Slashdot Mirror
Might iCloud Be a Musical Honeypot?
An anonymous reader writes "Between watermarked MP3 files and matching identical files, iCloud Music Match might wind up being a giant trap for finding owners of illegally copied files should the RIAA subpoena the evidence."
... Convert to WAV, then LAME it back to MP3. I bet someone can come up with a simple bash statement using mplayer and lame.
Apple as a company cares a lot more about their brand image than most. If suddenly Apple had 90% of it's customers who uploaded pirated music being sued because of a service Apple provided - it would be bad. I'd assume that yearly fee you pay goes to the RIAA, because Apple being a hardware company cares little about software when it is driving their hardware sales.
Based purely on speculation! Revolt against Apple! Revolt!
Doing something like that to customers would ruin Apple's reputation with customers, and for what gain? So the music companies could sue their customer more successfully?
even though there was only 1 comment when I clicked, I knew I would be too late.
... but it won't be effective, because pirates won't utilize it.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
But I'm staying the fuuuuu away.
Are you actually uploading the MP3s to Apple? I don't think so.
The service has to "fingerprint" the files in some way. A hash of the file wouldn't be enough to identify it, since there could be an unlimited number of hashes for the same song.
At most, it's probably like SoundHound or Shazam that just listens to the track. Based on that type of analytic data, there's no way the RIAA or whoever could know whether you purchased the track legally or not.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
Doesn't the same problem apply to the music lockers (Amazon, Google) or even Dropbox? Why single out iCloud?
get FLAC and re-encode.
Am I out of touch or am I, by default, wise? I look at these services and think "why would I want that? I have an ftp site of my own anyway."
Considering there must be a business model behind these services to make $$$ I wonder what I might have to put up with
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
From the article: "I also doubt that there is going to be any process that is going to ‘listen to’ the music to see if it sounds like a recognized song."
Why not? This technology exists and is available in projects like MusicBrainz Picard, used for a very similar purpose. There's every chance that iCloud could work this way.
Transcoding doesn't fool YouTube's Content ID. Why should it fool iCloud Music Match?
...to be published before spreading this FUD. Oh yeah, then you might not be able to engage in your fear tactics.
RIAAnna ftw
You guys are completely paranoid.
There is no telling the difference between a CD that iTunes ripped or aggregated from your disk (which might have been ripped prior to iTunes' existence). Remember MacAMP (or any *AMP)? How about SoundJam? There was music before iTunes. (I tell ya!)
They are SELLING you an online subscription to "upgrade" (ie, crossgrade) this music to their catalog. This way they can stream to your devices and... believe it or not... possible upcoming thin, storage-less inexpensive devices.
The only trap in there, if any, is user's reliance on a yearly subscription; how many times are you willing to pay for the music you already own?
We shouldn't expect that they would store peoples' music files without exploiting the advantage of learning about what people have uploaded, right? Of course they are going to look for any exploitable pattern that can be gleaned. Comparing most-popular songs uploaded v.s. most-popular by sales to determine what kinds of music people acquire elsewhere, encoding qualities people typically utilize, track changes with encoding format trends, better quantify the amount of stolen music, collecting bounties on self-incriminated pirates... There simply must be business value for them to bother with this endeavor at all.
1) Apple doesn't get the file; that would take forever. They fingerprint or otherwise use ID information from the file to see what song you get. Without the file there is no "proof".
2) The implied message of the program is to bring pirates in "out of the cold" with a blanket payment. The music industry doesn't care as they finally get something instead of nothing. They would not seek to kill this golden egg they are about to hatch.
3) Suing individuals has just about run the course; there is no profit in it (for the music industry, movie industry is just getting started there).
4) No way for the most part to distinguish between copies you ripped off a CD and downloaded.
This story is an Apple Haters wet dream, they same technique they always try where they take something positive Apple is doing (providing a way to move away from pirating music for the masses) and twisting it into some distorted version that is actually evil in some way. The music industry itself has and will be evil incarnate, but Apple has treated the consumer quite well to date and really served as a needed buffer between the populace and ravening madness that is the combined record industry.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Yeah, because Apple wants to spend hundreds of millions of dollars creating and promoting its iCloud service just so that they can bring the hammer down on pirates and drive everyone away to other services. That makes sense. Maybe Slashdot is getting a little paranoid and forgetting what companies actually care about (money). Seriously, how did this type of paranoia get to the front page without being flagged as "makes no economic sense". Besides, if Apple were going to do that, then why haven't they already leveraged their iTunes application to do the exact same thing?
5) Even if you owned a file that was without a shadow of a doubt pirated, that doesn't matter if they can't prove you SHARED it. If you just own it all you MIGHT be liable for the 0.99 the song could be purchased for, not the 200x damages they normally seek in lawsuits. There is no way to prove, from a file, that YOU have shared it as opposed to someone else.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Apple does many things well, and near the top is providing a positive end user experience. Only a simpleton (or a troll) would believe Apple is setting their customers up for RIAA lawsuits.
From the article:
"MD5 hash values are a cornerstone of computer forensics and fully accepted as evidence that two files are identical copies of each other. You could claim that you didn’t download the song from the file sharing network because you were the one who uploaded it, but I doubt that will help your legal predicament."
The MD5 hash has been known insecure since at least 2005. See: http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2005/06/more_md5_collis.html. I seriously doubt any computer forensics expert in 2011 would use MD5 hashes as evidence that two files are identical.
If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it must be a duck.
They have no way to distinguish from format-shifted samples.
You can pay for a website, run something like Ampache, and have better functionality, have it be cheaper, and have your privacy.
Because YouTube is looking for a particular song.
And Apple is looking for a particular song to stream it to the user.
The watermarks allow them to trace a song to the person who bought it.
So we have two separate pieces of information to convey: the identity of the work and the provenance of the copy. YouTube's Content ID adequately identifies the work, leaving inaudible watermarks to identify the provenance. Do you remember the SDMI challenge, involving watermarks that were allegedly inaudible but could allegedly survive a transcode?
1) Apple creates this service to upload your music
2) User's upload massive amounts of pirated music
3) Apple passes to RIAA all the logins of people who have uploaded watermarked music
4) RIAA sues these people with massively punitive lawsuits
5) Apple profits!!... profits?!?! Right? Hey, where are all our iPhone customers going?
Such a move is entirely not in Apple's best interest and Apple would not let such a thing happen. Nor would Google or Amazon, unless compelled by a court of law. Steve spent months negotiating so they wouldn't get sued, they wouldn't turn around and allow their customers to be sued en masse. All the Android fans could only hope that Apple would be this galactically stupid.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
The problem is much worse with Amazon, Google, DropBox, etc. With those services you're uploading the file itself to their servers. The RIAA could stomp in with a fancypants court order and demand to see your music collection.
With iCloud you're not uploading the file; you're getting the "right" to play a different copy of the file that already exists on Apple's servers. Even if the RIAA came in, it's not clear there's much they could do.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
There is no reason a cryptographically secure hash, e.g. from the SHA-2 family, would not be considered proof.
That you have a file with a given song, yes.
That you own a copy that came from pirating instead of a copy that came from ripping using the exact same software on a different system, no.
You also assume Apple wants to keep all those hashes. Why would they? They don't care.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
It's not illegal to have a copy of a song.
Pretty trivial to have made a legal copy in a variety of ways including recording off the radio or your personal CD.
It is illegal to distribute songs.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
To date, no one has been sued for downloading a file. Simply possessing a copy that was illegally made is not illegal. It is making the copy that is illegal. Since this service cannot determine who made the copy, it is no threat whatsoever.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Each time you rip from a disk, the rip is slightly different.
True. CD has one "subcode" byte per six samples to store timing information for the 588 audio samples in each sector. The digital data from several lossless rips is the same; it just has a random amount (up to one sector) of silence before and after it because drives are allowed to let the subcode data drift slightly out of sync from the audio data. This leads to so-called jitter. But rip jitter doesn't interfere with the ability to identify the actual timing of the first note of a song.
Not that I would ever do such a thing -- cough, cough -- but if I was pirating mp3s and wanted to store them on a remote server under the control of someone else, which is not very smart to begin with, I sure as hell wouldn't pick a service run by the music industry or one of its primary partners like, just for the sake of argument, Apple.
Ergo, I read this story as an excessively wordy way to say that, yes, if you are dumb as a fucking rock, the odds that you'll get caught doing something illegal are higher than average.
Proud member of the Weirdo-American community.
... Capt. Obvious. Without this story, the re-re's would never have thought of this.
As for those talking about "Aww, they'd never go after individuals!" Um, what universe did you come from? Before, they had to settle for little girls downloading Happy_Birthday.mp3. You think they'll ignore someone with a 50,000 mp3 collection given the chance? Hell no! Why? Because most people SETTLE. And they can hold you up and say, "See, see, here are the ones we've been talking about!"
So, are you, owner of 50,000 mp3's (for which you have no explination) going to settle for $100,000 fine and lose your home? Or, are you going to fight them knowing that you are not a 14 year old girl, the songs aren't Happy Birthday, and they still kicked her ass all over the place?
But hey, don't let me rain on any Apple fan-boy's parade (above comments), this same technique would work on Apple, Amazon, or Google cloud music solutions. There's no "safe" cloud storage for streaming pirated music. It's not Apple, it's the industry. They love cloud, and don't doubt it. Cloud is the new DRM. Most people just haven't realized it yet. Then again, I buy my music... now. ;) And I'm fine with using cloud.
I8-D
This isn't entirely correct -- if the song isn't already in the iTunes Store's library, the file *will* be uploaded.
That's actually a very good point; music Apple doesn't sell will be uploaded.
However, again it's not proof you have shared the file with anyone (which they need to seek damages), and also at this point if a song is not on iTunes it's probably not owned my a major label so who would come after you?
It also assumes visibility into the "cloud" by third parties which I can assure you is something Apple does not want liability for.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
No one needs to prove anything. What percentage of the population has the financial means to merely defend against the accusation?
There has to be some proof to even bring a suit or else the company bringing the suit will be heavily fined and the lawyers possibly disbarred. Witness the major damage currently in progress for Righthaven and you will understand what a company insane enough to try this would face...
All that assumes that Apple would even let them have the data, which why would they without proof? It's a catch-22 of stupidity.
Why would the RIAA leave money on the table and accept a 0.99 restitution when they could go the distance .99 IS THE DISTANCE. That is as far as they can theoretically go with you simply owning a file. And they can't even get there as I have shown.
Through Media Sentry, we uploaded selected tracks from a honeypot and collected some IP information of the downloaders.
Because the honeypot seeded it using a torrent they ALSO had proof it was being shared to other people as that is a reasonable assumption due to how BitTorrent and clients generally work. With just knowing the file exists for a user you have no proof of how they obtained it.
Plus the lawsuits you mentioned aren't even working out that well.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I am not here to "save" anyone, much less a giant multinational corporation with more lawyers than I have t-shirts.
It's just that stupidity rubs me the wrong way, and few people on this planet are as willfully stupid as the Apple Hater. I am however gleeful in correcting stupidity on all fronts, not just Apple stories.
Basically I am doing what small part I can to delay the heat death of the universe by stemming the tide of intellectual entropy. So perhaps I am here to save something after all..
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I hate to hit you with this, but the whole "shadow of a [reasonable] doubt" standard applies to criminal cases, not civil suits.
a) Without any inking of who might have pirated music, the companies have no reason to legally compel Apple to give up data they are probably not even keeping. If the companies already have proof you are pirating music they don't need Apple's data anyway.
b) To bring a suit you must have some proof. If you are bringing a suit for copyright infringement you must have some notion a user shared a file, some initial suspicion even if remote. Just owning a file is not enough.
The whole thing is absurd on the face of it, nothing at work in this process is enough to bring a suit with. You don't need to "prove" anything as a judge would not accept a case based on this alone.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I was rather under the impression that possession of copyrighted works isn't the illegal bit. It's distribution that's the illegal bit.
As iCloud won't provide any evidence of distribution, I'm not sure how useful the information will be.
Over jobs dead body. That would be corporate suicide.
After 18 months or so, the RIAA will subpoena this information in the mother of all John Doe fishing expeditions.
And all they would get is that you now own a legal copy of "99 red balloons" (or whatever) with zero information about the original file that Apple used to determined you owned 99 red balloons.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Just add a tag to the ID3 for all the files. All the hashes will change and it will be impossible to make a match.
I would even call the plan brilliant - not because it provides a (possible) way to track piracy but makes the mantra now "Piracy - the recording industry's new friend (TM)." Now, every pirated song that is matched yields a Ka-ching for no distribution cost. The more a song is pirated, the louder the Ka-ching; which is the real music executives want to hear. I would go so far as to say they may even want to encourage "sharing" as Cloud gains steam since that would increase their relative take. Of course, someone will figure out how to fool the system into transferring songs for files you don't really have - but again, it's to the label's advantage. Apple's as well, because if that drives iCloud subscriptions, Ka - ching.
So who's the loser in this? Well, depending on the contract, musicians if specific sales (CD or online) is how they get paid; at least until they can figure out how to get a cut of the new revenue stream. Other music services, since Apple will be essentially a limitless source of music at a set price. Ultimately, sellers of physical media because there is no need to buy a CD when you can easily and essentially legally get whatever you want from Apple; which will please the labels because Wal-Mart will no longer be able to dictate terms to them.
I'd venture the real end game is to transfer to a subscription based service - for a flat fee d/l whatever you want. Keep it as long as you have a subscription. Create custom playlists and stream you're own radio channel, which for a reduced subscription fee will include select targeted ads. Yes, others have tried it but given the clout behind this Apple and the major labels may finally pull it off.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Except the proper phrase for this story is, "It's a troll!"
There is no trap here. The idea is all but impossible.
Apple acquired Lala.com a while back:
http://www.appleinfocenter.com/article/Apple_s_Lala_Acquisition_Could_Change_Music_Business/70457/index.html
"Lala uses licensed technology to instantly match songs from a consumer's personal music library with the web-based catalog on lala.com."
Sounds like Music Match to me.
Bet it will cost you more than $25/yr in power to run your FTP server...and I bet there will be times when your server goes down, or needs updating, or hacked, etc.
Oh, and I bet you have to spend hundreds of dollars of your time to setup and maintain the server...and I'm not even including buying the thing.
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
So, people are saying that Apple won't do something that would infringe on their income (re: iTunes). Others have said that they won't do something to screw over their userbase. The whole problem is going to be in the EULA that comes with iCloud and whether or not by accepting the EULA that you can have your files reviewed to see if they contain pirated material. Proving that you are in legal possession of copyright material will be YOUR responsibility, not Apple's. Factor in that RIAA probably realizes that more money is to be had from sales from Apple and that they have probably had some prior collaboration prior to iCloud. Otherwise, if RIAA pisses off Apple, could Apple not just say "screw it. We're closing iTunes store to all members of RIAA. Everyone can just download their pirated stuff for free." or they could offer a monthly rate that might screw RIAA over.
I think that the RIAA is not going to fight with Apple. Not that the RIAA is smart, they aren't. But, taking on Apple is kind of like SCO taking on IBM.
"Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet." General James Mattis
that we're all wrong, and iTunes Match is finally the bitchslap into modern times that the recording industry tools finally get...
People keep repeating the MYTH that apple will upload your songs .. It doesn't take a genius to realise that uploading everyone's songs would be an absolute disaster, waste of time, etc. etc. If you stopped to think, why would they do that? what if someone has a very large collection and a very slow uplink? You will have to download a matcher/hasher/identifier program which will identify the tracks you have available, and make the same tracks available to you via the Icload. Its ok for the price but ??? .. maybe they will find people BUY bieber but hardly ever play it .. and not so many buy Joss Stone but millions own/pirate it. Priceless information.
And no-one seems to be taking account of the marketing data and information which the rec co's will get, which to them is expecially valuable
it is a little naïve to assume apple hasn't considered this
it is a lot naïve to assume that RIAA and the current content producer-friendly presidential administration (and courts) won't consider capitalizing by subpoenaing user information
If this ever happened and Apple allowed it, no one would ever trust another Apple product ever again. Ever. Bye bye Apple.
kurzweil_freak
5th Kyu Genbukan Ninpo/KJJR student
Be the darkness that allows the light to shine.
it is a little naïve to assume apple hasn't considered this
Um, if you mean something like:
Person A: "Let's see, can we make money from this in other ways?"
Person B: "How about selling out our users?"
Person A: "Nope, that's retarded. Any other ideas?"
Then, sure, *maybe* Person B was high enough or something to have come up with the idea for half a second. Otherwise, no. It's all but completely impossible that Apple ever seriously considered the idea.
it is a lot naïve to assume that RIAA and the current content producer-friendly presidential administration (and courts) won't consider capitalizing by subpoenaing user information
What user information is that, exactly? Apple will only have a list of what songs you have (it's not illegal to have a song) and the files you have uploaded to the server (again, which are not illegal to have). And, in fact, Apple (unlike Google or Amazon--hey, where's the "it's a trap!" nonsense about them?) actually has a deal with the labels. A deal which you can be certain does not include a clause which opens their customers to lawsuits.
The only naivety here is in thinking that Apple would ever implement something so abysmally stupid. However, this being Slashdot, naivety (a very generous word) regarding Apple is not only standard, but highly rewarded.
If you were following Apple gossip in the weeks before the iCloud announcement, the press was full of reports about how Apple's negotiations with the labels were going. Some large percentage of the subscription cost is, in fact, going to the labels (vs. the RIAA). So, yeah, I doubt I'd worry too much about this. RIAA members are going to make a ton of money off this scheme.
And if you're still paranoid, go ahead and put on your tinfoil hat, and then just change a few bits from each song (or cut a second of the silence at the end of each track). Voila, new MD5 hash.
Apple's genius has a hard time with tracks that have incomplete metadata- I'll bet Apple will only mirror a track if the metadata is exactly correct.
I've seen some pirated tracks in my time and usually they had bad or missing metadata.
The US government forced US Telcos to set up systematic wire taping.
The US government can force Apple (or any other company, for that matter) to do the same in order to "detect illegal activity".
Amazon, Google, et al, didn't go to the trouble of getting licenses from the labels. Apple did. Presumably, the large share of iCloud subscription revenue the labels negotiated (they're getting something like 60% of the subscription fees!) was sufficient to buy them off.
Their "genius" service within iTunes ALREADY indexes your whole freaking music library and sends the results to Apple. If the music industry wanted to use this data to try to sue "pirates", they could have done so a long time ago.
Hello, is that Mitch Bainwol, CEO of the RIAA?
Hi Mitch, how's it hanging? Anyhoo, listen, I've come up with another of my brilliant business ideas. You're gonna love this one.
So, the first thing you do, you take the number one music retailer in the world. You know, the ones with enough cash in the bank to buy the whole of the recording industry. The one with a CEO who once killed a man with a spoon because the poor schmuck suggested an extra button on the iPhone. That's it - those guys. Yeah, so step one: you piss them off. Subpoena them and sue all their customers. Ruin their business. Make them real mad.
Then, for step two.... Mitch? Mitch? Are you there?
~~~~~ BigLig2? You mean there's another one of me?
spell out the process for you:
Person A downloads album from iTunes. the songs are watermarked with personally-identifiable metadata that indicate to Apple who bought them (this is current fact, not speculation).
Person A shares the album using favorite method with Person B (which is illegal for Person A to do).
Person B uploads his music collection to iCloud.
one year goes by
RIAA subpoenas Apple for the metadata, and records of who bought what.
Apple happily complies, as it isn't interested in the legal costs involved with a privacy battle it will lose.
RIAA parses the data, finds Person A illegally shared the album, adds them to the "to be sued" list.
the only way to avoid this situation would be if apple edited the music files that are updated to iCloud, laundering them for the customer. this won't happen because a) their RIAA contacts would have a fit, b) they would have to inform the public that their "stored" data is being altered -which they haven't - and c) it is an extra cost they just don't want.
What user information is that, exactly? Apple will only have a list of what songs you have (it's not illegal to have a song)
Yeah, but Apple doesn't have to prove the songs are illegal. The whole point of the program is the assumption that you are replacing illegally obtained songs with good, clean songs. Just by signing up you are admitting guilt. So the user information would be names and contact information, a list of illegal songs you used their service to replace, and admission of guilt in the form of the TOS of the program you signed up for. All of the lawyers' work is done for them.
We're talking nearly 15 years worth of CDs in my collection, many of which no longer have a physical disk associated with them (part of the reason I ripped them over to MP3 in the first place - the CDs were scratched and close to unplayable.) If Apple or the RIAA demanded I produce proof I legally bought my music collection, I'd be SOL. Couple that with tracks of dubious legality (radio DJ shows, international tracks that were not available for sale in the US, and even a few imported CDs from other regions), cataloging the legality of my music collection would be a giant headache for the lawyers at the RIAA.
Occasionally living proof of the Ballmer peak.
In all your posts on this topic, you seem to be consistently drawing the conclusion that Apple wouldn't share the data. What do you base this conclusion on?
That is only the first line in a chain of things that ends in the music companies getting no data of any use in a lawsuit.
But the reason I draw the conclusion is that no company lets any other company have access like that, without legal compulsion. And since the only reason to collect data that would even be of any use leading back to the original file would be for something Apple doesn't care about, Apple will not even be collecting the data the music companies would even consider going after.
Why? Because it costs Apple real money to store excess data they don't need, and they have no reason to do so.
I rely only on the obvious conclusions of the economics and law around the current situation to draw the conclusions I have. All the other proposals are fantastic voyages into tin-foil battery of the highest order as the rely on one or more fanatical notions of how real life works for companies and the law.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
spell out the process for you:
Person A downloads album from iTunes. the songs are watermarked with personally-identifiable metadata that indicate to Apple who bought them (this is current fact, not speculation).
Not quite. It has the user's email address in a tag which is easily removed.
Person A shares the album using favorite method with Person B (which is illegal for Person A to do).
Person B uploads his music collection to iCloud.
Which is not illegal to do, and won't happen anyway. iTunes music will be matched, not uploaded.
one year goes by
RIAA subpoenas Apple for the metadata, and records of who bought what.
On what grounds?
Apple happily complies, as it isn't interested in the legal costs involved with a privacy battle it will lose.
Bullshit. Were Apple to "happily comply", the company would end. Even if they eventually complied after kicking and screaming, the company would be severely damaged.
RIAA parses the data, finds Person A illegally shared the album, adds them to the "to be sued" list.
No, that's *not* what they will have found.
the only way to avoid this situation would be if apple edited the music files that are updated to iCloud, laundering them for the customer. this won't happen because a) their RIAA contacts would have a fit, b) they would have to inform the public that their "stored" data is being altered -which they haven't - and c) it is an extra cost they just don't want.
Um, no, that's not the "only way to avoid this situation". This situation is all but impossible to begin with. You don't understand the law, you don't understand Apple's business model. You, honestly, don't appear to understand much of anything.
No, the whole point of the program is to be able to 'upload' your legally owned music without having to upload it. So if I want to have a copy of all of my legally owned CDs that I have legally ripped onto iTunes - and in some cases at a slightly higher bitrate - I can pay Apple a fee to have them scan my music collection and match it with high-bitrate songs on their database. Others have speculated that it could be a way for people to 'launder' the pirated music in their collection, but this is not and never has been "the whole point of the program".
What user information is that, exactly? Apple will only have a list of what songs you have (it's not illegal to have a song)
Yeah, but Apple doesn't have to prove the songs are illegal.
Apple has no interesting in proving the songs are illegal. In fact, they have a very strong interest in not making their customers fearful that such a thing might happen as a result of being a customer.
The whole point of the program is the assumption that you are replacing illegally obtained songs with good, clean songs. Just by signing up you are admitting guilt.
What? I must have missed that part of the keynote.
So the user information would be names and contact information, a list of illegal songs you used their service to replace, and admission of guilt in the form of the TOS of the program you signed up for. All of the lawyers' work is done for them.
What illegal songs? When has the RIAA *ever* gone after someone for simply *having* a song? The lawsuits you are thinking of were for *sharing* the songs. iTunes Match isn't a song sharing service, nor does it contain a way to determine who has and who has not shared which songs.
Not quite. It has the user's email address in a tag which is easily removed.
which will rarely be done by Joe Filesharer
Which is not illegal to do, and won't happen anyway.
at this point you are proving to be either ill-informed, or sitting in the RDF (both?). there is little hope in helping you understand the gravity and the possibilities; bummer.
a snake?
All that proves is that you have a file that was once leaked illegally, not that you obtained it illegally
If the watermark carries enough information, it can show who originally leaked the file illegally, adding to the evidence against the leaker. Illegal downloaders wouldn't be prosecuted but might be given a discount on going legit in exchange for turning in leakers.
Which is not illegal to do, and won't happen anyway.
at this point you are proving to be either ill-informed, or sitting in the RDF (both?). there is little hope in helping you understand the gravity and the possibilities; bummer.
Let's put that quote in context, shall we?
Person B uploads his music collection to iCloud.
Which is not illegal to do, and won't happen anyway. iTunes music will be matched, not uploaded.
It is *NOT* illegal to upload your music to iCloud, even if that music was not legally acquired. Second, it *won't* happen, because you were talking about iTunes purchases, and iTunes purchases are matched, not uploaded.
But even *if* iTunes purchases get uploaded, or even if we include the scope to non-iTunes purchases, it's not illegal to upload them to this service! Cite one example of *anyone* being sued for merely *having* a pirated song. The lawsuits you are thinking of are for sharing them, not possessing them.
The assumption in this piece is that Apple will be collecting very granular information about the exact audio file - such as the MD5 hashes of the files. As the author points out, these types of hashes are no good for identifying the music, since they are unique to each rip. So unless Apple is collecting that information deliberately to help the RIAA, I can't see why they would collect it. In fact, if I were them, I would make sure that I didn't.
I don't think it said anywhere that the upload was the illegal part. It's just a means for pirated data to be detected. I'm not familiar with any lawsuits over the possesion of illegal music either (as opposed to sharing), but it's hardly a jump to assume that a court, when given evidence that someone has illegal data, would just think "It must have magically appeared!" instead of thinking it was shared (and hence still valid for a lawsuit).
If this service works as all of you think (hope?) it will, then Apple is effectively offering to "launder" all of your illegal music if you pay them a fee. Very nice.
Will Apple place a limit on the amount of "laundering" it is asked to do? Or will I be able to keep on downloading my pirated music (for them to "launder") forever?
I thought money laundering was a criminal offense? I guess not in Apple's case...
Don Corleone definitely was a chump compared to good 'ol Steveo.
Apple as a company cares a lot more about their brand image than most. If suddenly Apple had 90% of it's customers who uploaded pirated music being sued because of a service Apple provided - it would be bad. I'd assume that yearly fee you pay goes to the RIAA, because Apple being a hardware company cares little about software when it is driving their hardware sales.
Or maybe only ripped and paid content is allowed? When I watched the keynote I got the impression that ripped content was emphasized. The quote below also may suggest that content must be ripped or purchased somewhere. Stuff downloaded off the internet *may* not be part of Apple's plan.
"iTunes Match
If you want all the benefits of iTunes in the Cloud for music you haven’t purchased from iTunes, iTunes Match is the perfect solution. It lets you store your entire collection, including music you’ve ripped from CDs or purchased somewhere other than iTunes. For just $24.99 a year."
http://www.apple.com/icloud/features/
Apple could do something simple like reject MP3s with no appropriate meta data or dupes. If an MP3 was shared maybe only the first to upload will get to use it. Without dupes the RIAA may be thwarted, meta data only shows where the ripping occurred. It does not indicate who owned the CD and who took the MP3 home.
I don't think it said anywhere that the upload was the illegal part. It's just a means for pirated data to be detected.
I'm not familiar with any lawsuits over the possesion of illegal music either (as opposed to sharing), but it's hardly a jump to assume that a court, when given evidence that someone has illegal data, would just think "It must have magically appeared!" instead of thinking it was shared (and hence still valid for a lawsuit).
Who said they'll just think, "it must have magically appeared!"?
They've only sued the sharers, not the downloaders. It's definitely a huge jump to think they will start now, and even huger still to think Apple will help them do this!
To avoid redundant comment threads:
http://apple.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2257244&cid=36520494
+1 INFORMATIVE
"Liechtenstein is the world's largest producer of sausage casings, potassium storage units, and false teeth."
it is a little naïve to assume apple hasn't considered this it is a lot naïve to assume that RIAA and the current content producer-friendly presidential administration (and courts) won't consider capitalizing by subpoenaing user information
So, how long do you think the courts will put up with the RIAA conducting a pure fishing expedition?
I also think that Apple is smart enough that they have safeguards in place to keep this from becoming a problem.
Don't you think the idea here is that most users are looking for a place to put this collection we have, so we don't have to maintain it, back it up, etc.
Some of what we have was most likely obtained illegally, but who cares. Apple is going to cut the RIAA on their share through the fee, and they'll probably get a whole lot more than they ever would have even if we had legally purchased it. Then we'll slack off and eventually delete/lose our local files thus making us totally dependent on their cloud for music, then we'll have no choice in the future but to buy new legal music which we can't easily download or rip anymore.
So it'll eventually force you legit and it will make them money year after year and soon the supply of illegals will dry up. For me its worth it... but I'm tired of dragging my collection around and backing it up.
Ya, so do i. but 99.9% of the people out there wont even know what was just said.. 'ftp what?'
They are the market for these 'cloud' services. Not you. ( nor I )
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Oh, thanks for putting that song in my head.
To say that Match will be a honeypot is either trolling for readers or if sincere then paranoia. For Apple to allow Match to be used in that way would be the most damaging thing they could do in terms of hurting iCloud. It is much more likely that Match is a pre-curser for a full blown streaming service which can be rolled out once the music moguls can be shown it is a viable source of income.
No. The RIAA could also subpoena things like logs showing the IP address you logged in from and/or the account name you used.
If they then subpoena-ed the same information from the servers of a seized BitTorrent tracker site, they could tie the two together.
What they are then left with is more coherent information about you - e,g, the fact that you bought 99 Red Balloons from iTunes, then just happened to be Torrenting it shortly afterwards... or maybe that the fact you bought 10 albums from iTunes but your IP address shows you were seeding up to 20 albums, then in all likelihood you own them for 10 albums that you didn't purchase.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
What would happen if made a MP3 file of some random sound and then renamed it and filled out the tags for a legit tune? Could I gain access to this song through iCloud? Is music fingerprinting being used to verify the song indicated by the tags?
How about turning iCloud into a honeypot for the RIAA? Some unknown user or 2 or 1000 indicates he/she has 40,000 MP3 (bogus per above) they want to access in iCloud, RIAA sues said user for infringement, we all have a good laugh when its discovered the original files were all bogus.
Because an MP3 that is ripped looks a lot different from one that is Torrented.
there's two things that could occur: 1) evil paranoid plot in snagging pirates; 2) providing a safe haven for former pirates by promising back to the various MAFIAAs their cut through this service in exchange for not going after users participating in this service. if 1) doesn't occur, then 2) basically is a way to enforce perpetual servitude to Apple by making you dependent upon their services while satisfying greedy lawyers/media executives. Of course, Apple might just end up becoming the huge middle man, kinda like the Ticketmaster for selling music, books and movies. don't forget that in Pirates of Silicon Valley Bill and Steve kept repeating, "Keep your friends close and your enemies closer." Just remember that one.
The goal of iTunes Match isn't to "hunt down pirates", it's an amnesty program to "legitimize" the honest folks who may or may not have pirated music.
It will do nothing for piracy rates for about 2-3 years.
However, as iTunes downloads saturate the populace (as Apple is the #1 music retailer) and folks spend less and less time ripping CDs (by then only life-free-or-die-tards or audiofiles will do that anymore!), any "sharing" of the downloaded music will be fingerprinted with the download info.
Of course, this will result in sharing of some iTunes match files... and when those fingerprinted files are sent from a different user back to Apple, then it's clear it's a copyright infringement. Perhaps Apple will simply disallow matching of copied itunes files, or ignore or gently remind the user "don't pirate music". However, at this point, it could happen that the RIAA has everything laid out for them in black and white... a few high-profile cases is all it will take to keep the sheep in line and money flowing.
A capitalist, free-market take on compulsory licensing that both benefits Apple and the RIAA while keeping the government and it's pesky mitts off the gold and the concept of "paid tracks" still alive (as a side effect, it even throws a few bones to the users)... quite diabolical and visionary.
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It is *NOT* illegal to upload your music to iCloud, even if that music was not legally acquired. Second, it *won't* happen, because you were talking about iTunes purchases, and iTunes purchases are matched, not uploaded.
You keep running in a circle without much understanding, I'll try to help you. He is saying not that the uploader (Person B) is behaving illegally (neither by obtaining the music, nor by uploading to iCloud), nor will the uploader be actioned. However, by uploading a file watermarked with Person A's information, he will be letting the cat out the bag about how Person A did share the file - which is, without doubt, illegal under current interpretations of copyright law, actionable, and actioned on with some regularity.
Further, not all iTunes files are automatically matched, for just this reason. Only files that are watermarked indicating they came from your iTunes account will be matched. This feature is for saving bandwidth, not legitimizing stolen music.
You keep running in a circle without much understanding, I'll try to help you. He is saying not that the uploader (Person B) is behaving illegally (neither by obtaining the music, nor by uploading to iCloud), nor will the uploader be actioned. However, by uploading a file watermarked with Person A's information, he will be letting the cat out the bag about how Person A did share the file - which is, without doubt, illegal under current interpretations of copyright law, actionable, and actioned on with some regularity.
No, I know exactly what he is saying, and he is wrong.
Person B will not be sued for having the file (none of the MP3 lawsuits were against people downloading or possessing a file), and Person B's possession of the file does not prove Person A's guilt in having shared it.
Further, not all iTunes files are automatically matched, for just this reason. Only files that are watermarked indicating they came from your iTunes account will be matched. This feature is for saving bandwidth, not legitimizing stolen music.
That is wholly incorrect. iTunes will match any song it can identify, regardless of the source (the identification is done via fingerprinting, not watermarking). iTunes songs that were purchased by you are matched without scanning. They use your iTunes purchase records. This has already been implemented and is part of the free service. Songs that were not purchased by you on iTunes will still be matched, if they can be identified, with songs available on iTunes, regardless of the source, and also be made available as part of the $24.99 yearly service. Additionally, it will upload songs it cannot match.
But in no way whatsoever is this going to be used as a honey pot to catch pirates. This whole idea is a farce.
I have an ftp site
It's 2011. Do you still use telnet to log in as root to your server, as well?
Do you think the later needs to bend over for the former at the cost of antagonizing customers who plan to buy so many Apple devices that they can not keep them synced manually?
MD5 is not what Apple will be using, since every different bitrate and/or encoder will yield different files and thus different md5 sums for the same song. AND you will never know from the perspective of apple, which song we are looking at, if there are no meta information. So Apple will use some kind of audio fingerprinting system like MusicDNS or whatever. Look it up in Wikipedia. Probably they can even reuse information gathered by iTunes genius.
Because an MP3 that is ripped looks a lot different from one that is Torrented.
When you rip with iTunes I believe there is info on the hard drive indicating that the file was ripped locally. Apple may require this.
Wow, I know I'm late to the comment party, but it occurred to me, let's say worst case scenario, ill-gotten mp3's are policed and mined in the cloud for an RIAA-style litigation. Would a statute of limitations be applicable? Like say a college student who got a bunch of mp3s in the heyday of Napster, and then stopped downloading illegally, more than 7 years ago.
Could that person be held legally liable? I know the RIAA doesn't care about laws that could be applied to them, but it appears to raise an interesting circumstance.
The main reason that Apple took so long to announce the iTunes Match service was because they were obtaining licenses from the music labels, unlike Google or Amazon. As Mr. Jobs said in his presentation, when you use the Match service and pay the 29.99/yr all your non-iTunes music that is in Apple's catalog will essentially get replaced with the 256 kbps properly licensed version.
iCloud Music Match is much more a covenant than a contract, with Apple as guarantor.