Microsoft Vista DRM subverted

Filed under: Video, Windows, Microsoft, Commercial

Microsoft Vista DRM subverted

by Brian Liloia Jan 31st 2007

Within the past month, both HD DVD and Blu-Ray's AACS protection scheme has been bypassed, and now news has broken of a researcher cracking Vista's DRM scheme. Mind you, Vista just barely hit the shelves. Boing Boing sums it up very nicely:

"As with previous multi-year DRM development efforts, this one disintegrated like wet kleenex on contact with the general public. Now that Vista, HDCP, Blu-Ray and HD-DVD are all broken, it seems like the millions of dollars and thousands of work-hours sunk into these systems was mis-spent. The only benefit that these anti-copying systems confer to the companies that developed them is the right to sue competitors -- and that benefit could have been had by shellacking a one-atom-thick layer of token DRM onto their systems, just enough to be able to invoke the DMCA. Everything else was just gold-plating, wasted money."

So the trend continues. Anything meant to be protected will always be cracked, it seems. Researcher Alex Ionesco's hack bypasses Vista's anti-copying technology and allows for full-res, unencrypted high-def video streams. Due to legal concerns, he has not yet released his code, so it is unknown what will become of his hack. And how will companies respond to the prompt obsolescence of their copyright protection schemes?

Tags: aacs, copyright, drm, hacking, vista, windows

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

James said 12:39PM on 1-31-2007

I'd like to be the first to add:

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!! HAHAHAHAHAHH!!! HAWWW!!!! Hoo...

OK, got that out of my system. Seriously, when you see the $200+ sticker on that Vista box at CompUSA, remember that a big chunk of it -- I wouldn't be surprised if it was close to half -- comes from the time and effort put into their "content protection" nonsense, which simply will not ever work, ever.

Gardiner Westbound said 12:52PM on 1-31-2007

The motion picture industry fought the VCRs introduction saying all the studios would go bankrupt, until it figured out how to make a profit on it. What would they do now without the video business?

If the studio hacks and flacks stopped fighting downloading and concentrated on devising a scheme to facilitate customers downloading high quality movies for a reasonable price they would not need their expensive manufacturing and distribution system and would make tons more money.

e-tat said 12:52PM on 1-31-2007

If Microsoft has misrepresented the true use of PMP, wouldn't that leave it open to lawsuits by consumers claiming fraudulent practice? Wouldn't MS have learned by now that lawsuits are a waste of time and money? So why would they expose themselves this way?

Moore said 12:52PM on 1-31-2007

Crack it all, I say.

What a waste of time spent on DRM development. Utterly useless.

John said 11:12PM on 1-31-2007

I am glad someone hacked it. I think it's illegal anyway and I think people need to start suing the people responsible for DRM. it causes more harm then good.

My problem is I own all of my MP3's legally. a lot of what I own is stuff I had back in high school. I been out of school over 20 years and a lot of what I have is no longer in print. I spent many hours ripping all these songs and albums. not to share them but to preserve them.

now if DRM blocks me from enjoying these MP3's that I ripped from my own LP collection? then why would I want to spend over $300 on a OS that wont even let me enjoy them? considering my MP3 collection is worth more then windows vista.

This dose not harm music pirates. it harms people like me.

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