Another Cryptography Expert Gets Into The Vista DRM Ring
Wired
News | Vista Month: Welcome To The DRM? | Wired News has a blog about DRM
in Vista, and yet again we have another person writing about something they
have no clue about. Michael Calore and Scott
Gilbertson basically run down a few of the most popular posts online about
Vista’s “DRM.”
Here’s one of my favorite bits from the post. . .
“Clearly DRM is
something to think about if you’re planning to upgrade and it raises the
question: is Microsoft trying to create a new monopoly on content distribution?
The music labels are already realizing that iTunes DRM ties them to Apple and
Schneier seems to think Vista’s DRM will do the same for Hollywood content
producers.
Schneier thinks that
Microsoft is aiming to create a lock-in not just for Hollywood content
producers but also peripheral manufacturers. “It’s another war for control of
the computer market,” he writes.”
Here’s the link to the Schneier
bit for reference.
What Schneier fails to understand is that Microsoft has the
smallest part here. Yet again people,
lets go over this very slowly. The
content is already protected! The
content is already protected! The
content is already protected! The
content is already protected! Do we get
that? In case you didn’t, lets look into
a little bit more once again.
The content is already protected by non-Microsoft systems. How exactly is Microsoft locking Hollywood
content producers into anything then Hollywood bankrolled the content protection
system in the first place?
What Microsoft does what is to allow you to be able to play
the content you purchased. I know that
sounds crazy, playing what you purchased.
To do this, any company that wants to enable playback must meet the bar
set by the specific organization who controls that specific content protection
systems. In this example, AACS would be
that for both HD DVD and Blu-ray. To
enable playback you agree to their rules.
This applies to Microsoft, Apple, any CE company looking to make a
standalone set-top box player, etc.
Schneier apparently doesn’t understand this. He says “Microsoft put all those
functionality-crippling features into Vista because it wants to own the
entertainment industry.” Yeah, Microsoft
wants to you’re the own the entertainment industry so instead of buying up all
the content they can instead do the same thing CE companies do in order to
build a HD DVD Player? Hmm. That doesn’t seem right. If I wanted to talk about “owning the
entertainment industry” I’d be talking about Apple, since Jobs actually does
now (for all intensive purposes) own a huge chunk of content in Disney. Gates doesn’t own any content, unless owning
the entertainment industry applies to a single Stock Photo company (Corbis).
And on to those “peripheral manufacturers” that Microsoft is
trying to lock-in; I’m not sure how that works.
Lets talk HDCP, that technology that Hollywood requires and that Intel
developed. The one that Microsoft has nothing
to do with really. Or we could talk
CableLabs, AACS, 5C, and any other content protection system and you will see
Microsoft also doesn’t having any meaning input into the actually
protection. Microsoft is a part of AACS,
but I can guarantee they get zero input on the content protection, they are
just there because they want to enable playback and streaming of the content
that is already protected. Talking drivers, the big Microsoft lock-in that they
have been faced with for a long time? Of
supporting technologies like DirectX and COPP within their drivers. I didn’t notice to many people complaining
there. And of course, drivers can be
released without supporting the technologies (unless it’s x64, then they have
to be signed anyway), but the protected content that the user attempts to play,
will simply not.
Schneier also tries
to make an argument that Microsoft, “with 95% of the operating system market”
could of told Hollywood no, and that Hollywood would then have to get rid of
the requirements for DRM in their products.
Of course, we all know that PC’s
don’t account for even half of the playback market. When Average Joe wants to playback content
they reach for a CE player (eg. Sony, Toshiba, Pioneer, et al). PC playback is really just a convenience, it’s
expected however and Microsoft knows this. So, that 95% of OS
marketshare, really turns into 2% of the overall player marketshare. 2% seems rather low to me, but clearly without Microsoft's support
Hollywood is going to ditch DRM because of it (Catching the sarcasm?)
Schneier ends with. . .
“Unfortunately, we
users are caught in the crossfire. We are not only stuck with DRM systems that
interfere with our legitimate fair-use rights for the content we buy, we're
stuck with DRM systems that interfere with all of our computer use--even the
uses that have nothing to do with copyright.”
With this alone we know that Schneier fails to understand
the underlying concepts at work here. I
guess I should keep studying security and cryptography, it seems when you put
that anywhere near your name people take you seriously in matters completely
outside your field. Oh well, I guess I
will start signing with posts as below.
Chris Lanier
MCP, MCSA, MCSA: Security, MVP, Security+, A+, Network+
I’ll have to work on some cryptography ones, I’ll hit that
up next week.
(Thanks to Shawn Oster to link,
only way I would have known about the posting)
Update: And of course you can search for more of my writings on the same subject. Here are two recent ones relating to Vista.
OS X and
Linux: CableCARD, DIRECTV, Dish, HD DVD, Blu-ray?
What
Content Will Be Crippled When Output in Vista?