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Microsoft Patents DRM'd Torrents

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the i'll-patent-torrenting-torrents dept.

Anonymous Crobar writes "Microsoft has received a patent for a 'digital rights management scheme for an on-demand distributed streaming system,' or using a P2P network to distribute commercial media content. The patent, #7,639,805, covers a method of individually encrypting each packet with a separate key and allowing users to decrypt differing levels of quality depending on the license that has been purchased."

29 of 193 comments (clear)

  1. as old as bt by JackSpratts · · Score: 2, Interesting

    similar schemes have been around the community for (unfortunately) ages.

  2. That's actually pretty clever by holophrastic · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It's a great way of monetizing uncontrollable distribution channels. Easily allow anyone and their goldfish to distribute large content freely, and effectively charge at the codec level. Certainly solves a good half of the people-steal-everything problem. The patent's still stupid, but the idea's great -- I'd support a two-year patent certainly.

    1. Re:That's actually pretty clever by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      Certainly solves a good half of the people-steal-everything problem.

      What the fuck are you talking about? I'll just jump on the usual pirated torrent, thanks.

    2. Re:That's actually pretty clever by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 3, Funny

      Did they remember to patent hacking the encryption within 30s of release? Otherwise the hackers will get away with it!

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    3. Re:That's actually pretty clever by Kjella · · Score: 4, Informative

      Hahhahahahahahaha, you're serious aren't you? The malware/scammers have been distributing DRM'd WMV files for ages, hoping to make suckers get rooted by their malware or steal their credit cards. Nobody distributes them except retards and others too lazy to check their downloads, this changes nothing at all.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    4. Re:That's actually pretty clever by sakdoctor · · Score: 2, Insightful

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitrate_peeling but with DRM.

      DRM and P2P won't mix because it's a huge popularity contest. There is selection pressure against really bad, really big, or password protected/DRMed content.

    5. Re:That's actually pretty clever by PhreakOfTime · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Im sure everyone here knows your stance by now...but for those that dont, allow me to translate what you just said...

      It's a great way of monetizing uncontrollable(by me) distribution channels. Easily allow anyone and their goldfish to distribute large content freely(at no charge to me), and effectively charge(I collect money from the freely given resources of others without compensation) at the codec level. Certainly solves a good half of the people-steal-everything problem.(except for the fact that you are 'stealing' others resources without compensating them)

      Im sorry, but your business model is dying, thats why you have so much resistance to the current changes in the world. Allowed to come to an equilibrium, youd be out of work. You are completely free to follow whatever path you want, but when you start advocating for everyone to only do business a certain way because thats the only way you personally can survive, we part ways.

    6. Re:That's actually pretty clever by networkBoy · · Score: 2, Insightful

      no to mention that should count as prior art...

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    7. Re:That's actually pretty clever by denmarkw00t · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I'd pay, but I want the assurance that Big Content's hands stay off of my media, ESPECIALLY if I payed for the better quality. If I can't duplicate it, play it on my TV or stream it to a laptop/360/iWhatever/wireless projector/blahblahblah then I'm definitely going to pirate it. The biggest issue I have with DRM content is that the model for DRM hasn't gotten past the whole "You can have it, kinda, but its really still ours" mentality, and I'm not counting on codec-levels being the only "DRM" going on here.

    8. Re:That's actually pretty clever by betterunixthanunix · · Score: 4, Insightful
      1. How is making a copy "stealing?" You are failing to meet a key criterion by not depriving the person from whom you made the copy of whatever you copied. Stealing would be walking into my house and taking my hard drive.
      2. This system will fail because nobody will download the restricted media; there is unrestricted media available at no cost. Further, the amount of time needed to extract the secret keys from the restricted codecs is minimal, unless a hardware crypto module is required. I expect that any software implementation will be broken within a week; an implementation using hardware crypto will probably be defeated within a year of its release.

      Some of us stopped feeling remorse for the recording and movie industries when we saw how extensive their lies are. Like, the RIAA claiming that Kazaa was killing CD sales, when in reality they had record setting revenues during the height of Kazaa. Or Hollywood accounting. Or the claim that downloading is benefiting violent Mexican gangs. After a decade of claiming that they are suffering financially, I would expect to see RIAA and MPAA member companies all defunct or near bankruptcy, yet in reality these companies are among the wealthiest and most powerful corporations in the world.

      --
      Palm trees and 8
    9. Re:That's actually pretty clever by tixxit · · Score: 4, Informative

      The patent is NOT about distributing encrypted files, that is just one requirement of the process. RTFP.

    10. Re:That's actually pretty clever by cgenman · · Score: 2, Interesting

      For the record, I've bought music over the years, which I've then subsequently had to pirate for use in players other than the designated "official" player. MP3 DJ tables, music imported to home movies, old MP3 CD players in cars... It all needs to just work, and the only format that just works is MP3 without DRM.

      Adding restrictions to content literally drives legitimate purchasers to pirate sites.

      --
      The ______ Agenda
    11. Re:That's actually pretty clever by BobMcD · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Stealing would be walking into my house and taking my hard drive.

      Do you lay any claim to the data on that hard drive? Would not the thief merely be requiring you to line up your kids and take new snapshots of them, or recalculate your taxes, or re-download all your torrents? Have they actually deprived you of anything, by your standards? I'm genuinely curious if you attach any value to time and effort, or if because it is merely digital it can never have any value at all.

      This system will fail because nobody will download the restricted media; there is unrestricted media available at no cost.

      You're dreaming, at best. 'Nobody' or 'nobody who is already using torrents'? There are a vast, wide majority of people consuming media like this that have zero idea what a torrent even is, let alone how to safely acquire and use them. Torrents only appeal to a small, technically-minded group of people. Subsequently, few profits are probably lost to this crowd.

      Further, the amount of time needed to extract the secret keys from the restricted codecs is minimal, unless a hardware crypto module is required. I expect that any software implementation will be broken within a week; an implementation using hardware crypto will probably be defeated within a year of its release.

      See, again: minimal for whom? For those that were previously using illegal means to gain access to the content, or for those people who actually make up their target market. You know, the people who use money who buy these things.

      Some of us stopped feeling remorse for the recording and movie industries when we saw how extensive their lies are. Like, the RIAA claiming that Kazaa was killing CD sales, when in reality they had record setting revenues during the height of Kazaa. Or Hollywood accounting. Or the claim that downloading is benefiting violent Mexican gangs. After a decade of claiming that they are suffering financially, I would expect to see RIAA and MPAA member companies all defunct or near bankruptcy, yet in reality these companies are among the wealthiest and most powerful corporations in the world.

      On these points we definitely agree. They do in fact over-charge, and a certain backlash is to be expected. I do see the danger, however, in a world where everyone feels this way. Eventually there will be no one else to support the content you are obtaining illegally, and so none will be made. Any way you slice it, your torrents are funded by the good faith of others, and you are abusing that. If you really, honestly believed that the content held no value, and had stronger ethics, you'd simply stop consuming it.

    12. Re:That's actually pretty clever by holophrastic · · Score: 2, Interesting

      It's not about the technology, it's about the monetization. For people like me, now 30 years old, successful adults with money in the bank, there is absolutely no reason to steal a $4 product. Except that there are when it takes weeks for delivery, or days for research, or going and and getting it, or waiting for it to come in, or waiting for it to be released onto physical media, or any other sort of delay.

      The reason that theft is high-tech is because it can be. The crime industry doesn't suffer from haing to do things properly.

      This would allow legitimate sales to be made using techniques previously impossible for paid transactions.

      For example, I could purchase a $50 pre month licence to receive updates to these codec-like things, and be able to download the material from anywhere at any time. I could get it from the back of a van, steal it from my clients or steal it from my friends, and it's all legal. Because the purchase price isn't paid through the distribution channel.

      That's cool.

    13. Re:That's actually pretty clever by mcgrew · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Do you lay any claim to the data on that hard drive?

      The data should be backed up. In any case you paid for the drive itself, which the thief, who doesn't care about the data but only the drive now has a free drive but you have to go out and buy another drive.

      Would not the thief merely be requiring you to line up your kids and take new snapshots of them

      Were you dumb enough to not back your data up, how are you going to recreate your wedding pictures? How is lining up your kids going to recreate their baby pictures? This is nothing like downloading, which only makes a copy of data. But like I said, if it's backed up the data doesn't matter; you have copies. You're out the price of a hard drive. Should a thief come in and decide not to steal the drive but only copy its contents, you've lost nothing. In this case the thief is breaking and entering and invading your privacy, but not stealing.

      See, again: minimal for whom?

      Anyone. Once the key is broklen, the content will be on the internet sans keys.

      Eventually there will be no one else to support the content you are obtaining illegally, and so none will be made.

      This is a fallacy. Cory Doctorow (for one) puts his books online in HTML and many e-reader formats, free for anyone to download, yet is on the New York Times best seller list despite (or because of) the fact that anyone can get it for free. By this flawed reasoning libraries would have put book publishers out of business long before the invention of the computer.

      --
      Free Martian Whores!
  3. Hmmm. seems to me that someone will figure out... by hAckz0r · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ...how to put a torrent proxy service out there to read in a torrent stream and republish those DRM'ed packets as a non-DRM'ed version of the same data, or just torrent the key itself. Once the genie is out of the bottle its always a challenge to talk that genie back into that little tiny bottle.

  4. maximum utility. by gandhi_2 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    1. patent something.
    2. patent it "...on a computer".
    3. patent it "...on a network".
    4. patent it "...with DRM".
    5. patent it "???".
    6. Profit!!1!

    --
    THL phish sticks
  5. Solves the piracy problem at the user end... by stagg · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If this goes mainstream we won't get in trouble for downloading "stolen" products, we'll get in trouble for stealing/cracking encryption keys. That should be even harder to police.

    1. Re:Solves the piracy problem at the user end... by mewsenews · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Reminds me of "stealing" satellite signals. The government has cracked down on that pretty viciously.

    2. Re:Solves the piracy problem at the user end... by Nadaka · · Score: 3, Informative

      except that "steeling" a product results in a civil fine. Cracking DRM is a federal felony that can get you decades of hardcore prison time.

    3. Re:Solves the piracy problem at the user end... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      How can you "steal" something that is broadcast over an entire hemisphere? You and I are subjected to satellite signals of all kinds without our desire or consent. How is merely making use of that radiation we are bombarded with considered 'theft?'

      No, I'm not a tinfoil hat-wearing paraniod. I am just trying to look at it pragmatically.

      Now, I WOULD consider an UP-link to a satellite without authorisation to be theft of services (bandwidth, processing time, potentially introducing security holes), but to merely make use of signals broadcast, which I am subjected to all the time regardless of desire or objection, is NOT theft.

      Otherwise, if I were a farmer growing "organic" vegetables for hippy/crunchy treehuggers, I'd be crazy to not consider filing a frivilous suit against communication satellite operators for irradiating my crops or for trespassing, if only for generating PR in the paranoid hippy "community." Note to crunchies: I am not patenting this PR-generating scam as 'imaginary property.' Feel free to make use of my idea.

  6. Re:ambivalence by jpmorgan · · Score: 3, Interesting

    That's a problem you have with any DRM. However, a system like the one described would be a fairly interesting way to deliver live content to subscribers without undue server load, especially if the underlying P2P system was network topology aware.

  7. Already being done by ickleberry · · Score: 4, Insightful

    See BBC iPlayer/Kontiki

    Not only do they want to turn your own PC against you with their DRM, they also want to use your upstream bandwidth. All the disadvantages of torrents and all the disadvantages of legally bought "treats the buyer as a criminal" DRMified files rolled into one

  8. Bandwidth of a movie? by AmigaHeretic · · Score: 2, Insightful

    So if I only want to pay for the 700MB quality KEY, I still have to download the whole 4GB torrent?

    Where can I download this awesome torrents? Oh I think I found the link:

    http://thepiratemicrosoft.com/


    ..

  9. Waste of bandwidth and disk by mysidia · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If you only get the low quality anyways, why does it make any sense for you to be forced to pull the bits in the high quality version? This is a reduction in efficiency and convenience. Due to the long transfer times required for high-quality content, and very short transfer times required for smaller low-quality content.

    There's a simpler solution to this: use keyed/passworded private torrents.

    Make different quality versions different files.

    Then the customers who purchase low-quality content don't get to download the same file as the ones who purchase high-quality content, and it means, less bandwidth and disk space is used.

    If they change their mind and wish to buy a high quality version, they can simply download the high-quality version once given access. Upon successful download replace the lq file.

    This technology is superfluous.. it shouldn't be patentable, because it's not an actual improvement.

    Inventions have to be improvements to be patentable... it's called useful discovery

    As required by the constitution: To promote the progress of science and useful arts...

    Their technology does not offer an improvement versus pre-existing unpatented technologies in common use and simpler obvious ways of accomplishing the same thing, they do not have a useful invention.

  10. Embrace, extend, extinguish by HeckRuler · · Score: 5, Funny

    FINALLY Microsoft reaches out to embrace, extend, and extinguish DRM.

  11. Re:Patent Office Gets a Promotion by Theaetetus · · Score: 3, Informative

    So, is the patent office interpreting a law, then?

    Yeah, that's kinda their job - interpreting 35 USC 101, 102, 103, and 112, among others.

  12. Why are you guys so upset? by pclminion · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I always have to laugh when people complain about patents on technologies they hate. Hello? They PATENTED it. That means nobody else is allowed to do it. And Microsoft of course, will fail at it themselves. Thus the effect of the patent is to PREVENT these sorts of DRM mechanisms from proliferating. Use your brains people.

  13. Indeed by DrYak · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Indeed, using DRM-protected torrent to distribute paid-for content was attempted by several players almost immediately by several provider when bittorrent appeared. And lots of less-legal sharing cites may encrypt the torrents so only members of the community could access its content.

    In addition, having different levels of quality in different packets of the same stream (the more packet you have, the better the quality), has been proposed in lots of old systems such as the OGG/Vorbis compression (so that a web radio emits only 1 single stream and quality decreases as packet are dropped, instead of having to emit several stream of varying quality). In fact, progressive JPEGs work in a similar way (first chunks contain low-res blurry image, later chunks add the missing details), except that they are not a media stream but static pictures.

    Meanwhile the patent was applied for only in 2005. The only thing that wasn't widely used before, is using separate key on each different "quality" packets. But it looks almost straight forward given the other technologies.

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