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AACS: We're not done yet - May 2, 2007

The hullabaloo that erupted on Digg.com and other social media sites over a their removal of posts containing AACS processing keys in response to demand letters from AACS attorneys is not going to stop the group from pursuing other sites that are also hosting such posts, AACS officials were saying late Wednesday.

“We expected there would be some public comment about it at some point,” AACS spokesman Michael Ayers said of the Digg community’s outraged response to the letters. “It’s not going to stop us from exercising a legal protection we’re entitled to.”

Ayers, who is also a senior VP at Toshiba, said letters demanding removal of the posts are continuing to go out.

“We said at the beginning that we would exercise our range of technical and legal options in response to the purported hacks of AACS,” Ayers said. “Our first response was on the technical side, but we started sending out letters a few weeks ago. I’m not sure why it took until now to generate discussion but it’s nothing we didn’t anticipate.”

Ayers would not confirm how many letters had been sent, or how many more may be coming.

Last month, AACS issued a technical patch to its system intended to block the functioning of decryption keys that were discovered by hackers and posted online.

The keys purportedly can be used to decrypt and copy Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD movies to a computer hard drive.

The letters allege that the decryption keys amount to a device for circumventing a technical protection measure used to protect copyrighted content, as proscribed by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

Under that law, sites hosting those posts are potentially liable for “trafficking” in a circumvention device, which is also illegal.

After initially removing the keys from its site, the operators of Digg restored the posts after users erupted in opposition.

 

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