Hollywood Faces Online Piracy, but it Looks Like an Inside Job

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

> Date: Sun, 14 Sep 2003 22:52:56 -0400
> From: Lorrie Cranor <lorrie () research att com>
> Subject: Hollywood Faces Online Piracy, but it Looks Like an Inside Job
> To: dave () farber net
>
>
> John Schwartz has an article in Monday's NYTimes that mentions a paper 
> that my colleagues and I will be presenting at TPRC and the upcoming ACM 
> DRM workshop.
>
> The NYTimes article:
> Hollywood Faces Online Piracy, but it Looks Like an Inside Job
> by John Schwartz
> http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/15/technology/15MOVI.html
>
> Paper:
> Analysis of Security Vulnerabilities in the Movie Production and 
> Distribution Process
> Simon Byers, Lorrie Cranor, Eric Cronin, Dave Kormann, and Patrick McDaniel
> http://lorrie.cranor.org/pubs/drm03.html
>
> Abstract:
> Unauthorized copying of movies is a major concern for the motion picture 
> industry. While unauthorized copies of movies have been distributed via 
> portable physical media for some time, low-cost, high-bandwidth Internet 
> connections and peer-to-peer file sharing networks provide highly 
> efficient distribution media. Many movies are showing up on file sharing 
> networks shortly after, and in some cases prior to, theatrical release. It 
> has been argued that the availability of unauthorized copies directly 
> affects theater attendance and DVD sales, and hence represents a major 
> financial threat to the movie industry. Our research attempts to determine 
> the source of unauthorized copies by studying the availability and 
> characteristics of recent popular movies in file sharing networks. We 
> developed a data set of 312 popular movies and located one or more samples 
> of 183 of these movies on file sharing networks, for a total of 285 movie 
> samples. 77% of these samples appear to have been leaked by industry 
> insiders. Most of our samples appeared on file sharing networks prior to 
> their official consumer DVD release date. Indeed, of the movies that had 
> been released on DVD as of the time of our study, only 5% first appeared 
> after their DVD release date on a web site that indexes file sharing 
> networks, indicating that consumer DVD copying currently represents a 
> relatively minor factor compared with insider leaks. We perform a brief 
> analysis of the movie production and distribution process and identify 
> potential security vulnerabilities that may lead to unauthorized copies 
> becoming available to those who may wish to redistribute them. Finally, we 
> offer recommendations forreducing security vulnerabilities in the movie 
> production and distribution process.
>
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Lorrie Faith Cranor <lorrie () research att com>
> AT&T Labs-Research, Shannon Laboratory
> 180 Park Ave. Room A205, Florham Park, NJ 07932
> http://lorrie.cranor.org/    973-360-8607

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