rallying the disc patrol

Emedia Professional, Dec, 1998 by Debbie Galante Block

PROTECTION SCHEMES FOR CD AND DVD

The only thing that will change Consumer copying habits, say many analysts, is educated

Right now, illegal copies of Titanic are being viewed and popular games are being illegally copied and played. And despite the best efforts of anti-piracy groups worldwide, piracy statistics continue to soar, which begs the question: Can the DVD Technical Working Group's goal for copyright protection and anti-piracy solutions really change anything?

While it's clear that Hollywood's influence and concern over copy protection issues played a significant role in delaying DVD-Video's foray into the marketplace, copy protection for DVD-ROM, for the most part, has been ignored. Technology manufacturers say this benign neglect will change, but the future seems uncertain. After all, CD-ROM copy protection in the U.S. remains relatively stagnant. Indeed, the only thing that will change consumer copying habits, say many analysts, is education.

Scandiplan Technology's spokesman, Joergen Espensen, confirms the reluctance of U.S. software publishers to implement protection of their products. "Part of that story goes back to the mid-1980s when diskette copy protection schemes lost popularity because legal users often had problems, hard disk contents were damaged due to protection systems, and code security was low. However, attitudes are beginning to change in the U.S. The technological time delay is very small now, and an increasing number of products come from Japanese or European companies. So publications or software packages that are distributed worldwide must be implemented everywhere, or not at all."

THE PIRACY PROBLEM FROM A PLANETARY PERSPECTIVE

According to a study released by the Business Software Alliance and the Software Publishers Association, four out of every ten new business software applications installed globally in 1997 were pirated, with estimated revenue losses of $11.4 billion. Of the countries surveyed, the United States registered the most significant piracy-related dollar losses--at $2.8 billion--while China reported the highest piracy rate at a whopping 96 percent.

Following that study, the U.S. Trade Representative released its "Special 301" list, which focuses on countries that allow piracy to occur in their territories. Especially problematic for the entertainment software industry are China, Taiwan, Paraguay, and Bulgaria. In fact, the International Digital Software Association (IDSA) estimates a $3.2 billion loss for entertainment software alone.

Kathlene Karg, Director, Intellectual Property and Public Policy at IDSA, notes that the situation is not improving either. "Piracy hasn't gotten better," she says, "there has just-been a shift in where a pirated product is coming from and how it is being distributed." For example, CD-R technologies have made illegal copying easier, and some people are selling CD-R generated pirated software on the Internet for $10 a pop.

Unfortunately, Karg explains, "Pirating software can be done incognito and it generates quick cash." To minimize these developments, she recommends a worldwide crack-down on the people who are doing the pirating. "Policies need to be implemented that prosecute those selling illegal modification devices, like those which bust DVD's regional coding," she offers. But public education is also key. "Consumers need to understand that by buying pirated product, they are cannibalizing the industry they love."

TO PROTECT OR NOT TO PROTECT: PROPOSED SOLUTIONS

Of the 25 software publishers contacted for this article, not one was ready to vouch for any particular product. Is that because they don't want to tip their hand, or because they are not satisfied with the products currently available? The answer, it seems, remains open to interpretation.

Most of today's copy protection schemes are currently being experimented with or viewed by Hollywood studios, who have taken an aggressive stance on copyright protection. And the Copy Protection Technology Working Group (CPTWG)--a committee developed by the DVD Forum to research DVD anti-piracy and copy protection solutions--is currently considering proposals to standardize watermarking and authenticating mark technologies for digital-to-digital copying, which will enhance the Content Scrambling Scheme and regional coding already in place. The group is also working to extend protection to Internet and satellite transmissions as well.

Another solution frequently considered by the studios is watermarking, which embeds a mark into the video itself. Although transparent to the end-user, the watermarked video is forever coded, whether it is pressed to DVD or transmitted through a satellite. The value of this technique, however, is a subject often disputed.

While many industry analysts consider watermarking "too passive" to work, Macrovision senior vice president Mark Belinsky says it can, "from a pirate's standpoint, be very difficult to get rid of." The primary advantages of the authenticating mark, which exists as little more than a blemish stamped onto the disc, are its noninterference with playback and its subtlety--it can't be picked up by a recorder, and thus, can only be copied to compressed discs. Pirates, therefore, will have to have their own replication facility to make discs with authenticating marks, according to Belinksy.