Intel Threatens Legal Action Against Anyone Who Tries to use the HDCP Master Key
Intel Threatens Legal Action Against Anyone Who Tries to use the HDCP Master Key
Posted 09/19/2010 at 8:10am
| by Justin Kerr
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Intel has confirmed the leak of its HDCP master key, but since any implementation would have to be done in hardware, the chip giant claims it isn’t worried. On Friday however they also confirmed that they would take swift and decisive legal action against anyone planning to produce a product that circumvents HDCP in any way.
“There are laws to protect both the intellectual property involved as well as the content that is created and owned by the content providers,” said Tom Waldrop, a spokesman for the company, which developed HDCP. “Should a circumvention device be created using this information, we and others would avail ourselves, as appropriate, of those remedies.”
The leaked master key is a particularly devastating blow since it is used to create all of the lower level keys that are embedded within devices. It makes creating HDCP compliant recording devices a simple task, and its only a matter of time before black market devices begin to appear.
Intel still hasn’t released how the master key was exposed, or if any criminal investigation is pending. The news is especially painful for movie studios who just a few months ago convinced the FCC to let them remotely switch off analog ports on cable boxes for certain content. It remains to be seen what long-term impact this will have on copy protection for HD content, but Intel is clearly willing to back its mistake with an army of lawyers.
Will this deter the black market?
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scabbynacker
September 20, 2010 at 4:24am
Nothing will deter the black market from using this to their financial gain. It's just a matter of time before some organization with enough resources makes a bluray player that simply outputs unprotected 1080p video. It'd be nice to be able to simply create backups of some Bluray movies to keep in the car for kids, or for that case kids movies in general. This wouldn't be such an issue if Blurays were a sane price to begin with, but the fact that I'm not able to legally make a backup of something I bought is ridiculous.
It's time content providers realize that copy protection does not and can not work. It's time for them to update their business model, whether they like it or not.
PM_DMNKLR
September 19, 2010 at 11:39pm
I just a moment ago snatched up the code, lol, thanks to the fine folks @ pastebin.com. Not that it'll do ME any good, lol, but it's nice to know I have something important and useful. Sweet!
ilfipian
September 19, 2010 at 7:16pm
An anonymous download bundle, a USB to an EEPROm and an HDMI cable out the other end.
Sell the hardware. It can't do anything by itself though it would probably be classed as illegal.
Download the bundle, plug in the USB EEPROM. Burn the code to the EEprom. Now plug in the HDMI cable and output through the USB.
Just thinking off the cuff...
dougau
September 19, 2010 at 4:39pm
AnyDVD(HD) has been on the market for years, What's the big fuss about? Need I say more?
dougau
September 19, 2010 at 4:41pm
So it HAS to be done in hardware only? Really, honestly, truely, no BS?
dswanick
September 19, 2010 at 11:13am
I find this statement amusing : "Intel has confirmed the leak of its HDCP master keybut since any implementation would have to be done in hardware, the chip giant claims it isn’t worried.". Many real world systesm can be emulated in software. I'm not saying it CAN be done, but I've haven't run across a situation yet were some enterprising genius hasn't banged together some kind of software solution to a "hardware only" problem.
Kordova
September 19, 2010 at 10:35am
In my opinion it wont affect the fact its out there. People have been bypassing DRM for years and hasn't stopped them yet. So what difference is there now? I guess cause its just easier for them when they have the code in there hands.
Either way lawyers wont make any difference.
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