How to scare programmers

The American federal authorities managed to extract only one kind of benefit from Digital Millennium Copyright Act : scare programmers to death. Not everyone, of course, but some of them.

On August 30, Columonist Mit Technology Review Wade Raush said that after hacking the electronic books of Adobe, a certain programmer was hacked and the protection of books for Microsoft Reader - a program that allows us to read electronic books in another extremely common format.

For files designed for MS Reader, three degrees of protection have been developed, which are used depending on the requirements of the publisher of a particular book. The programmer in question, found a way to circumvent the most powerful of the three protection options - "exclusively for the owner", which suggests the opportunity to copy the book only once. Using the method he developed, the most protected MS Reader books are converted into files, which can then be read by any web browser (Wade Raush writes that the converting process was personally demonstrated). The programmer was forced to hack protection, since the opportunity to copy the book on only one additional computer categorically did not suit him - he needed more copies. In a word, Microsoft Reader electronic books protected in the world are no longer the most protected.

It is only unknown, thanks to whom. The programmer explained to Raush that he developed a hacking method for his own needs, did not plan to disseminate information about the hole found, and even more so to sell the utility he wrote. And he asked not to name his name. Microsoft representative Jeff Ramos in an interview with Technology Review rounded the following: "We do not comment on the alleged violations of the security systems of our software. In general, if necessary, we take the necessary measures." What does this mean, I find it difficult to say; It is not known what can in this context mean "necessary measures" in the understanding of Microsoft. But, given the corporation of rich experience in protecting rights to their intellectual property, it is easy to assume that the “necessary measures” include, among other things, judicial persecution. In this case, the nameless programmer, of course, is right in his desire to remain unknown.

There are different models of behavior in such situations. The Dutch cryptoanalyst Niels Ferguson, who collected holes in the Intel digital video protection system, refused to publish them even in Holland , deciding that the freedom of border border is more expensive for him. On the contrary, the head of Elcomsoft, Alexander Katalov plans to speak with a report , which has already become a reason for the arrest of Dmitry Sklyarov, in November at the security conference in Amsterdam (which, frankly, rather a calculated move in the campaign against DMCA than the fact of personal courage). Felten made a report on the holes in the protection of the digital audio, enlisting the promise of Riaa not to intervene and not protest. But, one way or another, American scientists are extremely concerned that their freedom to think, explore and publish the results of the study put DMCA under attack.

However, specialists from the US Intellectual Property Bureau , it seems, does not seem to bother. On Wednesday, the bureau published the results of the DMCA analysis conducted at the request of the Congress. The overall result is this : the law needs some clarifications regarding the guarantee of the consumer’s right to Fair USE (the bureau recommends introducing the requirement to provide users with the opportunity to create additional copies, as well as allow them to store archived copies of the audio and video data translated on the Internet), but does not require a fundamental review. There is an authoritative and quite reasonable opinion that the further use of such a vice will only lead to the fact that consumers refuse to consume that copy holders slip them: those protected from copying CDs risk simply being unclaimed in the market. But such considerations do not seem convincing to officials. Congress may not plan monstrous work on the review of DMCA in the near future. This means that it can still be condemned for publishing data on how to circumvent the system of protection of the copyright object, it can still be pretended that freedom of code is not freedom of speech, and writing programs is not a means of exposing the programmer, it is still considered a link on dubious materials by the analogue of the publication of dubious materials.

In general, there is something to scare programmers further.