Welcome, Anonymous  •  Sign In  •  Register  •  Help

DRM

Home Theater DRM

HDTV and Home Theater Podcast - Podcast #536: Movie and TV Piracy

A home theater podcast episode examines movie and TV piracy, challenging the MPAA-cited figure of $200-$250 billion in annual losses against a GAO study suggesting closer to $60 billion, potentially inflated by double-counting. The hosts argue that simultaneous worldwide digital releases, DRM-free downloads, and micro-priced streaming at roughly 10 cents per view would dramatically reduce piracy by addressing availability and cost rather than adding legislation. Research cited suggests consumers pay more for unrestricted DRM-free content, making pricing and access the practical levers studios should pull.

The HT Guys •
Podcasts
Streaming HD DRM

HDTV Almanac - Zediva: Rent-a-DVD-Player Service under Fire

Zediva offers a novel DVD rental model where customers rent both a physical disc and a dedicated DVD player housed in a server farm, with streaming delivered over the Internet for $1 to $2 per rental and a 14-day viewing window. The service currently supports standard-definition DVD only, with no Blu-ray option available. The MPAA has filed for a California district court injunction citing unlicensed streaming, making the service's near-term availability uncertain for consumers considering it.

Alfred Poor •
Columns
DRM

HDTV Almanac - ISPs Ready to Get Tough on Copyrights

The Center for Copyright Information, a joint initiative between major ISPs and the entertainment industry backed by the White House, has launched a six-strike Copyright Alerts program targeting illegal content downloads on broadband accounts. Participating providers including Comcast, Cablevision, Verizon, and Time Warner Cable can enforce escalating penalties ranging from data throughput throttling to full Web access blocking. Consumers do have access to an independent review process if they dispute an alert, making it worth understanding the program before a violation affects your connection.

Alfred Poor •
Columns
DRM Streaming HD

HDTV Almanac - Rovi to Acquire Sonic Solutions

Rovi, formerly Macrovision and known for DVD copy protection schemes and on-screen program guides serving cable and satellite providers, announced a $700 million-plus acquisition of Sonic Solutions, maker of Roxio CD/DVD burning software and the RoxioNow streaming platform used by Best Buy and Blockbuster. The deal expands Rovi's portfolio across both physical disc and digital streaming distribution channels. For consumers, this consolidation means a single company will increasingly shape the infrastructure behind home entertainment content access and protection.

Alfred Poor •
Columns
DRM Blu-ray

HDTV Almanac - HDCP Code Cracked

Intel has confirmed that the High Definition Copy Protection (HDCP) master key, which secures HDMI-connected devices including Blu-ray players against bit-for-bit digital copying, has been compromised. Exploiting the crack would require implementation in dedicated hardware chips installed in playback or disc-duplication equipment, making large-scale piracy economically impractical for now. The breach nonetheless signals that hardware-enforced DRM schemes carry an inherent expiration date, with real consequences for content distribution security long-term.

Alfred Poor •
Columns
Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem Unveils UltraViolet™ Brand
DRM

Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem Unveils UltraViolet™ Brand

DECE LLC, a consortium of nearly 60 member companies, launched the UltraViolet brand in 2010 as a cloud-based digital rights locker system enabling consumers to purchase, store, and stream digital movies and TV shows across connected TVs, PCs, game consoles, smartphones, and tablets. The platform relies on a cloud-based UltraViolet Account with a Digital Rights Locker, and incorporates Adobe Flash Access for secure content distribution and DRM interoperability across participating retailers and device manufacturers. For consumers, this means buying a title once and accessing it on any compatible device regardless of which store or platform was used for the original purchase.

Shane Sturgeon •
Bulletins
Politics & Policy DRM OTA Set-Top Boxes (STBs)

HDTV Almanac - FCC Orders Remote Kill Switch

The FCC granted a limited waiver lifting its 2003 ban on selectable output control (SOC), allowing cable and satellite providers to remotely disable unprotected analog output ports on set-top boxes while leaving copy-protection-capable ports such as HDMI unaffected. The waiver restricts SOC activation to a 90-day window per title and mandates a two-year review period before any permanent policy change. For consumers, this means providers can selectively cut off analog outputs on your hardware, though the FCC stopped short of granting the MPAA full control over all output types.

Alfred Poor •
Columns
DRM Blu-ray

HDTV and Home Theater Podcast - Podcast #416: Cryptography, DRM and You

A University of Michigan research team demonstrated a method to extract a full 1024-bit private key from an OpenSSL-based Blu-ray player by injecting minor power supply fluctuations during encrypted message processing, requiring just over 100 hours and roughly $80 in hardware. The AACS scheme protecting Blu-ray relies on AES symmetric encryption precisely because asymmetric algorithms demand too much processing power for real-time audio and video decoding. For everyday consumers, this underscores that DRM consistently burdens legitimate buyers while determined bad actors find reliable workarounds regardless.

The HT Guys •
Podcasts
DRM

High Definition Content Distribution in the US (Part 2) - The Quality Factors of HDTV Content Distribution

HDTV broadcast fits within a 6 MHz channel slot using MPEG-2 compression, delivering either 1080i at over 2 million pixels per frame or 720p at 60 frames per second, with 720p better suited for fast-moving sports content due to reduced interlacing artifacts. Cable, satellite, and telco providers routinely apply bit-starving techniques to maximize channel counts, while regulatory battles over Selected Output Controls and the Broadcast Flag have repeatedly threatened to artificially down-res HD signals on analog outputs. Viewers upgrading to larger screens are most likely to notice quality degradation from over-compression and multi-cast bandwidth sharing.

Rodolfo La Maestra •
Articles
HDMI Blu-ray DRM

Who Needs Content Protection?

The Advanced Access Content System (AACS) analog sunset provisions, finalized in June 2009, mandate that Blu-ray players manufactured after December 31, 2010 restrict analog video outputs to SD interlace modes only, with all analog video output prohibited after December 31, 2013 - directly threatening the 11 million HDTVs sold since 1998 that rely on component analog connections. The Image Constraint Token (ICT) compounds this by enabling content studios to down-convert 1080i/p source material to 480i, reducing pixel count from roughly 2 million to 338,000 per frame. For consumers and installers who have invested in component analog in-wall wiring for home theaters, these protection mechanisms impose costly retrofits with no corresponding improvement in picture or sound quality.

Rodolfo La Maestra •
Articles
Home Theater DRM Blu-ray

HDTV Almanac - DVD Archiving at Risk

A 2009 appeals court ruling remanded the Kaleidescape case back to a lower court, challenging the legality of DVD ripping devices that store movies on a local hard drive network server. The dispute, rooted in a 2004 contract breakdown between the DVD Content Control Authority and Kaleidescape, hinges on license terms rather than DMCA provisions directly. If the DVD CCA prevails, consumers lose the practical ability to make archival backups of purchased discs, potentially pushing them toward cable, satellite, and internet on-demand services instead.

Alfred Poor •
Columns
DRM Politics & Policy

HDTV Almanac - Real Networks Fights Back Against DRM

Real Networks has filed a legal motion arguing that the DVD Copy Control Association's CSS License Agreement constitutes an anti-trust violation, claiming the agreement structurally blocks individual studios from licensing copying rights to third parties like RealNetworks. The dispute centers on RealDVD software, which circumvents CSS copy protection to enable disc backups that are permitted under copyright law but restricted by the DMCA. If the anti-trust argument succeeds, it could unravel the legal framework underpinning DRM enforcement across the entire movie distribution industry.

Alfred Poor •
Columns
Cable HD DRM Streaming HD

HDTV Almanac - Cable TV: Moving to the Internet?

Comcast, Time Warner Cable, and Cox Communications are exploring place-shifting services that would extend cable TV subscriptions to Internet-connected devices anywhere, mirroring what Slingbox has offered independently for years. The primary obstacle is securing content rights from networks that are pursuing their own Internet distribution strategies, a negotiation process that could take years. If resolved, subscribers could gain on-demand streaming and server-side recording tied to existing cable accounts, positioning cable operators similarly to how Netflix leveraged its subscriber base to transition from physical disc to electronic delivery.

Alfred Poor •
Columns
DRM Streaming HD

Netflix Begins Roll-Out of 2nd Generation Media Player for Instant Streaming on Windows PCs and Intel Macs

Netflix launched its second-generation instant streaming player built on Microsoft Silverlight, bringing PlayReady DRM support and dynamic adaptive bitrate streaming to both Windows PCs and Intel-based Macs for the first time. The new player delivers faster start-up times, higher quality video adjusted in real time to connection speeds, and a significantly improved timeline navigation system for fast-forward and rewind. Mac users on Intel hardware, representing roughly three-fourths of Netflix's Mac subscriber base, gain access to a catalog of over 12,000 instantly streamable titles previously unavailable to them.

Shane Sturgeon •
Bulletins
DRM Streaming HD

HDTV Almanac - Preempting Movie Piracy

Warner Brothers is piloting early online movie releases in South Korea, a market with over 90% broadband penetration and an estimated 50% movie piracy rate, releasing titles digitally two weeks before DVD availability. Online distribution offers studios up to three times the revenue share of a DVD rental, while also enabling more robust digital rights management and digital watermarking to trace unauthorized copies. For consumers and the industry alike, this signals a potential tipping point toward Internet-based movie distribution as the dominant commercial model.

Alfred Poor •
Columns