NYT: In Web Uproar, Antipiracy Code Spreads Wildly

[babylonsister]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/03/technology/03code.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

In Web Uproar, Antipiracy Code Spreads Wildly


By BRAD STONE
Published: May 3, 2007

SAN FRANCISCO, May 2 — There is open revolt on the Web.

Sophisticated Internet users have banded together over the last two days to publish and widely distribute a secret code used by the technology and movie industries to prevent piracy of high-definition movies.

The broader distribution of the code may not pose a serious threat to the studios, because it requires some technical expertise and specialized software to use it to defeat the copy protection on Blu-ray and HD DVD discs. But its relentless spread has already become a lesson in mob power on the Internet and the futility of censorship in the digital world.

An online uproar came in response to a series of cease-and-desist letters from lawyers for a group of companies that use the copy protection system, demanding that the code be removed from several Web sites.

Rather than wiping out the code — a string of 32 digits and letters in a specialized counting system — the legal notices sparked its proliferation on Web sites, in chat rooms, inside cleverly doctored digital photographs and on user-submitted news sites like Digg.com.

“It’s a perfect example of how a lawyer’s involvement can turn a little story into a huge story,” said Fred von Lohmann, a staff lawyer at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights group. “Now that they started sending threatening letters, the Internet has turned the number into the latest celebrity. It is now guaranteed eternal fame.”

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[DawnIsis]

1. Every time they try to stop the downloading and copying of movies and music by changing the

encryption I just laugh cuz they can't outwit the computer geeks. They need to just give-up and start offering free downloads and make money off the advertising.

You can't stop the rock.

Same thing with stem-cell research and genetic engineering. It can't be stopped.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

2. What code are they trying to protect?

It wouldn't be hex09 f9 11 02 9d 74 e3 5b d8 41 56 c5 63 56 88 c0, would it?

[brokensymmetry]

3. Right.

It wouldn't be hex09 f9 11 02 9d 74 e3 5b d8 41 56 c5 63 56 88 c0, would it?

Yes, I think that's it. And, too, one could just Google 09 F9

But that would be wrong. :evilgrin:

[Swamp Rat]

4. hex09 f9 11 02 9d 74 e3 5b d8 41 56 c5 63 56 88 c0 ?

You mean, they don't want people to know this code in order to copy movies?:

hex09 f9 11 02 9d 74 e3 5b d8 41 56 c5 63 56 88 c0