The Times: Tech column - DeCSS/Palms at war/Net homes
By David Rowan
AND now for a dangerous and controversial statement. It may look like a random collection of keystrokes, but to the copyright lawyers in Hollywood, (i+1))=k(i+1))(CS Stab1(i+1)))key(i)) is a call to arms. That inelegant jumble, which was e-mailed to us by a friendly hacker, is part of a longer line of computer code that can crack the secret algorithms protecting digital video-disks (DVDs).
Hollywood studios, eager to safeguard copyright, encrypt DVDs so that films cannot be copied. The software also determines where a disk may be viewed so that a British DVD player might reject a disk bought in the US, and a Linux-based machine will not play films at all.
So when websites began posting a code that could bypass the encryption, known as DeCSS, the lawyers went in hard. The Motion Picture Association of America fought hardest against the code's implicit "theft", citing US copyright law to win a court ruling that bans www.2600.org from publishing the code and from linking to other sites that contain it. Meanwhile, the film studios' DVD licensing agency, the DVD Copy Control Association, launched a separate court battle against websites which, it claimed, were "divulging trade secrets" by linking to the code. One defendant, Andrew Bunner, claimed that he wanted to make legally purchased DVDs viewable on a Linux-based computer. All he had done was link to something already in the public domain.
A few days ago, an appeals court in California sided with Mr Bunner. DeCSS, it said, was itself a creative work that expressed "pure speech", and free speech could not be restrained by the studios. They are appealing, of course, and the legal fights will go on. But the pause gives us this opportunity to quote part of the code to show how difficult it is to suppress such widely available information. A quick Google search reveals the full algorithm which, of course, we would not encourage you to use.
Clearly it makes sense for film studios and record companies to wield copyright law against piracy. But relentless litigation designed to suppress any new challenge to copy-protection technologies will not silence dissent. Digital-rights activists warn that the more the lawyers seek to control how a DVD or CD is enjoyed, the more consumers will feel aggrieved. The fight is bound to be played out in our own courts once the new European Copyright Directive is enacted. Content owners risk a public relations nightmare if they insist on controlling how their digital works are enjoyed.
So here is a warning for Natalie Imbruglia, whose new album, White Lilies Island, has been found to incorporate copy-protection software. Known as Cactus, it prevents recording it to MiniDisk, or playing it on certain PCs. Sure, other record labels are also encrypting CDs to control where they can be played. But it is only a matter of time, Natalie, before code that breaks the restrictions spreads across the Web.
Do you really want to take on the whole Internet?
++++
Forget Daisycutters: the technology seeing the most action in Afghanistan is the Palm handheld computer. The most popular military applications include Platoon Warrior ("to help you with your daily administrative tasks as a military leader"), the Pilot Logbook ("store up to 60 different planes") and the English-Pashto survival lexicon (dangerous "khatarnaak"; get caught = "ksseewezem").
Soldiers can also download an "evasion map for Afghanistan" from sites such as military.com, which along with palmgear.com claim to offer all the "handheld military knowledge" that today's soldier needs. The good news is that these applications are available even to non-military types, which might solve a couple of Christmas gift dilemmas. We particularly like the camouflage faceplate, and the games downloads for "when the action is slow".
++++
TAKE your pick. The number of UK Internet homes has dropped by 1 per cent since May, says Oftel, reporting a first-time fall. No, there were a million new home Internet users between June and September, says NetValue, and they stayed online for longer. While they argue, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh have just published a "serious" study proving that heavy Net users "exhibit significant addictive behaviour patterns".
Apparently "pathological Internet use" is emerging as a "new clinical disorder". Warning signs include "thinking about the Net while offline" and staying online "longer than originally intended".
Phew. For the sake of the nation's health, let's hope that Oftel is right.
(The Times, November 12 2001)
AND now for a dangerous and controversial statement. It may look like a random collection of keystrokes, but to the copyright lawyers in Hollywood, (i+1))=k(i+1))(CS Stab1(i+1)))key(i)) is a call to arms. That inelegant jumble, which was e-mailed to us by a friendly hacker, is part of a longer line of computer code that can crack the secret algorithms protecting digital video-disks (DVDs).
Hollywood studios, eager to safeguard copyright, encrypt DVDs so that films cannot be copied. The software also determines where a disk may be viewed so that a British DVD player might reject a disk bought in the US, and a Linux-based machine will not play films at all.
So when websites began posting a code that could bypass the encryption, known as DeCSS, the lawyers went in hard. The Motion Picture Association of America fought hardest against the code's implicit "theft", citing US copyright law to win a court ruling that bans www.2600.org from publishing the code and from linking to other sites that contain it. Meanwhile, the film studios' DVD licensing agency, the DVD Copy Control Association, launched a separate court battle against websites which, it claimed, were "divulging trade secrets" by linking to the code. One defendant, Andrew Bunner, claimed that he wanted to make legally purchased DVDs viewable on a Linux-based computer. All he had done was link to something already in the public domain.
A few days ago, an appeals court in California sided with Mr Bunner. DeCSS, it said, was itself a creative work that expressed "pure speech", and free speech could not be restrained by the studios. They are appealing, of course, and the legal fights will go on. But the pause gives us this opportunity to quote part of the code to show how difficult it is to suppress such widely available information. A quick Google search reveals the full algorithm which, of course, we would not encourage you to use.
Clearly it makes sense for film studios and record companies to wield copyright law against piracy. But relentless litigation designed to suppress any new challenge to copy-protection technologies will not silence dissent. Digital-rights activists warn that the more the lawyers seek to control how a DVD or CD is enjoyed, the more consumers will feel aggrieved. The fight is bound to be played out in our own courts once the new European Copyright Directive is enacted. Content owners risk a public relations nightmare if they insist on controlling how their digital works are enjoyed.
So here is a warning for Natalie Imbruglia, whose new album, White Lilies Island, has been found to incorporate copy-protection software. Known as Cactus, it prevents recording it to MiniDisk, or playing it on certain PCs. Sure, other record labels are also encrypting CDs to control where they can be played. But it is only a matter of time, Natalie, before code that breaks the restrictions spreads across the Web.
Do you really want to take on the whole Internet?
++++
Forget Daisycutters: the technology seeing the most action in Afghanistan is the Palm handheld computer. The most popular military applications include Platoon Warrior ("to help you with your daily administrative tasks as a military leader"), the Pilot Logbook ("store up to 60 different planes") and the English-Pashto survival lexicon (dangerous "khatarnaak"; get caught = "ksseewezem").
Soldiers can also download an "evasion map for Afghanistan" from sites such as military.com, which along with palmgear.com claim to offer all the "handheld military knowledge" that today's soldier needs. The good news is that these applications are available even to non-military types, which might solve a couple of Christmas gift dilemmas. We particularly like the camouflage faceplate, and the games downloads for "when the action is slow".
++++
TAKE your pick. The number of UK Internet homes has dropped by 1 per cent since May, says Oftel, reporting a first-time fall. No, there were a million new home Internet users between June and September, says NetValue, and they stayed online for longer. While they argue, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh have just published a "serious" study proving that heavy Net users "exhibit significant addictive behaviour patterns".
Apparently "pathological Internet use" is emerging as a "new clinical disorder". Warning signs include "thinking about the Net while offline" and staying online "longer than originally intended".
Phew. For the sake of the nation's health, let's hope that Oftel is right.
(The Times, November 12 2001)
posted by David Rowan at Monday, November 12, 2001
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