New MS CD Copy Protection Scheme

[Syini666]

Stung by the common practice of consumers copying, or “burning,” new versions of a store-bought CD onto recordable CDs, music companies have invested heavily in copy-protection technologies that have mainly backfired or annoyed customers.

Full story here


Unfortunately the article doesn't tell to much about the actual system. I wonder how long it will take after its unveiled before someone breaks the system?

[alittlebitnumb]

For decades, it has been a war. Anti Piracy measures are enacted, crackers have a new challenge. Crackers loooove a challenge. I'd say if it's made, it will be broken, no doubt about it.

Cheers,

albn

[Tim_axe]

When I hear digital rights management....

I already have some hardware that uses digital rights management, a cell-phone infact. It is a Sony Viva, and it uses OpenMG Memory Sticks. It basicly took the original Memory Stick and put some extra stuff inside of it. I can tell you that it costs a lot more for the DRM hardware built into the puppy, and it requires Read/Write access to work. The software automatically detects the mode, and will choose to function depending on what the current mode is (read-only/full). First of all, it is different from a CD because it is a Flash Memory Stick. It also has its own piece of hardware that plugs into the USB port. A specific piece of hardware. I have the included adapter, and my own purchased Universal Flash Adapter. Simply put, the adapter I bought seperatly doesn't work with the DRM software. It can still read and write to the Memory Stick, however. The DRM software is able to distinguish between the "real" and the "other" files. You can't copy/paste the whole memory card and expect it to work. There is probably some section you can't access that the DRM software manages. Well, that isn't all. On the PC side, there are a few Microsoft Access Databases that seem to be storing some information, but there are other forms of protection because a simple edit of that database doesn't let you do anything you want.

How is this relevant? First, it shows that DRM software/hardware is possible, and is in use. Specifically, the technology here is OpenMG. Magic Gate makes the Sony OpenMG Memory Sticks. I know that much for sure. Of course it isn't a CD, but some of it may apply... The main difference is that with the OpenMG Memory Stick and OpenMG Audio Format there is no compatibility with most other things. You can't open up the Memory Stick in WinAmp and play it. In the case of a CD, it could go both ways with their use of the word "layering". A 'CD-Player Layer' could hold completely different data than the 'PC Layer'...

Well, anyways it sounds frightening. It sort of 'informs' you on what Paldium is going to be doing, just to remind you. But, one thing that the article seems to be pointing out is that it is for Audio CDs. There is already technology right here right now that will let you pull audio from anywhere - analog > digital... Maybe that is why they invested $500 million to fix this...


-Tim_axe

[kadeng]

There is no way to protect cd s from being copied at this moment there will always be ways around it s copy-protection.