HD-DVD Processing Keys Getting Some Late Play


A few months ago, I wrote a post on HD Processing Keys and the futility of DRM. I pointed to an article on Engadget that talked about the AACS processing keys being retrieved. As a quick aside, the processing keys are a little like the master keys that allow hundreds or thousands of discs created before April 23rd to be ripped.

Yesterday, the story exploded when someone posted the keys, it got lots of action on Digg, and then Digg pulled the story in response to a complaint from the AACS. My post happens to be the first hit on Google, at present, for HD-DVD Processing Key, so my post has been getting lots of play the last 24 hours.

The thing that's funny about this firestorm is that it's all about old news. As I mentioned, I wrote the article on February 13th, and it was several weeks old then. The AACS had already responded to the key break and issued new keys, so why'd they decide to go after Digg now? Just trying to play hardball, I'd guess.

Update: Here's a copy of the cease and desist letter that Google received back in April asking it to remove posts on Blogspot that had the key posted. What funny is until they went after Digg yesterday, most people didn't even know the processing key was available. Now they've created such a mess that everyone knows and it will always be available somewhere online and findable no matter how many cease and desist letters AACS sends out. There are almost 36,000 hits to the key on Google right now.


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Last modified: Thu Oct 10 12:47:19 2019.