Company tries to make DVD Copying Hard...

[Jonbo298]

LOS ANGELES, Feb. 15 (Xinhuanet) -- A Silicon Valley company unveiled Tuesday a new technology that it claims to be able to block 97 percent of the DVD-copying software used by Internet pirates, without interfering with a DVD's paly ability or picture quality.

Macrovision Corp. said its RipGuard system, which can be included in personal computers, DVD players and DVD recorders, would plug the digital hole through which unauthorized versions of DVD films can be easily copied on a computer and then "burned" to other discs or put online for downloading.

The company is just the first of several firms expected to rollout new anti-piracy technology that has been years in the making, according to a Los Angeles Times report carried by its online version.

For Hollywood studios, the technology could help wring even more revenue from DVDs, which have become a leading source of their profit.

It is estimated that unauthorized DVD copying cost the studios some 1 billion out of the 27.5 billion dollars they collected from worldwide DVD sales and rentals in 2004.

"Macrovision RipGuard DVD is designed to dramatically reduce DVD ripping," Steve Weinstein, head of the company's entertainment technologies unit, said in a statement Tuesday.

Although the software used to rip discs is illegal in the United States, it has been in widespread use online since a Norwegian teenager and his chat-room friends wrote an early version in 1999.

The potential market for Macrovision is huge. With hundreds of billions of DVDs pressed every year, even a small licensing fee from the major studios would generate a significant boost to the company. Enditem

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2005-02/16/content_2581302.htm

This is laughable at best. That 3% can tell the other 97% how their software somehow bypasses it or I give it a month after this is introduced before its found a loophole. Stupid companies, they never learn how determined people can be to circumvent copy protection.

Hackers/Crackers <insert number here> - Companies: 0? :p

[Happydude]

heh, i wouldn't be surprised if this repgaurd would be history within a month after it comes out....as for preventing copying of DVDs, it's a good idea for hollywood, they just need to find a better way.

[Dark Samurai]

I'd be mad too, if I lost 1 billion dollars from my 27.5 billion /sarcasm...

[Jonbo298]

Well, the movie industry wants to suck every last dollar out of you to go to projects that fail horribly because the director thought it was a good movie :p So that extra billion just makes bad directors feel better :p

[Dyne]

I can only see the revenue from this as minimal. My impression is that the people who do download movies are probably the same crowd that rents movies and wouldn't buy movies anyways.

Just another company that wants to profit on royalties. :D

And speaking of which, this is mid-late in the DVD generation. People should realize that BluRay and HD-DVD formats will have next-to-no piracy when they get released. But I don't see any companies putting all their eggs into the next gen basket right away.

I say, put the eggs in the basket instead of wasting your money on yet another piracy protection program, unless it's 100% teenager-proof. This 97 is a pretty number on paper to PR people, but movies will still get ripped and widespread. The wide-spreading may just take a little longer, but with the way fileshare keeps growing, I doubt it.

[Blackmane]

This will stop non-hackers who just want to have a movie for free and don't have any knowledge in that area, but beyond that....

Pshh, I love when companies try to claim that their software or technology is "virtually unbreakable" because there is always somebody waiting to prove them wrong.

[KillerGremlin]

If you want proof this doesn't work, just look at the music industry. I mean, the Velvet Revolver CD installed software onto your computer so that when you ripped it the sound would be distorted. I did 2 trials. I stopped the autorun, the software never installed, and I ripped the hell out of it. I then let it autorun, the software secretly installed in the background, and I still ripped the hell out of it. Not only is my ripping software uber, but these attempts are futile at best.

[GameMaster]

Trying to stop hackers is a lost battle from the start. There's always a way to bypass something. Trying to stop hackers just wastes money. We are a group of individuals who simply cannot be stopped and will not stop until our demands our met.

Apple's DVD player software doesn't allow people to take screenshots when a movie is playing. So I just went to VersionTracker and found a third party piece of software that does allow screenshots. It's great.

I need to point out that when the companies try to restrict people from copying, it just gives the hackers more motivation to solve the puzzles and eventually bypass the security measures.

[dropCGCF]

I think if companies were smart, they would sell movies on uncopyable-USB drives.

[KillerGremlin]

Ha. 256mbs of USB space is expensive as hell. I don't want to drop 60 dollars on a movie.

[MuGen]

There will always be a way to break through any type of protection. Encryption of files was invented back in the late 80's and people still get their Credit Card's stolen off of big secure socketed websites.

Hacker's find ways and eventually make it known to all, in what would appear to be a "program" they wrote for the non=hax0r commune.

Besides, you should be able to save a CD to your computer if you have the REAL CD with an encrypted authentication. They shouldn't restrict real buyers from ripping the CD, if they don't want to have the CD everytime they wanna hear the music.

And DVD's? Easy to bypass protected DVD's on a Mac. You don't RIP the DVD as a DVD. On a Mac you copy the disk itself as a Disk Image and not a DVD Master. Once you have that copied... you double click on it and it Mounts like a DVD but it's NOT a DVD copy, it's just an image of a disk.

But anyway.... eventually something will be made by an l337 hax0r to bypass these securities.

[KillerGremlin]

The RIAA and the MPAA just need to give up and stop focusing on stoping piracy. The idiots seem to think that the problem is lack of anti-piracy protection. That's not the problem. The only reason I pirate music is because the industry sucks in general. There is to much advertising, and the record industry makes Billions off of shi|ty artists like John Mayer. Why should I help contribute to an organization that makes billions exploiting music, especially when the music I listen to is usually not contrived. If there was a way to send my 10-14 dollars directly to the band, then I'd buy more CDs. But there isn't. I'm surprised more bands haven't taken stances agains the RIAA.

Same goes with the MPAA, only not as much.

[thatmariolover]

And speaking of which, this is mid-late in the DVD generation. People should realize that BluRay and HD-DVD formats will have next-to-no piracy when they get released. But I don't see any companies putting all their eggs into the next gen basket right away.


That's exactly what I was thinking as I was reading the article. This is great, it should be out right about the time I invest in HD-DVD.