A spy in your CD?

[Err]

http://www.newscientisttech.com/article/dn9728-a-spy-in-your-cd.html

A patent filed by Sony last week suggests it may once again be considering preventing consumers making "too many" back-up copies of its CDs.
Such a move would be controversial. In November 2005 Sony was forced to withdraw anti-piracy software it had placed on its CDs to restrict the number of copies a buyer could make because it introduced security vulnerabilities to Windows operating systems.
Sony's latest idea is to place a piece of monitoring hardware inside the CD. Its patent suggests embedding a radio-frequency ID chip that could be interrogated wirelessly by a PC or CD player. The chip would record the number of times the disc was copied and prevent further recordings once it reached the limit. The device could also be fitted to DVDs. Whether Sony will turn the patent idea into reality remains to be seen.

 

[User Name]

I download all my music anyway, legally through Rhapsody (mostly anyway). I never touch Sony stuff. The last product I bought from Sony was a head unit for my car. BIG mistake. That ****er came out quick and I went with Alpine. Never been happier.

BTW, that edited word did not start with a f. Since when has s ucker been a bad word?

 

[EvilAmericanMan]

For some reason su ck is filtered, wierd because RO doesn't ****...

 

[Reddog]

LOL and what will it achieve when someone can make an .iso of the CD on their HDD and then burn 1,000,000 copies from the file if they want?

Or how will it counter someone burning one copy onto an average blank CD lacking the RFID chip and then using that as a master for future copies?

Bollocks IMHO.

 

[pookie]

See my previous comments re: Sony.

Assholes.

/\
Not censored? ****ing odd.

 

[Lionel-RIchie]

Free information is the way of the future. Companies based on information and the like are going to be having a hard time coping with this (I know I would if I saw my means of providing for myself drying up), but with the advancement of information technology the near-complete availability will exponentially increase.

I mean, look, technologically security measures for information don't seem to be advancing as fast as the methods of obtaining it. Each time a new CD protection software comes out to "protect" (read: not let me play a game because of my older CD rom drive model? Or implant a system on my computer that will potentially mess it up [Starforce?]) a method of bypassing that is right around the corner.

Information security is a reactive technology, and like with war and economics, if you are always reacting to the opposition, they have the advantage over you.

I'm not condoning piracy. People do need to make money off of the stuff they are selling, but the lengths that companies and organizations will go to nowadays to protect said information is kinda ridiculous (except in, say, a national security/secrets situation, banks, identities...you know...something that actually matters). This is kind of off topic, but another example of this "overprotection" through greed would be the MPA/NMPA threatening guitar tablature websites with lawsuits claiming that these individual interpretations of published music is copyright infringement. This is infuriating, as you cannot claim that teaching another person a song that you figured out how to play is COPYRIGHT INFRINGMENT! But, that topic is for another time...

 

[Mobius One]

Is this the same as the Sony BMG disks that would install a rootkit in your system, tracking your every move and sending data back to Sony HQ?

Lol, they're getting greedy with their proprietary ****. They need to cut the **** and make their crap usable and economical. They'll sell more that way and get a better reputation with the people.

 

[MrBunsy]

If Sony carry on with these ideas for much longer they won't have many customers left. Not that that's a bad thing.