[282] in Privacy_Forum
[ PRIVACY Forum ] The Coax Straightjacket: Stopping Cable
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (privacy@vortex.com)
Mon Oct 8 16:28:10 2007
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Date: Mon, 08 Oct 2007 12:48:09 -0700
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The Coax Straightjacket: Stopping Cable Copy-Protection Abuse
http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000310.html
Greetings. VHS is dead. Its ghost lingers in our homes and in
cobweb-filled corners of electronics retailers, but make no mistake,
VHS recording is rapidly going the way of the dodo. And this
passing is being used as an excuse for one of the biggest consumer
ripoffs in technology history -- with our friendly neighborhood cable
television services (in their various incarnations) chuckling
mightily at the situation.
When we first started hearing about Digital Rights Management (DRM)
systems planned for digital television, there was a great deal of
concern, even though the planned focus appeared to be on "premium"
programming (HBO, Showtime, Pay Per View - PPV, and so on). Much of
this seemed rather academic anyway, since consumer devices that
would be affected by such systems were still largely vaporware.
But that situation has changed rapidly, and now cable firms (and
their fiber, satellite, IPTV, and other variations -- I'm calling
them all cable) have got their subscribers by the you know what, and
unless the FCC (fat chance) or Congress (perhaps a better chance)
get moving, consumers will see their hard won rights to record and
save television programming fade into history. It's happening right
now.
The Supreme Court "Betamax" decision decades ago established the fair
use rights of consumers to make copies of television programs, and
save them on videocassettes. But with the demise of VHS, the newly
ascendent technology is Digital Video Recorders (DVRs), such as the
TiVo and its various cruder generic cousins (the latter typically
cable company supplied).
DVRs allow saving of programs on their internal hard drives, but
there's a problem. Video takes a lot of bits, and hard drive space
is limited. So the trend now is to find ways for consumers to save
programs to external media and devices (such as DVDs or PCs), much
as they could with VHS tapes. Direct DVD recorders are appearing,
as are newer generation TiVos that will shortly have the capability
enabled to move programs to PCs and then write them to DVDs.
But many cable firms are trying to thwart these capabilities via DRM,
trying to turn back the clock to pre-Betamax days. Their magic wand
for this purpose is the Copy Control Information (CCI) byte,
transmitted as part of digital cable channels, which impacts any
modern device that interfaces directly to a cable system (e.g.,
through cableCARDS like with the newest TiVo HD -- and many more
devices so affected are now appearing).
Set CCI=0x00, and the consumer can dump programs off of their DVRs.
Set it to 0x02, and the programs are locked down. The device
manufacturers must abide by this rule or suffer the wrath of
CableLabs -- the cable industry's own version of Dr. Evil's R&D
operation.
Given the power that CCI holds over consumers, one would think that
there would be concise standards for how it would be applied to
programming. Buzzz! Wrong! In fact, the significant regulations
that apply to CCI simply require that digital broadcast channels
(that is, over-the-air signals retransmitted as digital cable
channels), must set CCI=0x00. Beyond that, the regs are essentially
silent.
Now, logically one wouldn't be surprised to find cable companies setting
CCI=0x02 -- blocking program saving to DVDs, etc. -- for special event
programming, PPV, and perhaps even the HBO/Showtime class of premium
channels.
What you might not expect to frequently find is cable company ad hoc
CCI blocking of essentially *all* basic digital channels (other than
over-the-air) totally on their own volition -- creating unfair
recording capability variations around the country.
For example, Time Warner Cable is generally setting CCI=0x02, and
blocking dumping of programs from DVRs, in this expansive manner.
There's no evidence that all of these programs suppliers have
demanded such an action. Many of these channels run Cable in the
Classroom programming that is specifically licensed to be recorded,
saved, and distributed in schools under various terms. CCI=0x02 can
directly block such licensed use. Similarly, it seems unlikely that
the various C-SPAN channels would demand blocking of program dump
functions, yet Time Warner is routinely setting CCI=0x02 for some or
all of these channels as well (which may often appear only on
digital tiers) on many TW systems.
Since nothing requires TW to be taking this broad control freak
approach to DRM on their digital channels, the most likely
explanation would seem to be a CYA mentality run amok,
subscribers' rights be damned.
Comcast, on the other hand, has reportedly been trending in the
opposite direction, with their systems moving toward CCI=0x00
settings for most digital channels, allowing consumer program
dumping and external saving.
Question: What possible valid reason can there be for cable
subscribers of one company's systems to have vastly fewer recording
rights for the same channels, compared with subscribers of another
company's cable systems?
Answer: There's *no* valid explanation for this disparity. It's
wacky, wrong, and just plain unacceptable. And as more consumer
devices affected by this craziness rapidly deploy in the marketplace,
subscribers are going to go ballistic when they discover that the
pricey boxes they've bought have key functionality cut off at the
knees by cable company edict in many locations.
If the cable industry was smart, they'd collectively start reversing
draconian CCI settings right now, and start universally treating
their subscribers as individuals to be appreciated, not chattel to be
abused. But absent such an enlightened approach from the industry
as a whole, it's likely that we're going to have to make it clear to
Congress that when it comes to this sort of DRM abuse (to paraphrase
Howard Beale in the 1976 film "Network"): "We're as mad as hell and
we're not going to take this anymore!" -- assuming that our cable
companies don't try to block this too, of course.
--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein
lauren@vortex.com or lauren@pfir.org
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800
http://www.pfir.org/lauren
Co-Founder, PFIR
- People For Internet Responsibility - http://www.pfir.org
Founder, PRIVACY Forum - http://www.vortex.com
Member, ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com
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