How the MPAA knows where movies are Pirated
Written by Ernesto on October 31, 2006I’ve posted a story about the MPAA’s piracy stats, and that NY is the pirate capital of the world. In the post I said that it was hard to track down the source of CAM releases, but that was a mistake.
Although I’m familiar with the watermarks that are put in DVD’s, I never realized that theater releases are marked as well (see picture for the “dot pattern”).
However, sometimes release groups find a way to remove these watermarks. An example can be found in the NFO of the Mission Impossible III release by SaGa. In the NFO SaGa thanks ORC, for helping them out with “de-dotting” the release.
Here’s an interesting email I received from a reader who actually worked for an anti-piracy company. Some good info, and useful tips and tricks that “might” keep pirates under the radar ;).
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Thought I’d let you know how the authorities are able to track down where CAM, TS, TC, SCR, DVD SCR, etc. copies are from. In all cases, the individual copies are watermarked and then kept in a database for later comparison. These watermarks are developed and instituted either by the companies responsible for the film (i.e. Kodak) or the prints (i.e. Deluxe, Technicolor). Each has a different method, some more effective than others.
Here is a Wikipedia article about them:
Generally the CAP codes are more for film elements (i.e. CAM, TS, TC releases). For the disc and tape copies (i.e. SCR, DVD SCR) there is usually some form of watermarking combined with a time stamp or individual code of some sort.
These types of protection sometimes work and sometimes don’t. A lot of groups have experience with obfuscating them and (usually successfully) hiding where they got their copy from.
Fortunately most of the companies focusing on anti-piracy are not actively trying to target the groups themselves, leaving that task to the DOJ or FBI to handle. Because of this, most of the media attention and an overwhelming amount of the resources are dedicated to people who are not close to the scene at all, so a lot of these anti-piracy methods don’t really work very effectively.
Most of the attention is actually on users and first propagators on BitTorrent and eDonkey, so I’d actually recommend using various forms of protection such as PeerGuardian and generally staying on private trackers or at least the less popular ones (NTI being a good example). Also safe is jumping on hugely popular torrents once they reach critical mass. There are simply not enough resources for anti-piracy companies to track what 5000 seeders and 8000 leechers are doing all at once and gather data that will be usable in a court of law.
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Another reader pointed me at the new anti-piracy watermark system that Philips has started to rollout. Philips successfully equipped over 1300 cinemas with their new system called “Cinefence”. CineFence watermarks are believed to be harder to erase by pirates, and contain the time, place and date of the recorded Film. Forensic marking of digital Films is now a mandatory requirement, as specified in the Digital Cinema System Specification (pdf link).
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35 Responses
Those tips make that anti-piracy dude look awfully stupid in my eyes.
@Hannes; He’s one of us, but has infiltrated the enemy base :p
Those anti-piracy fuckers can stick those dots where the sun don’t shine.
PG2 :) If he mentions this hes good in my books… “PG2 For All” Should Be Sprayed On A Blockbuster Window lol
I don’t really understand…. on each kodak film they made a cap code? So for every theater there’s a different cap code???
Vince, yeah thats exactly right. I’m sure I read about this a fair while ago to be honest.
Still, congrats on making digg front page.
Thanks Tom, but i wonder how the heck they can “decode” a cap code from a simple divX video…….
That captured image with Tara Reid is from what movie??
This has been known in the scene for some time, and usually the cammers remove the frames from which those shots are taken, so you can usually see some small skip in the movie….quite honestly, I can see those dots in the movie when I see them at the theaters and it’s quite annoying.
[quote comment="18564"]That captured image with Tara Reid is from what movie??[/quote]
my bosses daughter or something.
“NY is the pirate capital of the world”…..he he he ……go to Rusia or other east-uropean country…..and you will see where is that “pirate capital of the world”
Thank you so much for these piracy tips! FUCK artists, FUCK content creators, and FUCK their rights. I’d much rather watch movies without paying anybody anything at all and hoping they’ll keep making them in the future.
@Platypus: “Those anti-piracy fuckers can stick those dots where the sun don’t shine.”
For instance, a movie theatre? (couldn’t resist)
[quote comment="18592"]Thank you so much for these piracy tips! FUCK artists, FUCK content creators, and FUCK their rights. I’d much rather watch movies without paying anybody anything at all and hoping they’ll keep making them in the future.[/quote]
If the NY Times can publish information about how we track terrorists and their money, I think it’s safe to report about anti-piracy techniques. Its an interesting story, and pirates probably already know this stuff already. Your hyperbole, however, is duly noted.
#10 is right. the amount of piracy in Russia, china and India is mind bugling. NY is but a tiny speck.
Hey, Malaysia’s the true pirate capital of the world. No argument required, just facts.
and generally staying on private trackers or at least the less popular ones (NTI being a good example
what is the url for nti? thanks
let’s face it: the mpaa can’t keep up with the sheer amount of movies that are already available online, and they can’t stop release groups from releasing movies online. it’s a pointless battle on their part to try to stop it from happening. i know i haven’t said what i’m about to say on this site, so here goes: the internet has changed everything, and government feds can’t handle it. seriously, just look at the amount of things that have changed since the advent of the internet. pay for music? why? pay for movies? why? pay for software/games? WHY? i know, i know. it’s teh illegal to download movies, music, games, programs, etc., but it’s not illegal for movies, music, games and programs to cost so much damn money? that’s what i personally don’t understand. i know, i know. the people that develop/make movies, music, games and programs all bust their collective asses on developing/making the finished product, and they deserve to get paid for their efforts. i’m all for that, but i’m also all for their creations not costing a ton of damn money. sure, a cd may only cost 12-15 bucks, for instance, but it’s the point that there’s just so much crappy music out there that cost that much money that’s not even worth me chunking down 12-15 bucks for that i would rather download the cd first to see if it’s even worth me paying money for to begin with. besides, most of the music that i like to listen to are by artists that are no longer in their heyday, and therefore they’re not making all kinds of money on album sales and concerts like they used to.
Interesting stuff. Very informative article, thanks!
Ok everytime I goto see movies I catch the CAP codes. I keep asking my friends, and they barely notice them if at all. They’re such a pain in the ass. I can rememeber throughout Jackass 2 there were at least 10 of them, and its so damn easy to see them. This makes it sound like pirates have a crazy way of killing the cap codes. It’s simple, remove the 2 or 3 frames that have the cap codes or blur it out…
What is the mpaa?
[quote comment="18716"]What is the mpaa?[/quote]
What is google?
Klik Hier
@df – welcome to the internet buddy.
What’s also possible, if removing the watermarks is not possible, to recode movies and put fake watermarks in it. I know that for some they stand for a lesser quality, but it’s at least better than getting caught.
Now, while the X nr of dot’s might be easy to reproduce, and thus hack (recode movies without dots to include them, or if movies already contain the dots (or other watermarks), add multiple versions of them in the movie), other types of watermarks might be a bit harder to crack. I cannot imagine that Philips is a company which creates a very easy to detect watermark. I also cannot imagine that a new version of the movie is encoded for each theater, though it is possible of course. I’d rather think of some device which filters the image and puts a watermark on it on the fly. This (might) even allow the algorithm to change when it has been hacked.
Just some random thoughts for you to think about in this crazy world.
Who cares about codes and stuff in theater movies.. i havent seen one movie with good quality! (or sound)
CAP codes are why I no longer pay to go to movie theaters. The pirates will find ways to not let these get them caught, and in the meantime legitimate paying customers are punished and then driven away.
what is the INTERNET ?
: )
[quote comment="18843"]what is the INTERNET ?
: )[/quote]
It’s that thing that’s inside the EXTERNET
well i have to agree with all of abt this mpaa thing they cant ever stop piracy this way,and pd9 ur right malaysia is the pirate capital and what quality they sell,and china is second.. in india it is bollywood piracy and film maker are already felling the heat of piracy.. by the way what is nti do anyone has a link to it.
Hey my fellow pirates, does peer gaurdian 2 block your IP from everything or is it just for P2P and not BT
If you can’t figure out what the fuck NTi is or how to use Google, then you either deserve to get caught trying to pirate or you just don’t deserve a fucking computer and online access. In most cases, both.
lizard king you are not worthy of calling yourself a pirate with that comment ! what a little cock jockey you are
and the wheels keep turning
Well the obvious answer would seem to be to CAM it in 2 locations and use the 2 versions to create 1 de-dotted release – which is what I guess goes on :)
Look we understand that producers have to get paid because they got families to support and kids to take care of and mouths to feed and shit but i have agree with graphicartist2k5… the stuff cost just too damn much… like some artists put only a few good songs on the album just to sucker you into buying the whole thing and its not like the “current” good song was not available earlier to put on the previous album. Downloading stuff for free is a fulfilling exercise where you can try stuff out before you realize you got the stuff anyway so you wouldn’t even dream of buying it now like some dumbass jerk that wears a suit and tie to work or some retard who makes free software (OpenSource) so we can take it and pretend to be appreciative but laugh at him and all contributors for supporting our lazy free-loading asses.
i don’t see why we should pay so much to put those self righteous so called “stars” who are not really different from you and i that have some special talent but so called “stars” exploit special talent and make big business out of one special talent and live in decadence while i sit with stupid songs that i paid for and stupid games that i also paid for and stupid stupid videos that i have to hire from video store for disappointment. Anti-pirates should stick a pole up their ar*e while they beg and plead Hollywood and such to fire some unnecessary staff and stop paying those f*c*ers high salaries so they don’t have to screw us on the deal but they will anyway like those amateur production places that high those desperate trailer park specials to do their dirty work and make lots of money for them while those apes get some bananas for their hard work.
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