Author: Ed Felten
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Fixing Trusted Computing
The EFF has posted a very nice piece (apparently written by Seth Schoen) on “trusted computing” systems. The piece makes two important contributions to the debate. First, it gives the best simple introduction to trusted computing technologies that I have seen. Second, it suggests “owner override,” a technological tweak that would largely eliminate the downside…
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Halderman Dissects New CD Copy Protection
Alex Halderman has published an interesting technical report analyzing the newest CD “copy protection” technology. Alex, who is a graduate student here in Princeton’s computer science department, also wrote the definitive paper on the previous generation of CD copy protection. Alex’s paper explains how the SunnComm technology works and why it won’t help the record…
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"Hacktivism" by Artists
A debate has started over the suggestion by Harvard Law prof Charles Nesson that artists respond to file-sharing of their work with “hacktivism,” by launching targeted denial-of-service attacks on people who redistribute their work. The reaction in blogworld has been negative. This is probably illegal, but Derek Slater writes that Prof. Nesson is looking for…
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Story Time (Cont.)
Several readers took issue with my previous post relating anti-infringement technology to anti-cancer technology. So let me clarify what I was and wasn’t trying to say. First, I wasn’t saying that infringement is okay. It’s not. And I wasn’t trying to draw a moral equivalence between infringers and copyright owners. Remember: I analogized infringement to…
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Diebold Voting Machines "At High Risk of Compromise"
As expected, an independent study of the Diebold electronic voting machines purchased by the state of Maryland has found that “The system, as implemented in policy, procedure, and technology, is at high risk of compromise.” The study was commissioned by the state and performed by SAIC. A Washington Post story by Brigid Schulte reports that…
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Story Time
In a speech today, John Fictitious, president of the Hospital Association of America, expressed his industry’s disappointment at the continuing prevalence of cancer in America. “Our industry stands ready to deploy a cure, but the doctors and drug companies have been unwilling to sit down at the bargaining table to work out a mutually agreeable…
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File Sharing Vs. The Web
Ernest Miller is on a roll over at LawMeme. His latest post asks why people treat HTTP (i.e., the web) and peer-to-peer systems so differently: P2P and http uploading and downloading of copyrighted MP3s are, essentially, functionally equivalent from a copyright point of view. From a technical point of view, however, there are significant differences.…
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Senate Commerce Testimony: Post-Mortem
Today I testified at a Senate Commerce Committee hearing. The issue under discussion was whether (or how) the government should require the inclusion of DRM (anti-copying) technology in digital TV equipment. Here is my written testimony. If you haven’t been to such a hearing, you might be surprised at some of what happens. For one…
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Volokh and Solum Debate IP
Eugene Volokh and Lawrence Solum are having an interesting debate on the theory behind intellectual property. So far there have been four postings: Volokh’s initial posting, explaining via a clever example why it might make sense to treat information as property Solum’s response, challenging Volokh’s example Volokh’s response to Solum Solum’s response, digging deeper into…
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Senate Testimony
I’ll be testifying tomorrow morning at a Senate Commerce Committee hearing on “Consumer Privacy and Government Technology Mandates in the Digital Media Marketplace.” The hearing is really about two topics: the DMCA subpoena process that allows copyright owners to learn the identities of Internet users (“Consumer Privacy”), and the impact of regulations that would require…