cbs228Geeks Of The World, Unite
join:2000-09-04
Saint Louis, MO | Why DRM Will Fail Hacker's rule #1: There is nothing built that cannot be hacked.
Even the most stringent of DRM systems will be cracked eventually due to the rules of basic cryptography. Encryption, with a high-bit key, is very secure for purposes such as sending email since the people who intercept the data do not have the key. For DRM, however, the end-user must have the key (and algorithm) somewhere on his/her system in order for decryption to take place. At some point, these two things must be loaded into your RAM in order to turn the encrypted data into something useable. By careful examination of the program's execution at the point where the decryption occurs, it is possible to obtain both of these things.
We have seen failure after failure, in country after country, of the effort to legislate the problem to death. DeCSS and programs to crack iTMS's encrypted AACs have not gone away despite these laws. Like any number of things in the world (such as... spam!), anti-DRM cannot be eliminated with a penstroke.
We have also seen the growth of hardware-based DRM initiatives such as TCPA/Palladium/Whatchamacallit. This merely makes cracking DRM more difficult, since the same elements of decryption (a key and an algorithm) are still present-- they're just located in a harder-to-reach place and a higher level of understanding is required.
Do not underestimate the dangers of TCPA, however, since the project's goals are essentially to remove all control of your computer from you, and place it instead in the hands of corporations and other "trusted" entities. Remember, "trusted" computing means that your computer doesn't trust you— it trusts someone else instead. To me this seems eerily similar to The Clipper Chip initiative, and TCPA could be used for just that purpose. I leave you with the admonition to never surrender control of your system to another person, be it a spyware company or Microsoft, who you cannot trust to act in your best interests.
Perhaps one day the RIAA et al. will wake up and realize that their efforts to DRM-ize everything are futile and that they are only aggravating their customers in the process. But don't bet on it.
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"If you stare too long into the abyss the abyss stares back at you." -Nietzsche
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