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Google Quietly Makes 'Optional' Web DRM Mandatory In Chrome (boingboing.net)
JustAnotherOldGuy quotes a report from Boing Boing: The World Wide Web Consortium's Encrypted Media Extensions (EME) is a DRM system for web video, being pushed by Netflix, movie studios, and a few broadcasters. It's been hugely controversial within the W3C and outside of it, but one argument that DRM defenders have made throughout the debate is that the DRM is optional, and if you don't like it, you don't have to use it. That's not true any more. Some time in the past few days, Google quietly updated Chrome (and derivative browsers like Chromium) so that Widevine (Google's version of EME) can no longer be disabled; it comes switched on and installed in every Chrome instance. Because of laws like section 1201 of the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act (and Canada's Bill C11, and EU implementations of Article 6 of the EUCD), browsers that have DRM in them are risky for security researchers to audit. These laws provide both criminal and civil penalties for those who tamper with DRM, even for legal, legitimate purposes, and courts and companies have interpreted this to mean that companies can punish security researchers who reveal defects in their products. Further reading: Boing Boing and Hacker News.
Don't care about netflix so bye bye chrome.
It's still optional; just stop using Chrome.
A republic cannot succeed till it contains a certain body of men imbued with the principles of justice and honour.
Hmm... would that constitute tampering under DMCA?
Use IE.
They've moved the options regarding Flash and PDF Reader plugins. Widevine is not listed nor given the option to be disabled within the UI.
Also these are Plugins not Extensions, two entirely different things.
Pretty soon Microsoft will look like angels...
Google Chrome is not open source. Only Chromium is. And Chromium already has web DRM disabled by default. So you will only have to build Chromium, without any changes to the source code at all.
Something something Evil....
who would have guessed
Widevine like all EME are plugins, they are not part of the browser binary, but separate libraries. Chromium couldn't be open source if it wasn't designed that way. So remove the plugin? In any case the part about researching Chrome... WTF? Chromium is open source...
Or is anyone else getting tired of basic internet tools being turned in to monsters? By that I am talking about FireFox deciding to not trust a certificate, you can't select "Yes, I know, give it to me anyway". EG: StartCom's certs - you can't click past, you have to use another browser.
Another example: Java 8 - I maintain servers. Many thousands of them, all over the globe. No, I can't put valid certificates on them. That would violate compliance in the first place, in the second place, we are talking $many^3 servers. But in Java 8, you have to add the IP to an exception list. Yeah, that's a lot to maintain. So we don't use Java 8.
Please guys that write this stuff - you cannot make unilateral decisions on security and not impact workloads. Yes, the average Internet user is an idiot and needs to be protected, but those non-idiots don't have the hours of time needed to get around your unilateral coding decisions.
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
There I said it.
Why, because media companies are too stupid to come up with a better model so they bog down the net with streams of moronic shows.
While I am venting my spleen over stupid stuff, another thing pissing me off is slashdot starting to display ads over the posts even when signed in - please stop doing that shit slashdot.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
People can still screen capture, record audio/video.
Bam. DRM defeated.
And only 3 stories between the old one and this. Was the other version not upsetting people enough?
Do we stop being idiotic sheep and start lynching these traitors and their families for compromising international security in the name of profit?
Pitchforks DO still exist, right?
And now they just never ever say anything like that anymore?
Yeah? So I turned your toaster into an alarm clock. I'm an EET thats what we do.
Apparently they can and they do just that, hence your plea for help. But discussing this in terms of your workload is really discussing a distraction. Computer owners benefit from software freedom because software freedom grants users the ability to make the software do what they want it to do. If your chosen Java runtime doesn't behave the way you want, pick a free software Java runtime and customize it to be more efficient for your needs. If Firefox doesn't have the UI you want, you can customize it to gain that UI or port older code you liked to the current version. Sure, this comes at a price: learning development, testing code, documenting one's work, and possibly coordinating changes with others (such as publishing for upstream adoption). But the alternative is non-free software where you don't have options and you beg developers to see things your way—as you said, the proprietors "make unilateral decisions" and these decisions affect more than just security issues. Software freedom lets you decide how much you want others to control your computer.
Digital Citizen
nope because your not messing with the drm part just removing it but that means you can not watch videos that use it. im sure there are audiences that do not care for it.
but it says its on by default now in chromium.
Please stop by to tell us what a wonderful new development this is.
So on top of hovering up all your data and destroying your laptop's battery life there's yet another reason not to touch Chrome with a bargepole.
Google are thoroughly embracing their new motto: Be Evil.
I will nolonger you Google Chrome unless I freakin' have to.
How does this affect forks like Vivaldi? I think Vivaldi is build using the Chromium source code which, according to this story, Google also contaminated with this change.
Why should I give a shit about that DMCA? I love it, if it means the US competition has to resign before they may even start!
--signed, European security researcher.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Can you explain to use the difference between plugins and extensions?
Plugins only affect inside web pages. Extensions affect all the way up to the GUI. A plugin can't create a new menu item, but an extension can.
the moronic, autism-hating, custom EpiPen-hating, Musk-hating Slashdot troll!
Look, it's a crap situation, but in a few years when you're trying to use the web on some low end slow eight core piece of crap that shows a 1080p desktop on a TV (e.g. phone that runs a linux VM), it ought to be useful.
The better security might be, well, more sure, when "AI" is used to spread malware.
Now I feel for people with custom GUI stuff. But perhaps some of the features belong in the browser itself. Likely, Firefox might become meaningfully "embeddable" ; so many browsers are just skins of Chrome and iOS Safari, but for Firefox there aren't that many (most derivatives are alternate builds or historical)
So if you want your star-shaped upside down tabs and whatever, maybe there will be equivalent projects to Vivaldi, Brave etc.