[DMCA-Activists] Re: [DMCA_Discuss] Student Charged for Breach of DirecTV "DRM"Trade Secret

[michael . weishaar]

I really don't see this story as much more than a thief getting caught.
IMO, this is way outside the bounds of fair use, and is just a 
criminal act.  


On Fri, 3 Jan 2003, Seth Johnson wrote:

> 
> > http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/03/technology/03PIRA.html?ex=1042174800&en=6c78d302b05b60c9&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE
> 
> Student Charged in DirecTV Theft
> By JENNIFER 8. LEE
> 
> 
> WASHINGTON, Jan. 2 — A 19-year-old University of Chicago
> student was arrested in Los Angeles today and charged with
> stealing trade secrets from DirecTV, the nation's leading
> satellite television provider. 
> 
> Federal prosecutors said that Igor Serebryany of Los Angeles
> would be charged under the rarely used 1996 Economic
> Espionage Act with stealing the documents — which described
> the latest technology to control access to DirecTV — and
> releasing them on the Internet. He faces a maximum sentence
> of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
> 
> Prosecutors said Mr. Serebryany, a sophomore at the
> University of Chicago, stole confidential papers about
> DirecTV's latest generation of satellite television smart
> cards from the law firm of Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue. Mr.
> Serebryany, who worked for an outside document preparation
> company, was imaging papers for a civil lawsuit over
> DirecTV's card technology.
> 
> Jones Day represents DirecTV in a lawsuit against NDS, the
> company that designs encrypted satellite cards for DirecTV.
> According to prosecutors, Mr. Serebryany sent hundreds of
> digital documents to three satellite pirate Web sites in
> September and October. 
> 
> The confidential documents contained technical
> specifications for DirecTV's Period 4 generation of
> satellite smart cards, as well as correspondence between NDS
> and DirecTV discussing the card's architecture and design,
> according to DirectTV. The technical details about the card
> are valuable because the three previous generations of
> DirecTV access cards have already been hacked by pirates. 
> 
> Satellite television smart cards, which slide into set-top
> boxes, contain computer chips that decrypt signals from
> DirecTV's satellites. Hacked satellite television cards
> override the encryption technology, allowing a viewer to
> receive the satellite signals free.
> 
> While prosecutors say Mr. Serebryany did not profit
> personally by releasing the documents, the Economic
> Espionage Act prohibits the release of information to
> benefit others. "This is a very serious crime which we will
> prosecute aggressively," said James W. Spertus, an assistant
> United States attorney. 
> 
> Satellite piracy is a huge underground industry estimated in
> the tens of millions of dollars. Many of the pirate vendors
> are based in Canada where, until this year, the legal status
> of pirating American satellite television was ambiguous.
> Dozens of Web sites are devoted to satellite piracy. Many of
> them serve as public forums for discussions on how to
> reverse-engineer the Period 4 technology.
> 
> DirecTV said that the documents, though confidential, did
> not provide a roadmap for reverse-engineering the new chip.
> "The card is designed so that even if you know everything
> about it, you still can't hack it," said Marc Zwillinger,
> the lead lawyer for DirecTV's anti-piracy efforts.
> 
> DirecTV has been plagued by piracy. The company has 11
> million paying subscribers, but industry analysts estimate
> that an additional million or more households illicitly
> receive DirecTV signals. To combat the piracy, DirecTV spent
> $25 million on research and development of Period 4, which
> it introduced last year. The company is also spending tens
> of millions of dollars to mail the cards to subscribers.
> 
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