By Pablo María Sorondo
Translation: Guy Simpson

And so the dog bit the hand that fed it. Thanks to the success of the Internet and the rapid spreading out of new technologies, the industry that created them suddenly saw their versatility as a threat, for they made copying and redistribution possible on a global scale, with no reduction in quality and no payment for the relevant licences. The authors, however, the copyright holders, and the mega-companies in the world of cinema, music and videogames, were determined to claim their dues and to put a stop to unauthorized digital copies of their material. To this end they came up with digital protection systems, which can be installed in any file or software, and which impose numerous restrictions on the user. This is Digital Rights Management (DRM) [1], known popularly as anti-copy systems.
Bill Rosenblatt is president of consultancy Giant Steps, a drm technology manufacturer and editor of newsletter drm Watch. He classifies the concept under two main definitions, one of which is strict and the other broader. "Nearly everyone today focuses on the strict definition, which is about technology that encodes digital contents and requires special hard or software, in addition to a permit, in order to access these contents," Rosenblatt told MYRIADES 1. Thus, from a technical standpoint, the purchaser of an online music file (in iTunes, for example, or from Apple) which is encoded, will need a special medium (physical or digital) which will permit them to listen to it in accordance with a license – another file which contains a second code to decipher the first. In the broader definition, different technologies [2] combine to control access or to investigate users who exercise unauthorized use.
"By DRM we mean that system which permits transformation of contents in such a way that its use is limited in accordance with licensing specifications that protects the rights to the use of said contents. Although no technology exists that is 100% invulnerable to piracy, the aim of DRM is to put enough barriers in the way of pirates to dissuade potential malicious attempts at infringement." Thus reads a document drawn up by Communications giant Telefónica S.A. What it omits to mention is that, thanks to this new technology, firms are able to maintain control over their digital products, even after their sale; and, moreover, impede many legitimate applications that users should be able to enjoy.
How these systems work varies according to the environment – Microsoft, Apple, Sony BMG, EMI [3]  – they are designed for. Each has their own, although their functions are essentially the same: it identifies the user and the circumstances under which the user is accessing the work; then it permits or denies access to the contents or its reproduction; and finally, it limits the possible uses of the product. This data is sent by Internet to the supplier [4]. An aggravating circumstance, which impinges on privacy and is that they the system is included in a large number of devices (computers, but also audio reproducers, telephones, TVs, photocopiers, toys, electronic books...) but without informing the buyer.

Lex, Rex
The Latin American Free Software Foundation (FSFLA) describes on its site a particular aspect of anti-copy Systems which is related to the judicial, as well as the technical field. In the words, of the association, the creators of this technology "are lobbying heavily all over the world for legislation that will prohibit the production, distribution and sale of electronic devices unless they are equipped with DRM." At the same time, any attempt to bypass or pirate the set-up (and note that intention to act is proscribed instead of its execution) is classified as a criminal offence and subject to the penalties laid down by corresponding law. (See: The code-breakers).
Although each country establishes its own laws on intellectual property, and consequently on related areas, there is a perceptible tendency towards the standardization of local regulation in accordance with international legislation. The World Intellectual Property Organization's (WIPO) Diplomatic Conference of 1996; Title 17, Chapter 12, Subchapter B Section 1002 of the US Civil Code and Article 7 of the EC directive 2001/29/EC all prohibit the manufacture of hard and software without DRM provision. These regulations put into effect the WIPO International Copyright Treaty which was ratified in 1996. "The treaty says that it is a criminal offence to hack into DRM protective systems or to create tools that permit others to do so; and signatory countries (practically all the industrialized nations) are urged to adopt more or less equivalent legislation in this regard," states Rosenblatt.
Meanwhile, pressure is put on many other countries which were not involved in the treaty to align themselves with its legal principles, generally via indirect mechanisms that are linked to economic measures. Thus the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), the commercial alliance that the USA wishes to consolidate within Latin America, includes a non-negotiable clause that makes DRM anti-copying systems compulsory.
Nonetheless, Steven Waldman for the FTAA's Committee of Government Representatives on the Participation of Civil Society warned that the WIPO's regulations had been on the wrong track from the outset: "DRM is fraught with unintended consequences that not only render the approach ineffective, but actively hostile to the purposes for which states establish intellectual property rights and protections."
The legal requirement that designated protective systems be used for any and all digital products could disadvantage those for non-restrictive software, which are winning over more and more supporters and consolidating their competitive position with the industry leaders. FSFLA points out that measures of this kind deny the users of free software the possibility of accessing digital content, even though no law has been contravened. Thus, "access to DRM-conditioned digital content using programs modified by the user is impossible and generally requires the use of restrictive operating systems, putting serious obstacles in the way of the production and distribution of Free Software," the foundation explains.

Can you trust your computer?
To tighten its control even further, the contents industry is doubling up anti-copy software with DRM hardware. The idea is called Trusted Computing, although its detractors lost no time in rebaptizing it Treacherous Computing.
"Large media corporations (...) are planning to make your computer obey them instead of you. Treacherous computing is a more appropriate name, because the plan is designed to make sure your computer will systematically disobey you," writes Richard Stallman, founder of the pioneering free software movement GNU Project, in Can you trust your computer? In this article, Stallman insists on the perilous nature of these controls, which will demand authorizations for each program before they can be activated, and unless the developer can guarantee them, they will simply be rejected. [5]
If that wasn't enough, they also have the ability to record the behaviour and private data of users, and to install on their own initiative and without notification new software that permits improved manipulation.
"There is serious concern because these companies can see what the user does with the content and about some rights that the product permitted and DRM won't; and another controversy about how it can lock down users to specific machines in order to run the content," Rosenblatt reports, while describing the two clearly opposed camps on the battle as the critics, for whom "DRM is inherently evil", and industry, for whom it is "absolutely necessary for the protection of its content."
The new Microsoft operating system, Windows Vista, brought with it a weight of accusations concerning its associations with these protective systems. On the face of it, it is designed to block files and programs which fail to comply with legal requirements, and to alert the supplier if the user is infringing them. But the same thing occurs if, for example, someone attempts to record a copy of a music CD that they have bought on their car's CD player (a private, not-for-sale copy), or to carry out a back-up of their files. If you want to watch a film on a normal LCD monitor that doesn't have DRM, also known in this context as CPRM or Content Protection for Recordable Media. Windows will cancel the sound and show the visual image "slightly blurred." In this case in point, Microsoft's opinion is diametrically opposed to the evaluation of users.
In A Cost Analysis of Windows Vista Content Protection, Peter Gutmann of the University of Auckland's Department of Information Science, considers the potential collateral damage to industry of enforcing the new features. Studying the requirements for graphic devices listed in the Windows Vista Logo Program, he highlights the fact that the main one (GRAPHICS-0001) has nothing to do with your computer's memory, the velocity of the processor, the colour palette or resolution quality, but a content protection specification. For Gutmann, "this is a pretty amazing admission, because it means that Microsoft is placing content protection above all other requirements for Vista."

Unzipped
On September 1, 2005, a Disney executive made a comment in The Economist that reveals something about the desire to cover up anti-copy systems: "If consumers even know there's a DRM, what it is, and how it works, we've already failed."
The INDICARE project (Informed Dialogue about Consumer Acceptability of DRM Solutions in Europe) has published a Consumer's Guide to DRM [6], which evaluates the acceptability of this technology to European consumers and offers a user's guide to all its major features. INDICARE recommends familiarization with the technology in order to be able to recognize which products use it and the implications; it explains how to detect DRM systems from certain basic identifiers that – in a very few countries, such as Germany – the manufacturers are obliged to state by law. But there are exceptions; the EU has yet to formulate a directive about the labelling obligations for these systems. [7]
The huge complexity of the problem of anti-copy systems doesn't end here. Writer Eric Flint, in There Ain't No Such Thing as a Free Lunch, looks into the business model that underlies digital protection systems and concludes that the debate will continue for one simple reason: "because our opponents have what amounts to a quasi-religious and sometimes downright hysterical blind faith in the magic powers of DRM." And he concludes: "As a test of competing business strategies in the real world of economic intercourse, the debate is over."

References

[1] Baptized by its authors as Digital Rights Management, its critics prefer the title Digital Restrictions Management. They emphasize the excessive limitations on use that the Systems impose on the buyer.

[2] Watermarking, fingerprinting, scrambling, simple labeling etc. In Chapter Two of What Every Citizen Should Know About drm, lawyer Mike Godwin – legal director of Public Knowledge, former legal consultants to Electronic Frontier Foundation– makes a detailed description of each of these technologies and adds an evaluation of their effectiveness.

[3] While the majority of record companies limit piracy by restricting the ways customers can use the music they buy, the BBC reported on a significant move by EMI. It unencrypted the songs it sells via download sites like Apple's iTunes, which will now be more expensive and of higher quality. An unprotected song from iTunes with the higher bitrate will cost US$ 1.29 (up from 99¢).

[4] See the lawsuit between Electronic Frontier Foundation and Sony BMG for the XCP-DRM system, a piece of software that can collect information about the time, frequency and identity of songs customers listen to and forward this information to the company.

[5] To find out about compatibility of legally acquired files and specific software or hardware fitted with DRM, read the European Consumers' Organization's Test on the interoperability between online music stores and portable players.

[6] The report was headed by Margreet Groenenboom and Natali Helberger for the Institute for Information Law (IViR) with the backing of the European Commission. The authors make it clear that their statements do not necessarily reflect official views. See also indicare's, A User‘s guide to DRM in online music, from the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

[7] In accordance with the  International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, suppliers must clearly state the devices or platforms on which the content may be reproduced, and which not; if the content is computer-compatible, the operating system, software and hardware on which it will work. See also the British Campaign for Digital Rights which provides examples of these and other identifying labels.