D4rk0n3 used our news submit to tell us about this Reuters story he spotted earlier today. Apparently, piracy is a pretty big problem fro broadcasters and movie studios, according to this report it amounts to 3.5 billion dollars. They don't say where they pulled the figure from or for what time span it refers to though.
The bad news is they have heard all about CSS and they aren't going to use just a software solution this time. They will be dropping chips into players to help perform the descrambling duties. Looks like it has some backing from some pretty big clients too; like DIRECTV and Rupert Murdoch.
 NDS, STMicroelectronics and Thomson said on Friday they will develop new encryption technology to foil video piracy, a 3.5 billion dollar problem for broadcasters and movie studios. The anti-piracy technology, known as the secure video processor (SVP) platform, is designed for media companies to protect their content from unauthorized copying and redistribution. A rise in piracy has accompanied the explosion of digital video players. Crafty programmers have discovered ways to crack into DVD players, for example, to make copies of Hollywood movies quickly and cheaply. The new technology is designed to allow media companies to encrypt their content with their own digital rights management (DRM) specifications and have it unscrambled for viewing solely by devices embedded with SVP-enabled chips. The companies hope enough SVP-enabled video playback devices and TV set-top boxes will hit the market in coming years so as to allow consumers to transport the encrypted content to specially equipped SVP devices for playback. |
We have to wonder if one group can come along with a technology like this SVP platform and rule the digital content world. In addition, what will the consumer say if they once again have to replace their equipment in order to watch some content?
Source: Reuters
