RIAA Wants to Hack Your PC
Posted by Steven Parker on 16 October 2001 - 14:10 · no comments & 74 views
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Full name: Steven Parker
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Full name: Steven Parker
Forum name: Neobond
Contact: via forum PM
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Look out, music pirates: The recording industry wants the right to hack into your computer and delete your stolen MP3s.
It's no joke. Lobbyists for the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) tried to glue this hacking-authorization amendment onto a mammoth anti-terrorism bill that Congress approved last week.
A copy of an RIAA-drafted amendment obtained by Wired News would immunize all copyright holders -- including the movie and e-book industry -- for any data losses caused by their hacking efforts or other computer intrusions "that are reasonably intended to impede or prevent" electronic piracy.
When a customer buys a prereleased CD, that person is sent an encrypted URL, which links to Speedera's streaming area, Smith said. The buyer can then listen to the music featured on the CD as often as desired. But once the CD is released to the public and presumably delivered to the customer, Speedera will block the Web address.
This also serves to protect the property of the music industry. After Napster, music companies grew hypersensitive to any offering that distributed copyrighted materials to a mass audience. They worried that the technology could be cracked and thereby allow the music to be copied, pirated and spread over the Web.
With Speedera's technology, listeners are kept from copying or recording the streamed music. Smith said there is a secret key embedded into the encryption that prevents anyone but the buyer to access the URL. He declined to offer specifics on how that is done.
"You can't record the music; nor can you e-mail to a friend. And it can't be accessed if someone posts it on a Web site," Smith said.
The technology is easily accessible for other kinds of media, such as video, and through different software, such as Microsoft's Windows Media and RealNetworks' RealMedia.
Sources close to Amazon said that if offering prereleased music over the Web proves successful, the e-tailer will likely extend the feature into other digital content.