Music industry claims MP3s are traceable
by Will Knight
NewScientist.com news service
18:30 29 August 03
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99994111
Recording industry lawyers have claimed that detailed analysis of the data in MP3 music files can prove the files were downloaded illegally from an online file-sharing network.
The revelation came with the release of court documents relating to a case against a New York woman. She is accused of sharing 1000 songs through a peer-to-peer file network, using the online pseudonym "nycfashiongirl". She claims to have made the MP3 files found on her computer from CDs that she owned.
But lawyers for the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), which represents the world's largest record companies, write in a court document: "The source for nycfashiongirl's sound recordings was not her own personal CDs."
The RIAA says the username of another computer user was found in the header of one of the MP3s. Headers are routinely used to store a song's title and length, but some MP3 compression software may also add information such as the username of the person who created the file.
The RIAA said that it also examined the digital fingerprints, or "hashes'', of the MP3s and found that some matched those of files previously see on file-sharing networks.
Markus Kuhn, a computer researcher at Cambridge University, UK, says the process of MP3 encoding involves variables that can create tell-tale differences between two files of the same song.
Sampling process
If an MP3 is copied digitally it will be identical. But making the first MP3 involves compressing the output from a CD, meaning small errors in the sampling process may produce a slightly different final pattern of bits.
Different MP3-making software programs may also compress files in a different way, producing different end results. But Kuhn points out that to his knowledge no-one has yet shown how statistically reliable using such features is in identifying the source of an MP3.
MP3 compression reduces the size of CD digital music files by 90 per cent. This has made it possible to send music over the internet quickly and store thousands of music files on a computer hard drive. The loss in listening quality of the music is minimised by removing sounds in the original file that are calculated to be inaudible to the human ear.
The music industry has been granted more than 1300 US court subpoenas forcing ISPs to reveal the identity of users offering files for download through peer-to-peer networks. Those found guilty could face fines of between $750 and $150,000 for each song.
© Copyright Reed Business Information Ltd.
Can't someone make a program to delete al that crap from your mp3's?
I'm sure someone will eventually.Originally posted by maartendc
Can't someone make a program to delete al that crap from your mp3's?
I say it's time to switch audio formats to something more secure (and probably less traceable). I have always been a fan of the OGG music format. There are a lot of others out there too.
You people don't understand. Hash is not something that is in the file, it is a cryptographic method where you use the file (any file) as input and it produces a certain fixed length (e.g. 160 bits) output. A hash function has certain properties such as that a small, even one bit change in the source file, results in completely different hash value. If the hash values calculated over two files are identical, then almost certainly the files are also identical. It's like a way to get a digital fingerprint of a file, any file.
if you wipe your hard drive (i dont mean format) they have no proof you had that file on your hard drive just re-install the OS and say u got a new hard drive and play stupid i reckon tey cudnt do shit to you
You can format your drive and the data is still recoverable. Now, how do you wipe your hard drive without a format? Toilet paper? J/KOriginally posted by p2pmaster
if you wipe your hard drive (i dont mean format) they have no proof you had that file on your hard drive just re-install the OS and say u got a new hard drive and play stupid i reckon tey cudnt do shit to you
"There is a very thin line between genius and madness"
~J.
Yea I know of that, it's up to dod standards and all. It's like taking a magnet to the harddrive. I don't think I would ever be in a position to use it.Originally posted by mr-g
http://dban.sourceforge.net/
"There is a very thin line between genius and madness"
~J.
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