DRM's Far From Perfect
“If consumers even know there’s a DRM, what it is and how it works then we’ve already failed”
—Peter Lee
Disney Executive
Before the advent of the digital age, it was easy for a content publisher and owner to control the distribution of information. Any and every form of content, be it music, cinema, books or photographs had to be printed on paper or recorded on films or magnetic tape. It had to be physically published and distributed.
While these distribution packages could be duplicated, it was complex, expensive and slow. The quality of the duplicated work was often poor with each successive copy getting worse. Large-scale duplication was not feasible or profitable. Technological limitations ensured that the producers of content as well as its publishers were protected against unauthorised users.
The mass replication age
The computer age led to a digital revolution. Digital media started gaining preference and popularity over analogue media. Digital content could be easily produced with superior quality, manipulated and enhanced. Most of all, it could be reproduced without any loss of content quality.
On top of it, the Internet’s rise made it no longer necessary to make or sell actual objects such as books, tapes, and CDs. A digital copy of the file can be sent anywhere instantly using Internet, broadband connectivity and file-sharing software. As data is no longer associated with a physical object, it does not deteriorate or perish. However, the best part is quick and free delivery.
Battle for rights
Media moghuls finally woke up to the digital revolution’s threats as it hurt them where it affected them the most—their bottomline. Thus began the media industry’s struggle to censor the free spread of digital content. These were opposed tooth and nail by the advocates of freedom of information on the Net. DRM technology was devised by the media industry to regain lost ground.
DRM stands for Digital Rights Management. It is a general term for the methods of controlling and protecting digital content including digital audio, video, images as well as other forms of digital content such as e-books. DRM allows media owners and publishers to control the use, duplication and distribution of their digital content.
Evolution of DRM
Many DRM systems have come and gone because they have fallen short of expectations. Despite spending astronomical amounts on R&D, these have failed to protect rights of content owners and publishers. Nor have they been able to respect the rights of the legitimate purchasers of the digital content. In fact, the only people who benefitted were organised crime syndicates responsible for mass copying and duplication of digital content for the piracy market.
One of the first DRM technologies to arrive on the scene was the hardware dongle. It was a separate piece of hardware to be attached to the computer before the authorised user could use digital content. Later modifications include USB and smart card devices. Installation and set up of these devices was complex and it interfered with the proper use of many existing devices. However, cracks were available to circumvent such hardware. So, software and digital piracy flourished despite the existence of hardware protection.
A controversial use of DRM was CSS (Content Scrambling System). Though it was aimed at preventing mass piracy, it ended up victimising the authorised user. It was implemented by the DVD Forum on movie DVDs. The DVDs were encrypted according to location that they were sold at. This restricted the use of legitimate purchasers. The user fraternity came up with software tools like DeCSS, which enabled users to make quality digital copies of the DVDs. The most glaring flaw of this technology was the ease by which it was bypassed.
Another DRM technology used is digital watermarking. Each disk or storage media has a unique ID. The name and address of the purchaser is taken at the point-of-sale and entered into the database along with the unique ID of the media. Any copy of the digital content will include the unique ID, which can be viewed by the publisher and they could catch hold of the purchaser whose product was used for making the multiple copies.
Sony’s XCP controversy
A British company First 4 Internet developed extended copy protection (XCP) for Sony BMG (henceforth called only Sony). It was marketed as XCP-Aurora. A legitimate purchaser of Sony’s CD is prompted to install a program misleadingly named as Plug-and-play manager which remains active in the user’s computer even after the Sony CD is played.
Whenever any audio CD was played it intercepted all commands to the CD drive and gave random noise if any other music media player tried to access the audio CD. This software also concealed its activity like the rootkit software used by blackhat hackers to hide tracks of its presence. It did this by hiding all processes, files and registry keys starting with $sys$ from the user’s view. The rootkit could be exploited by crackers to hide their files and processes after they have gained access to a user’s system. This flaw was specific only to Windows-based systems. Neither the XCP nor the rootkit had any effect on other operating systems. This was exposed between October 31 and November 7, 2005 by sysinternals.com, vnunet.com and the Boston Globe which classified the software as spyware.
In response to the negative publicity, Sony released a software utility to remove the rootkit component from the affected Windows-based computers. But this utility did not remove the rootkit. All it did was unhide the hidden files installed by the rootkit. It also installed extra software which could not be removed. On 16 November, 2005 US-CERT said that XCP used rootkit technology to hide files from the user and that this technique is a security threat to the users. They also said the uninstall option provided by Sony made the system more vulnerable. So on 18 November, 2005 Sony provided a removal tool to actually remove the rootkit component from any affected Windows-based computers. It also announced that it had recalled all unsold CDs from retail outlets and will provide the affected purchasers with new CDs sans the rootkit.
Legal implications
The Digital Millenium Copyright Act was passed in the US. It is now illegal to bypass a DRM system. Even more controversial DRM regulations are on the cards including adding copy prevention codes to broadcast HDTV signals.
DRM takes away many basic rights given by copyright laws. For instance, copyright contents become a part of public intellectual property after the expiry of the copyright period so anyone can access it freely. But DRM systems do not have any time limits and there is no method to remove the copy control mechanism after the copyright period expires. Copyright law does not prevent resale of a copyrighted work. Copying is legal in exceptional cases like fair use or fair dealing. But DRM prevents authorised purchasers from exercising these rights.
The states of California, New York and Texas in the US as well as the Italian government have initiated legal action against Sony BMG and First 4 Internet for invasion of privacy and unauthorised tempering of user’s computers during its rootkit controversy.
Cases of DRM abuse are well-known and range from the absurd to the bizarre. For instance in 2000, Adobe Systems released Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland with DRM control. It disabled the text-to-speech feature normally available in Adobe’s eBook reader. The book was released with a notice that ‘this book cannot be read aloud’.
Another example is New York University’s Kraiser Dental School. The dental textbooks are available only on DVD and students have no choice but to buy DVDs. Those DVDs are readable only and that too on authorised computers and for a limited period of time. After that period the DVD expires and all information in the DVD becomes unavailable. This DVD contains many books that are not available on paper at all.
India so far does not have a Digital Copyright Act. “Digital content is covered in the amendments made to the Copyright Act and the aggrieved party can move civil or criminal court and seek remedy for infringement of copyright. Combating digital or software piracy is also covered in the Information Technology Act. However, given the presence of many global media players in India, introduction of a new law on DRM is not above the realm of possibilities,” says Mumbai based advocate Sitaram Bhamblani of Bhamblani & Company.
Those in favour of DRM are of the view that DRM concepts, security and cryptography-based technology are well understood and it is possible to sort out the initial problems faced by the authorised purchasers of digital content. They also say that if the creator or authorised distributors of digital content are not given the power to control distribution and replication of their content, then creativity will be adversely affected.
Those against it feel that the DRM issue is gone too far and violates the right to privacy of authorised users and purchasers. It has turned many normal user activities into illegal acts. DRM component of a software will take control of user device and restrict its action with scant regard for the user’s wishes. The user will have no choice, as he will not be able to disable or modify those restrictions. They also say that giving control of user computers to a third party (content publisher or creator) may lead to abuse which can go well beyond enforcement of copyright.
DRM is also being called as the first step towards Internet censorship. It is a barrier to free market and free information flow. In Europe, DRM schemes are seen as an abuse of copyrights and are nick named as eSlavery.
What next?
DRM is poised to become the next battleground between the content owners and publishers on one side and the users on the other. The content owners and publishers are determined to regain lost ground and make up for the loss of revenue that is a result of the digital revolution. The box above gives a preview of some of the schemes being cooked up on this front.
Content biggies are in no mood to give any rights for free and want totalitarian control over digital content in or out of cyberspace. On the other hand, users are determined to use content on their own terms. And as it has happened before, the initiatives will keep shifting from side to side. Only time will decide who will emerge as the clear winner.
Source: Express Computer Online
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