AACS: A Lesson in Futility

[peterweg]

May 2, 2007 - AACS: A Lesson in Futility

Posted May 2, 2007 by Josh


The latest chapter in the fight against piracy is making its way into news headlines today, with the unofficial confirmation that a processing key for HD DVD titles (and possibly Blu-ray titles) was leaked onto the web. I say "unofficial" because while AACS has not confirmed its existence, or the amount of damage it will undoubtedly cause, they are not hesitating to issue cease and desist orders to every website and blog that posts the mysterious code. If their reaction is to be a judge of the impact, this is going to be a huge problem for movie studios.

The Advanced Access Content System (AACS) is the one of the three anti-piracy tools available to Blu-ray studios in order to protect their intellectual property from being freely distributed against their will. Thus far, it has proven to be as effective as a screen door on a submarine. The first Title Key was discovered on the web in January, and it took them three months to address the issue - not exactly the definition of a prompt response. The problem was a memory leak in a popular PC software player which left the Title Keys (codes unique to each movie) readable with a memory dump. The April fix rejected those codes and required the software players to fix the leak.

More recently, an Xbox 360 HD DVD add-on was modified to allow the computer to bypass the AACS system to some degree, paving the way for future applications which could potentially bypass the system completely, meaning any key change would have zero effect on the drive's ability to read and copy media.

Now, a processing key has been inadvertently leaked to the web (some say by AACS themselves), making all HD DVD discs wide-open for copying. Whether you're for or against Digital Rights Management (DRM) is inconsequential; the effects of piracy are felt by all. When AACS was first cracked, Universal (HD DVD) and Fox (Blu-ray) pulled their releases off the table and waited for a fix. That means less titles released, and no matter how you spin it, that is bad news for consumers.

Universal's reaction to this news is yet to be seen, but they surely can't be happy. Fox has taken a more proactive stance by speeding up the development of an anti-piracy technology they helped get added into the Blu-ray spec: BD Plus (BD+). The current rumors circulating are that Fox is waiting for testing to be completed for BD+ before releasing any titles using the new technology (which should be sometime in June).

The worst aspect of this entire situation has to be the actions taken by AACS themselves. The key was posted, and then numerous hacker sites posted the key to spread the word. While it was available, it was contained to that relatively small group of individuals. Then AACS started issuing cease and desist orders, and that is when mainstream media caught on. Now, the code is everywhere - even on t-shirts - and it has become impossible to stop the virus. How one organization can be so sloppy is beyond me, but one thing is sure: AACS has failed.

http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=162


Originally Posted by ra1024
"I'm a little confused. Does this key mean AACS is completely circumvented like DeCSS for DVD or is this just a temporary problem that will be fixed on later discs and players?"

Temporary problem. DeCSS was made after finding the encryption algorithm. They haven't found that yet - only a top level key developed with it. Once they find the algorithm, or bypass the system altogether, that is when it is broken. Josh

[neilneil]

I thought that was the point of AACS. They could patch any compromise that came up and there wasn't one 'master key' that could open them all and was irrevokable.


EDIT
Any system that has a single irrevokable key is destined to fail at some point.


-Neil

[peterweg]

The details are secret and finding anything about this on the net is difficult because it gets removed.
Loads of people spout off opinions when they may not understand it themselves.

[BadAss]

It wouldn't suprise me if the BD camp leaked the AACS codes in order to scare the HD-DVD studio's. Can you imagine the ramifications if there's no protection for HD-DVD titles? Fox was wise to push for BD+ it could in the long term save the BD format.

[BadAss]

Out of interest, has there been any HD-DVD titles ripped to the internet so far?

[peterweg]

Yes, a few HD-DVD are about. 7 when I just counted.

The key was leaked by AACS themselves, apparently.

Why would Blu-ray leak their own key and why would Blu-ray 'people' have access to the HD-DVD key?

Edit: I suppose if they think BD is unbreakable. Hmm, **** poor strategy if they give up a half their security to win a war they have already won.

[MAW]

The story, and the link to the principal site they are talking about is on BBC news. Currently, AACS is ALL BD have, so I find the likelihood of them being the leak very small. Even though I don't think they think the war is over, they are digging in for the long haul. BD+ on it's own may not be enough anyway, no doubt there'll be a horde of hackers onto that. Nothing is uncrackable these days, the hackers could just link in to the folding programme, and get the PS3 network to do the slogging for them, LOL! Seriously now, copy protection is history. People are not doing it for profit, but just because they can. And just like the infinite number of monkeys and the script for Hamlet, enough people trying and it will be broken.

[Miyazaki]

There are loads of hd-dvds and blu-ray discs on the internet.

Some have been downsampled to .wmv files or .ts files.

[Bald Monkey]

Yep, plenty of both knocking about... which does make a mockery of all this

But I agree with MAW it's more about beating 'the system' than profit.

[MAW]

I'm also aware of a number of HD titles of both flavours doing the rounds. No personal experience, my PC is not connected to my AV system, I have enough of PCs at work thank you, but the file sizes look right for undoctored HD movies. So the hack must actually work.

[BadAss]

Hmmm, maybe I should re-subscribe to ****hosting. Hmmm yes..... Batman Begins.......hmmm.

[TrevorS]

But there were a number of HD DVD and BR rips already posted coming out of Muslix84 efforts a few months back. Do we know the new key release is currently having a similar effect?

Why on earth would AACS leak a key? This seems completely inane to me!

[neilios]

Originally Posted by BadAss

Out of interest, has there been any HD-DVD titles ripped to the internet so far?

15 bluray and at least 54 hddvd movies available ,all full rips.
All bluray and hddvd movies released so far are available on the net ,but have been reencoded and shrunk.

[danvitale]

I'd like to read some more about the BD-J protection and how it compares to the current AACS standars on HD-DVD and BluRay.

[BadAss]

The Studio's must be having kittens.

I've had HDTV rips before but how can you tell these HD rips are specifically from HD-DVD and BD?