hardware player keys while your at it. You then build a failover into your code so they have to disable play on a significant useful fraction of the players out there in order to keep you from copying a disk.

    10. Re:As always with DRM by penguinchris · · Score: 2, Informative

      I don't know if you've actually seen blu-ray movies in comparison with DVD movies, then, because it is actually a huge improvement. Blu-ray movies look amazing - if you need proof, go to pirate bay and download one.

      You of course won't notice a difference on non-HD TV, but on a computer monitor or HDTV the difference is quite large and well worth the upgrade in my opinion.

      The difference in quality is so apparent on an HDTV that even the many people who didn't notice a difference between VHS and DVD immediately see the massive improvement.

    11. Re:As always with DRM by mrchaotica · · Score: 2, Interesting

      But, of course, the patch containing the new key would have to -- you guessed it -- contain the new key! So then you just compromise the new key (ad infinitum) by intercepting the patch. If the PS3 can read the key from the patch, so can you.

      --

      "[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz

    12. Re:As always with DRM by prisoner-of-enigma · · Score: 3, Insightful

      So all you need to do is examine the update and pull the new key out of it.

      If you'd think about it for a moment, you'd realize that if it were that easy, BD+ would've been cracked long ago. It wasn't, so clearly it is not "all you need to do."

      While Sony is demonstrably stupid in believing DRM cannot be bypassed for at least ten years, they are not stupid enough to send out an update where the new keys can be easily snagged. I'm sure you can get the technical details of why what you propose is folly if you head over to the Doom9 forums. You probably need to read up on the basics of encryption and keys first, though, since your knowledge in this area seems a bit lacking.

      --
      In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
    13. Re:As always with DRM by prisoner-of-enigma · · Score: 2

      The point is, the 'legitimate' (w/ DRM I use that term loosely) doesn't brute the key, and the legitimate software can be watched in action. That means that reverse engineered Free software can be created to do the same thing.

      What you say is technically correct but grossly underestimates the complexity and effort involved. BD+ obfuscates itself under layers upon layers of encryption, misdirection, and self-checking for tampering and observation. Admittedly, it is all for naught if you have the time, tools, and knowledge to peel back all that obfuscation and find the real code, real keys, and so forth in operation. But the effort to get to the point where we can bypass BD+ has taken the concerted effort of hundreds (perhaps thousands) of hackers and perhaps 300-500 man-years of time to break. And it's still open to Sony coming back and breaking it dependent upon how desperate Sony wants to be.

      Please, try to appreciate a little more the incredible milestone that's just been achieved. It was not even remotely easy to get this far, and we can't even say for sure the journey is finished.

      --
      In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
    14. Re:As always with DRM by symbolset · · Score: 2, Funny

      I doubt anyone who wants the service has balked at that.

      Tech support: Hi, may I help you?

      Customer: I'm having trouble with the install instructions. It says I have to plug in some telephone cable thingie.

      Tech support: Yes, you plug the telephone cable into the unit. The spot is clearly marked in blue.

      Customer: Yeah, like I tried, but I have two cables for the phone. One goes to the wall and the other goes to the PC. Neither one fits.

      Tech support: Two cables?

      Customer: Yeah, they're for charging. Oh! I have another one for the car... no, the car one doesn't fit in the hole either.

      Tech support: Are you using a cellular phone?

      Customer: Yeah. That's my home phone.

      Tech support: You need to use your land line.

      Customer: I don't have a LAN line here. When I get online I plug the PC into the phone.

      Tech support: I'm going to have to escalate this to my supervisor. Please hold...

      --
      Help stamp out iliturcy.
    15. Re:As always with DRM by Splab · · Score: 2

      That would require you to brute force the other players player key, which is of course pretty much impossible...

    16. Re:As always with DRM by evilviper · · Score: 3, Interesting

      But, of course, the patch containing the new key would have to -- you guessed it -- contain the new key! So then you just compromise the new key (ad infinitum) by intercepting the patch.

      Once SOny notices that happening, they'll make sure to give every PS3 (or small groups of PS3s) it's own key. Then, when one is compromised, they know more or less who did it, and don't provide an update for those PS3s when they revoke the key.

      How many PS3's are you willing to buy?

      --
      Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
  12. Forget copying, I want to play my BR under Linux by janek78 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't really care if I can copy my BluRay disks or not (I'm too lazy to back up my movies - if I break a disk and I like the film, I get a new one).

    But I would love to be able to play my legally bought films under Linux without having to reboot (or having to go to jail for that matter). Maybe one day. :)

  13. So this might be the breakthrough for BluRay? by Teun · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Maybe this breakthrough will finally make BluRay a popular format, so far I haven't seen much (or any) pick up.

    --
    "The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
  14. Or a reputable Linux user could... by symbolset · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Skip the BD player deal, buy the Disc at retail and then download their platform shifted unencrypted movie backup through P2P*. The full BD+ library should be available within a few days, if it wasn't already.

    * Even though it's inherently fair, this method may not be legal in your jurisdiction. Consult your attorney before using.

    --
    Help stamp out iliturcy.
  15. How does it work? by tangent3 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Hoping some expert can describe how this all works to the masses out here. From a quick glance through the forum, this is what I think is happening...

    BD+ movies are released with corrupted data
    A conversion table is required to fix the corruption
    The conversion table is built using code on the BD+ disk that runs on the BDVM.

    The bulk of the work on the forum thread seems to be an effort to reverse engineer the opcodes and libraries (called TRAPs?) available in the BDVM, and to reimplement the VM.

    I'm not a security or crypt expert, but I can't imagine how anyone can expect this kind of security to remain secure for 10 years.

    1. Re:How does it work? by Kjella · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The short answer is - think of it as a computer application, a simple one can simply to its job. An advanced one can try to determine if it's being debugged, running in a VM clone or whatever. They can still pull new rabbits out of the hat that can cause problems. As usual though, the pirates will share the good copy and the "casual" guy trying to use alternative OS/software will have a broken player. What you're seeing here is not new by any standard, AnyDVD HD was there first and obviously output from it has been doing the rounds on P2P. This is mostly a battle to make it so that you can pop in a BD, fire up an open source player and have it work.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    2. Re:How does it work? by noidentity · · Score: 2, Informative
      Yes, that's my take (not that I RTFA or anything):
      • Content on disc is encrypted.
      • Disc includes program that generates decryption key.
      • Program itself is highly obfuscated, and generated specially for each decryption key, so there only way to determine the output is to run it.
      • Virtual machine's instruction set and behavior are now known.
  16. Your secure edifice... by nzgeek · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I think a quote from a famous internet wordsmith is in order here:

    Someone needs to emphasize this in such a way that the right people see it: people who pirate software enjoy cracking it. The game itself is orders of magnitude less amusing. And their distributed ingenuity will smash your firm, secure edifice into beach absolutely every Goddamn time. There are no exceptions to this rule.

    --
    gadgetophile.com
    1. Re:Your secure edifice... by drunkennewfiemidget · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Yup. The crackers will find out a way past it, the normal users will feel hindered and annoyed by it, and the very people you were trying to stop will be completely unaffected and find a way to pirate it anyway.

  17. Re:Forget copying, I want to play my BR under Linu by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I don't really care if I can copy my BluRay disks or not (I'm too lazy to back up my movies - if I break a disk and I like the film, I get a new one).

    Clearly you have no children living with you.

    --
    When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  18. Great by corychristison · · Score: 2, Informative

    I'm sick of my VirtualBox/WinxP/AnyDVD-HD setup. I'd MUCH rather a native Linux command-line tool to automate the process when inserting the disc. ;-)

    Thank you to all developers! Great work!

  19. Re:The end of DRM is good news for content owners by samkass · · Score: 5, Interesting

    A lot of people are just not buying content - even though they would like to buy content - because they know that money spent that way is wasted and they don't want to throw their money away again.

    At the risk of my karma, I'm going to mention that no one I know seems to fall into your generalization of people not buying Blu-Ray discs or players because of DRM. The most commonly cited reason for discs is lack of ubiquitous players (in cars, portable players, friends houses, etc) and the most common reason cited for players is the expense of a Blu-Ray mechanism. In fact, breaking the DRM makes Blu-Ray riskier for investors and therefore likely will increase costs (higher risk means higher cost) in the short term.

    All in all, because Blu-Ray is 10x the bandwidth of any online "HD" movie source (and I use that term loosely for online offerings) and because online DRM is so much worse, I don't see it going away. Instead I see it likely to win over DVD-- DRM or not-- but not until manufacturing costs ramp down due to better technologies and economies of scale.

    Consider this. Is a DRM-free H.264/AAC mp4 file more convenient, or is a DRM-laden disc that you can play in your car, computer, PS3, portable system, or friend's house by carrying around a 16 gram disc? I suspect for geeks it's the former, but for most consumers it's the latter, and it's really just about making players ubiquitous. The odd player out is, of course, the iPod. It's the one thing that is both ubiquitous and doesn't favor the disc. If the Blu-Ray consortium came to some agreement with Apple there it would go a long way towards gaining acceptance.

    --
    E pluribus unum
  20. Re:Like those uesless bank vaults by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Except bank vaults don't also vastly decrease the usefulness of banks for legitimate customers...

  21. These are important points for dialog by symbolset · · Score: 5, Insightful

    no one I know seems to fall into your generalization of people not buying Blu-Ray discs or players because of DRM.

    We shall see. Most people don't know really why they're not trusting of innovation in content technology. The advantages of open content though are immediately obvious and so when the content owners open up the content it starts flying out the door.

    All in all, because Blu-Ray is 10x the bandwidth of any online "HD" movie source (and I use that term loosely for online offerings) and because online DRM is so much worse, I don't see it going away. Instead I see it likely to win over DVD-- DRM or not-- but not until manufacturing costs ramp down due to better technologies and economies of scale.

    "Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of backup tapes." Technology has passed this one by, but the truth of it remains. Content providers would do well to sell the right to the content separately, and let people figure out how to get the content on their own. If they must, they can offer content at kiosks you take your external hard drive to. The tree huggers should like the idea of transport-media free content distribution at the very least - that's less mylar disc in the landfill.

    Consider this. Is a DRM-free H.264/AAC mp4 file more convenient, or is a DRM-laden disc that you can play in your car, computer, PS3, portable system, or friend's house by carrying around a 16 gram disc?

    For the car and portable system a downrezzed movie that fits on an 8GB SDHC card are sufficent, and that form factor is considerably more convenient than a disc that doesn't even fit in your pocket - and is too fragile to carry that way anyway. People do this on their EEE all the time. A 360GB external 2.5" USB drive is bigger and heavier but smaller than a BD with case so it still fits in your pocket, is less susceptible to scratching, fits multiple movies on one disk, and has many other advantages.

    Open content means you can make backups. You can convert to your target platform. You can move your content to where you want it and any technology that can play it will continue to play it for all time. DRM content does not have any of these advantages. Most importantly that last one.

    --
    Help stamp out iliturcy.
  22. direct link by ivlad · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Direct link to announce: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=1207578#post1207578

  23. Congratulations! by AmigaMMC · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I own over 500 DVDs, I love to collect movies and my favorite shows and I look forward to collect BD as well, but I will never support any kind of "protection" that punishes a honest person. I travel all over the world and I often pick up movies from other countries, why shouldn't I have the right to play them back at home, in my living room? The region protection was stupid and any protection is stupid because it doesn't keep pirates away but just honest people like myself who paid dearly for their discs. If my DVD Player had not been unlocked I would not have spent a good chunk of that money on DVD. And I'll go even further: I should be able to send my original DVD of movie XY (not related to Kyle ;) ) and upgrade for a reasonable cost to the same movie on BD, after all it's movie studios that pushed the new standard.

  24. WIPO by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    Member of WIPO? Then yes you do.

  25. Obviously, "10" was in binary... by Cyberax · · Score: 5, Funny

    Subj.

  26. Re:Obsolete the installed base? I think not. by PingXao · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Nah, this DRM nonsense is just starting to heat up. There's a new Copyright Czar on the job now, and Hollywood will throw more cash than ever at lawmakers to try and shore up their busted protections. This will continue since US export numbers are propped up by Hollywood's entertainment distribution network. They'll see this as a "must-protect" industry. In the end they'll fail, but anyone who thinks the supporters of DRM are about to give up should think again.

  27. Oh lol by skulgnome · · Score: 2, Interesting

    They estimated that it'd last for 10 years. It took the Doom9 forum people 5 _weeks_ to hack it. That's like, less than a hundredth of the estimate (i.e. 5/520).

    I wonder. They must not have heard that architectures with an obfuscated instruction set are also reverse-engineerable? I distinctly remember reading an article on the Transmeta VLIW machine's opcode and instruction packet format... and that one has never been officially released at all.

  28. Re:Shouldn't that be Congratulations to Slysoft? by TrekkieGod · · Score: 2, Insightful

    A hearty congratulations to the brilliant programmers of Doom9, including Oopho2ei - who claims not to be a "professional programmer".

    I mean, it seems their programmers did it first, and then helped out the Doom9 people by providing hints here and there.

    Not to diminish the value of the doom9, who gave us an open solution to the problem, but let's not forget the other guys.

    --

    Warning: Opinions known to be heavily biased.

  29. Why we are giving these guys props by symbolset · · Score: 4, Informative

    When Slysoft did this in March. I've had those versions of AnyDVD and CloneDVD for several months. Why is this news? Seriously, not trolling here, but even the submitter mentions this and links to the original Slashdot article on it.

    Because their software is open. Their developments are contributions to the pool of human knowledge. Slysoft's achievement is also deserving of praise, but they while they showed us it could be done (which most of us assumed), these developers showed us how.

    --
    Help stamp out iliturcy.
  30. Re:Physical access FTW by evilviper · · Score: 3, Informative

    What? Cracking DRM has NOTHING to do with the 'analog hole'.

    --
    Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
  31. Re:The end of DRM is good news for content owners by Bert64 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    What's to stop you putting that DRM-free file onto a 16 gram disc...
    Or onto a memory stick for that matter...
    Or a portable hard drive that will store a large number of movies...

    DRM-free gives you a lot of freedom, you can do whatever suits you best, your choices are not taken away from you.

    --
    http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
  32. Re:The end of DRM is good news for content owners by Bert64 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Yes, look at the success of the ipod...
    Does anyone still use portable CD players any more?

    I doubt it, big clunky device with a spinning disc inside that skips the music when it's jolted too hard, and only stores 80 minutes of audio unless you carry around a big stack of equally clunky discs for it.
    Compare that to an ipod or similar device, which can store hours of audio on a device little bigger than a credit card in some cases.

    --
    http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
  33. Support the forums by eiapoce · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I am proud of having been a contributor of the Doom9 forums. Go and pay you tribute: they demonstrated to the industry once again that DRM is a sick idea and will NEVER work.

    P.S. Now I can go and buy a BD recorder. Just as I did with the first DVD Writer after deCSS.

  34. Re:The end of DRM is good news for content owners by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Consider this. Is a DRM-free H.264/AAC mp4 file more convenient, or is a DRM-laden disc that you can play in your car, computer, PS3, portable system, or friend's house by carrying around a 16 gram disc?

    Now there's a false dichotomy. Why can't we have a disc containing the DRM-free H.264 file?

  35. The more things change... by Mspangler · · Score: 5, Interesting

    "The content must contain sufficient information for the content to be decoded. Anything one software can do, another software can do (see Knuth, et seq)."

    From the copy of "Beneath Apple DOS" (copyright 1981) that happens to be on my shelf, page B1;"It seems reasonable at this time to say that it is impossible to to protect a disk in such a way that it can't be broken. This is, in large part, due to the fact the diskette must be bootable; i.e. that it must contain at least one sector which can be read by the program in the PROM on the disk controller card. This means it is possible to trace the boot process by disassembling the normal sector or sectors that that must be on the disk."

    So they have been flogging this dead horse for 27 years. High marks for persistence, low marks for, well, everything else.

  36. Re:Forget copying, I want to play my BR under Linu by init100 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    if I break a disk and I like the film, I get a new one

    You are exactly the kind of customer that all big movie and music companies would like every customer to be. DRM is a way to make that happen. That way, they can make customers pay for the same content multiple times, growing their profits by leaps and bounds. While you pay through your nose, they laugh all the way to the bank.

  37. PS3 Ubuntu/Intrepid Package? by Doc+Ruby · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Anyone want to package this tool up with the PS3 mplayer vo driver for the PS3 Ubuntu Intrepid release?

    --

    --
    make install -not war

  38. Re:Obsolete the installed base? I think not. by dontmakemethink · · Score: 2, Interesting

    It's more likely that we're nearing the end of this DRM nonsense forever. Finally! Or am I too optimistic of their intelligence? History does weigh heavily against my hopefulness here.

    Intelligent or not, either they will cave to market pressures, or the format will vaporize and another will take its place.

    And there are benefits to a pirating marketplace. I am one of those people who would never buy a movie, but would rent/copy if the means are available to do so, rather than download. By doing so I am supporting the format and at least paying a royalty. I don't want the box or any extra crap anyway, just the movie to put in a binder, so I'm saving the cost and waste of the packaging, which are the most expensive components to manufacture (printing the artwork is #1).

    I don't see why they don't just authorize the copying of rentals. Suppose a movie rental generates 30-40% as much revenue as a movie purchase for movie studios and the format developer. The format developer gets another piece when I purchase the blank media to copy onto. The studios could compel rental companies to let them track rentals to form a database of consumer activity that could be sold to marketing companies. Distribution costs would also come way down. Add those revenues and savings together plus a small rental fee hike, and you end up with the same revenue as hard-copy purchases, all without stuffing landfills with unwanted discs and cases.

    Also, by owning a playback device of the movie format, I become a welcome recipient of bought movies as gifts. Over the years I think I've been bought about 30 DVD's, more revenue they would never have gotten if I did not support the format.

    Think about it. Did DVD reach its peak profitability before or after CSS was cracked? I believe I'm one of a large enough market segment that will never buy a Blu-Ray player until I have the means to copy them, nor will I upgrade to an HDTV until then. I bet a movie media format cannot survive without supporting us, and TV manufacturers should really get behind this.

    --

    War as we knew it was obsolete
    Nothing could beat complete denial
    - Emily Haines
  39. Re:Seriously... by eddy · · Score: 2, Interesting

    >I don't know why the hacker community keeps bothering with breaking these DRM schemes.

    It's an extremely rewarding intellectual pursuit. Some people do crosswords, some do pure math. Reverse-engineering, to me, is the pinnacle of engineering. The purest form.

    There's never just one reason, nor one idea of whether or not it 'helps' the format (in this case), but you don't do it if you don't enjoy it, cause the pain (frustration) and suffering (hours and hours of tedious work) during the bad parts... you don't suffer through that if you don't get the high when you break through.

    These DRM schemes especially are like challanges, calling you out. "Here's what we want you TO NOT DO.", nay, "Here's what you CAN'T DO."

    Such challanges seldom go unanswered. It's human nature to answer the call.

    (Good work, Oopho2ei et.al, I applaud you)

    --
    Belief is the currency of delusion.
  40. Huh, what? by symbolset · · Score: 3, Funny

    The purpose of DRM isn't to stop copying altogether - it's to increase the difficulty to the point where the amount of copying is trivial.

    ... and you're going to claim success for DRM after this insightful observation?

    Somebody will be along shortly to mod you funny.

    --
    Help stamp out iliturcy.
    1. Re:Huh, what? by __aagmrb7289 · · Score: 4, Funny

      Do you understand that success can be defined differently by people with different goals? Or is that beyond you completely?

      I don't think DRM is successful, when it comes to MY goals. But many of those who are employing it? Yes, I believe their goals are being met.

      Would you like to add anything useful to this conversation, or are you just throwing stuff out there to see if anything sticks, oh wise and whatever one.

    2. Re:Huh, what? by symbolset · · Score: 2, Funny

      Requote:

      The purpose of DRM isn't to stop copying altogether - it's to increase the difficulty to the point where the amount of copying is trivial.

      I replied to this before, but it was apparently lost. Your answer is here.

      If copying has been made so difficult that the amount of copying is trivial, then why are 1TB SATA drives, 4TB NAS devices and such like moving so fast they don't even shelve them off the skids? Are people making more backups of their photos and email than ever before? Really?

      --
      Help stamp out iliturcy.
    3. Re:Huh, what? by prisoner-of-enigma · · Score: 2, Funny

      If copying has been made so difficult that the amount of copying is trivial, then why are 1TB SATA drives, 4TB NAS devices and such like moving so fast they don't even shelve them off the skids? Are people making more backups of their photos and email than ever before? Really?

      Don't be absurd. For one thing, copying DVD's has been and continues to be incredibly trivial for anyone to do. With your average flick taking up about 8GB-9GB for a dual-layer DVD, you can fill up a 1TB drive pretty fast. And let's not forget Windows and its voracious appetite for gigabytes.

      But there's a far less nefarious reason why large drives are selling fast: they are cheap. People usually spend somewhere between $100-$200 on storage. Right now, that will buy you a lot of space if you're not all that concerned about speed. Thus, people buy big drives because it's not noticeably cheaper to buy small drives.

      Last, you mention 4TB NAS devices as if every home on the block has one. I can assure you they do not. Such items are hugely popular in businesses but they are next to impossible to find in the common household. You and I may not be common (I have about 8TB online at my home), so citing your own situation hardly validates your point.

      --
      In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
  41. Re:Patent trouble by localroger · · Score: 5, Informative
    First, you need to understand what a patent is; it is legal protection, to be sure, but more than that it is a form of publication. Patents exist to encourage inventors to reveal what they have discovered so that others can build on it. Their reward for giving away their secrets is the period of artificial monopoly to capitalize on their discovery. But yes, you can read patents and glean what went into them and expand upon them, because that's what patents are designed to make possible.

    Second, you need to understand what the remedy is for a patent holder whose patent is violated. There are no "patent police" who go out and look for patent violators. Patent owners have to keep their own vigilance, and when they think their patent is being infringed the remedy is to sue the infringers. The result of such a suit is usually an injunction to force the infringer to stop selling his competing products. (Probably the most famous case of this was Polaroid v. Kodak, where Kodak was forced to abandon their entire line of Polaroid-like instant cameras, of which they had sold millions.)

    Now bearing this in mind, exactly what would Sony or Fox or whoever get by suing Doom9? They aren't making money off of this, they just gave it away. Injunctions notwithstanding it's almost impossible to stop the dissemination of software whose authors have deliberately tried to make it available for free. There are no profits to seize, and any effort to show a dollar amount for damages would be very iffy. Patent infringement is not fraud and is not criminal, so there is no risk of anybody going to jail. All in all, there's not much the patent holder can do in this case except suck it up and go on to the next project.

    --
    Brackets contain world's first nanosig, highly magnified:[.]
  42. This horse is dead by symbolset · · Score: 2, Funny

    For one thing, copying DVD's has been and continues to be incredibly trivial for anyone to do.

    And so is downloading HD content from the Internet. And still far more people just drag their external HDD over to a friend's and sneaker net it home. It's quicker and more convenient. One day soon the common man will discover the mysteries of the VPN.

    Some people collect lint. Some others collect video and audio content -- far more than they would ever use -- not because they really intend to enjoy it, but oddly enough because they enjoy the practice of collecting and cataloging it. Some of these folks like to show off their collections, share them, and have the latest thing that's not yet generally available.

    Last, you mention 4TB NAS devices as if every home on the block has one. I can assure you they do not.

    They sure keep a lot of them in stock at Walmart, Frys, Office Max, and every department store I've been in lately. I would think they wouldn't do that for such rapidly depreciating merchandise unless it was moving quickly. Do you have figures? Citation please.

    --
    Help stamp out iliturcy.
    1. Re:This horse is dead by prisoner-of-enigma · · Score: 2, Funny

      They sure keep a lot of them in stock at Walmart, Frys, Office Max, and every department store I've been in lately. I would think they wouldn't do that for such rapidly depreciating merchandise unless it was moving quickly. Do you have figures? Citation please.

      Can you not read? You stated 4TB NAS's are flying off the shelves, and you stated it while referring to home-based use of video. The inference you were trying to make is that 4TB NAS's are selling like hotcakes because people are busily filling up their drives with legal (and illegal) content.

      I stated these NAS devices are flying off the shelves not due to average consumer demand but instead because of demand from businesses of all stripes. Small businesses in particular are snapping up NAS units at a record pace. I consult for a living so I see this, but if you want exact figures, Google is your friend. I found this in about ten seconds. There's far more where that came from if you care to look.

      --
      In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
    2. Re:This horse is dead by symbolset · · Score: 2, Funny

      Sorry, the uses you cite don't account for 5% of the volumes I'm seeing. And my reading skills are fine, thanks.

      --
      Help stamp out iliturcy.
  43. Denial by symbolset · · Score: 2, Funny

    It's not just a river in Egypt

    --
    Help stamp out iliturcy.