DRM group pledges to fight Digg rebels

– From Times Online

Bloggers who published the key that would unlock the copy protection on HD-DVDs have been threatened with legal action
Jonathan Richards

Bloggers who posted links to a software key that would unlock the copy protection on some high-definition DVDs have been threatened with legal action.

The entertainment industry-backed consortium which developed the protection said that it was looking at “technical and legal tools” to confront bloggers who made the key available, saying they had “crossed the line.”

The 32-digit key appeared widely on the internet this week, including in a YouTube video and on T-shirts, and many bloggers considered publishing it as an exercise in free speech, one alluding to Thomas Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence.

Michael Ayers, chair of the group that built the software, which uses digital rights management (DRM) technology, said that there was “no intent from us to interfere with people’s right to discuss copy protection,” and that the body had received “good cooperation from most folk” in preventing the leak of the key.

“Some people clearly think it’s a First Amendment issue. We respect free speech – we know some people are critical of the technology,” Mr Ayers told the BBC. “But a line is crossed when we start seeing keys being distributed and tools for circumvention. You step outside of the realm of protected free speech then.”

Earlier this week a row broke out when Digg, a popular technology news site, took down links to the key, saying that it had received ‘ cease and desist’ order from the group which developed the protection, known as AACS.

Facing open revolt from readers angry that the site had deferred to the owners of Advanced Access Content System (AACS), the site’s founder, Kevin Rose, reposted the link to the key, saying that he would “deal with the consequences.”

Mr Ayers would not comment specifically on the AACS group’s plans, but said it would take “whatever action is appropriate. We hope the public respects our position and complies with applicable laws.”

He said that tracking down those who had published the key was a “resource-intensive exercise”.

According to a Google search, almost 700,000 pages have published the key.

Jonathan Zittrain, a professor of internet law at Harvard Law School, said that assuming the key could break a DVD, it’s distribution would infringe the provisions of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DCMA).

“If a site isn’t policing the distribution of the code, and a publisher has issued a takedown notice, which is then not obeyed, they would likely reserve their right to sue,” he said.

09-F9-11-02-9D-74-E3-5B-D8-41-56-C5-63-56-88-C0

What is it?

It’S the original HD-DVD Processing Key for most movies released so far. This means the number is precisely the key you need in order to decrypt and watch HD-DVD movies in Linux (Insert VLC, etc).

It seems though at the moment that all DVD’s made after April 23rd have a new Processing key. Some people are skeptical but others say that a new processing key should be out in a matter of week’s.

The number caused a huge controversy on May 1st, 2007 on the famous news site “Digg.com”. It was posted originally under the article “Spread this number. Now” and was deleted well after 10,000+ Digg’s. The deletion of the story though upset Digg users as they we’re trying to have a moment of true “Freedom of speech” while also “Sticking it to the man”. Another story soon spout up called “Spread this number. Again.” and got well over 15,000 Digg’s before it was deleted. After that story was deleted users were reporting that they were banned from digg.com for digging the story and/or commenting on the original stories. Campaigns shot up fast to spread the number faster and for the first time on the Internet a widespread organized revolt happened. Users posted hundreds upon hundreds of stories including the number and spammed the comment boards on digg, and they didn’t stop there. Domains were created with the Processing key inside the domain and more. Finally May 2nd came around and after countless battles digg finally gave in to the community and posted their own story that included the key and said “We will side with the community, no matter what”. The key has made much publicity on sites ranging from “woot.com” to other well-known sites.

Many news publications describe May 1st, 2007 as the official day for the “1st Digital Revolt”. One can only imagine what will happen when the next key comes out.

With that in mind, the best way to describe the whole thing is to quote the New York Time’s itself:

“For most people this is about freedom of speech, and an industry that thinks that just because it has high-priced lawyers it has the final say”

note I posted the number because I had heard that this is no longer the key.