Chip to curb game piracy

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and then "revenue will flow from Asia and India"
"There is a stealth encryption chip called a TPM that is going on the motherboards of most of the computers that are coming out now," he pointed out

"What that says is that in the games business we will be able to encrypt with an absolutely verifiable private key in the encryption world - which is uncrackable by people on the internet and by giving away passwords - which will allow for a huge market to develop in some of the areas where piracy has been a real problem."
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:O

Encryption chip will end piracy, open markets, says Bushnell // News // GamesIndustry.biz
 
Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.................. :O

I aint upgrading for a long long while now.... :bye2: :chair:

Wheres that chip? :crash: :cens2:
 
^^TPM's are a different cup of tea.... the issue really is, the restrictions necessary to provide a complete chain of trust implementation that actually means something useful (in terms of piracy prevention) is.... challenging.
 
wateva b the case...it will remian unbreakable for couple of months after tht def some one is going to crack tht nywayz......as it is always happening......
 
morgoth said:
and then "revenue will flow from Asia and India"
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What these companies fail to grasp is that they are much better off seeking larger volumes with still lesser prices which is the only way to beat the pirates in india and china . even if they do manage to develop this "uncrackable" thing (which I don't think would ever happen), all this will do is that many ppl will just not play PC games anymore.......india is still way below the west in terms of per capita income and that has to be considered sensibly for them to actually tackle piracy.
 
This is real bad news for me. I was planning to upgrade in the next 3 months. I am currently stuck with 5200 fx agp.

Will getting an older Motherboard duringthe upgrade help me avoid this chip?

Also have they already begun implementing for the last few months, are they going to implement it now or are they planning to implement it from now on?

I heard about something similar to this 2 years back on gamer tv.
 
^It makes no difference whether you have the chip. If you don't have the chip, it just won't play, period. Until they crack it, that is, at which point it won't make a difference whether you have the chip or not...
 
So let's see.

The newer games will carry his encryptions with them and this chip will decrypt them. If I don't have the chip or an authentic copy of game then the game information won't be decrypted properly. Hence the game won't be playable.

So even if I purchase the motherboard containing the chip, older games or the games that don't have this security will not be affected by the chip. The games with the security can still be cracked at a later date. But if I don't have the chip then these games will not be at all.

Are my assumptions right?
 
In a sense. Let me explain what a TPM does.

A TPM, allows you to securely boot up and verify a chain of trust. Basically, the TPM is sort of uncrackeable itself (let us assume this is true). It certifies that the bootloader it loads is indeed version X.Y. That bootloader (which you now know is X.Y and hence can be trusted) certifies that it loads OS A.B. The OS, which is now known to be X.Y (and can perhaps be trusted) then certifies that it is patched, has downloaded blacklisted keys, is not running a debugger etc. When all these things occur, the game will run.

Problem is, it isn't clear _what_ the OS needs to certify. And until you can clearly define what security properties need to exist... you can't really enforce them.

Clearly, only newer games can make use of this tech. And even when they do... it is not clear how
 
KingKrool said:
^^TPM's are a different cup of tea.... the issue really is, the restrictions necessary to provide a complete chain of trust implementation that actually means something useful (in terms of piracy prevention) is.... challenging.
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That's why I hate Vista even more. Who knows how much Palladium/NGSCB crap it has. XP FTW. Linux FTW.

What sucks even more is that they label "TPM" as a "Trusted implementation" whereas it can possibly do more harm to privacy (than piracy :rofl:) than any single thing. I see no reason to not believe that the US govt didn't get themselves a backdoor to watch over any other guy. That's a lot of power. The manufacturers have been insidiously shipping motherboards with TPM even from 2003 (just like they brought in RPC2, CSS, CPRM and AACS). Only now since each mobo has a unique identifier which can interact with the os and be used to send info of the system to big brother who can override the owner's access, its a whole new ballgame. Mobos won't just phone home, they'll even lock you down.

Its no secret that hardware companies cheat while providing drivers (graphic card optimizations for benchies, or the more recent fiasco attributed to Creative of limiting functionality of the original product). There's no reason they won't do something to maintain their monopoly by crippling alternatives of their products eg. NVIDIA mobos totalling ATI graphic cards, one software preventing another to function properly (eg microsoft preventing OpenOffice to run properly). I guess MPAA and RIAA are going to have field days ahead, now since Proposed US ACTA multi-lateral intellectual property trade agreement (2007) - Wikileaks

Also, its very possible for malicious users to interact with host hardware to cripple it forever by messing up with the TPM system once it becomes mainstream.

For the first time, I am thinking of abandoning Windows altogether. Shame on you Microsoft. As if WGA wasn't enough.

neways, just like we have mod-chips for consoles, it would not take much time for mod-chips to be made for mobos.:@
 
The Ross Anderson page is a good read. But hopelessly out of date. Most people have long given up on the kind of anti-piracy that was desired to be pushed with such TPMs. I would agree with him that it does no good whatsoever in terms of preventing piracy. TPMs really are about secure storage and attestation. Anything else is just silly. They allow you to provide certain properties more securely, but if you start using it for anti-piracy, you are seeking to enforce something that is way too strong to be useful.

Palladium/NGSCB crap
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Most people who whine about it have no idea what it is. NGSCB is really about trusted network connect - which btw, is something even Stallman praised (as opposed to TPMs). TPMs can help with TNC, but aren't necessarily required (though a network admin can add that requirement). BTW, TNC is also called network access protection. It is present in XP SP3, there are efforts to put in Linux platforms too (commercial products already exist). Engineers long ago realized that for certain use cases (security), TPMs and TNC were invaluable (and don't invade privacy in any real sense). Now if the rest of the world would catch up (read: the people who don't do anything useful except run campaigns online) TPMs could be used for something good (not about anti-piracy, but instead for securing your system). Since people aren't willing, the only thing that is being pushed is that stupid anti-piracy crap which will not work. Even MS, Intel and IBM's engineers won't believe the silly statement that TPMs will end all piracy. Everyone already knows it won't.
 
I'll expand a bit.

Trusted Network Connect enforces the following - the administrator of a network states: "All computers on my network must be patched to within 20 days of the latest patch releases. Their AV definitions must be up to date. Also, they must have the following group policy security settings. I'll believe a computer fulfills these requirements when a product from Microsoft, IBM or Symantec says so".

So basically, each computer will have a NAP/TNC product on it. This program will check the system to see whether it conforms to spec, and then signs a certificate which attests to that fact. This certificate is then given to the server, which allows the client to connect.

Now, this is all pretty secure, but you may wonder - what if someone manages to steal the keys? You could potentially create a fake certificate which could allow any bad client to connect. Note that my description of TNC is incomplete. Creating a false certificate is much more complex than what you might imagine from the preceding discussion.

At any rate, TPMs can be used here. Use the TPM for secure storage and attestation. That way, the TPM can first verify that the OS is in a "safe" state (i.e. is a known OS with known drivers loaded) and allows you to build up a chain of trust, with a very secure root (the TPM). This makes creating a fake certificate much harder.

The problem with anti-piracy measures is the specification - "The computer should not have any cracks installed, nor a debugger, nor software X, or software Y, nor......". The policy cannot be completely specified in any open system. You can still use TPMs for anti-piracy measures, but the goal would only be to slow down attackers, or make it more annoying to use in the real world. Such uses of TPMs wouldn't involve the rather draconian revocation techniques that Anderson despises (as do I). Key revocation is better done at an administrative domain level, not across them.
 
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Neotheone said:
What these companies fail to grasp is that they are much better off seeking larger volumes with still lesser prices which is the only way to beat the pirates in india and china . even if they do manage to develop this "uncrackable" thing (which I don't think would ever happen), all this will do is that many ppl will just not play PC games anymore.......india is still way below the west in terms of per capita income and that has to be considered sensibly for them to actually tackle piracy.
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the thing is that games are already cheaper in india .

Cod4 PC version sells for around $45 which comes to abt Rs 1800 considering Rs 40 per $..but in india u can find a original copy for around Rs 700..same goes for any other title.

How much cheaper do u want the game to be?

I hope u dont want it for free.

Pirates will be pirates no matter even if original games are Rs100.

they will say F**K U ...i will get that for free.

The only way to stop piracy is to strengthen the law and catch the ppl who actually make it available in the first place.

Not impossible to do that..jus not enough efforts taken.
 
KingKrool said:
The Ross Anderson page is a good read. But hopelessly out of date.
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The post itself may be old, but I wouldn't exactly call it "out of date" and certainly not "hopelessly" so. The concerns (maybe not all) are still valid IMO.

But recent developments such as "experiments" with using DRM in music which ordinary consumers are getting burned by their purchased files suddenly expiring or failing to play on other devices (thanks such as to Apple's iTunes popularity)... so now more average joes (certainly not most) know the term "DRM" and are realising it's evil, so hopefully politicians across the globe will think before passing silly bills n laws.

We already see this with DRM-free stores such as Amazon and others, so it's getting better... but then again, I'm sure the marketing/PR people inside the big media and othe corporations will use other new consumer friendly names for the same DRM... nice warm sounding coochie-coo names like "FairPlay" or "PlayForSure" were used for the same DRM where people got burned heh
 
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