Watermarks

The concept of watermarks for video content (it's harder to get away with in audio) is really just serialization. Think of somebody stamping a serial number into the DVD you just purchased. That serial number travels with any copies you make, so if it ends up in a BitTorrent someday, it can be traced right back to you.

Great idea, or at least so thinketh Tivo and others.

Some problems come to mind, though. The first one is theft. Let's say I legitimately transfer a TivoToGo show to my PC. For realism, let's make it my Microsoft PC. I have done due diligence with regard to anti-virus and anti-spyware software on this PC, but dag-nabbit, the fool thing gets infected because of a zero day exploit. Not that anything like that would ever happen, of course. Nothing to worry about, right? Anyway, this takeover of my machine transfers everything of value out to a server in some other country, and of course that includes all the Tivo content, which immediately is offered for download at cut-rate prices. Is that my fault? My bet is that the movie studio and Tivo would look at it that way.

Another scenario is my watermark appearing and I don't think I ever owned the movie in question. Quite naturally, I'd like some proof that the studio or Tivo or whoever really is absolutely certain that this watermark belongs to me. In other words, I and my attorney would like to see the source code that produces the watermark. Do you think the offended parties will just hand that over willingly? Somehow I doubt it - I bet that would be considered extremely proprietary, because letting out the code would make reverse engineering with an eye toward removal that much easier.

But why would it be that hard anyway? I would think that if you wanted to steal this stuff, all you'd need to do is compare a number of copies of the same content and see where they differ. Sure, there will be red herrings in the bits, but with enough copies, couldn't you figure out what was going on - at least enough to obfuscate the watermark? Of course the people developing watermarks are trying to avoid those problems.

My gut feeling is that the pirates will win this battle.

Comments?

More Articles by Anthony Lawrence - Find me on Google+

Jump to Comments

Many of the products and books I review are things I purchased for my own use. Some were given to me specifically for the purpose of reviewing them. I resell or can earn commissions from the sale of some of these items. Links within these pages may be affiliate links that pay me for referring you to them. That's mostly insignificant amounts of money; whenever it is not I have made my relationship plain. I also may own stock in companies mentioned here. If you have any question, please do feel free to contact me.

Specific links that take you to pages that allow you to purchase the item I reviewed are very likely to pay me a commission. Many of the books I review were given to me by the publishers specifically for the purpose of writing a review. These gifts and referral fees do not affect my opinions; I often give bad reviews anyway.

We use Google third-party advertising companies to serve ads when you visit our website. These companies may use information (not including your name, address, email address, or telephone number) about your visits to this and other websites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services of interest to you. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies, click here.