"Cinavia"/Verance BluRay audio watermark protection - Page 101

mustardman · 5th March 2014, 02:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by omegaman7

I'm betting somebody knows something. I find it rather interesting, that $ony is the only company massively supporting Cinavia. I suspect other companies may be aware of a possible circumvention. Hopeful thinking? Conspiracy theory? Perhaps. But then, perhaps the other companies are being asked to pay a ridiculous sum of money to employ it? One thing's for sure. If ALL the companies were suddenly using it, there would exist an even larger need, to circumvent it. Myself, I don't even give it much thought. None of my devices support detection. Though I do find this "irreversible" protection scheme intriguing.

I don't believe in the no win scenario...

From my reading on the matter, the licencing fees that Verance charges are truly extraordinary! Like 10K to 300K, and then per film and per disc charges on top of that. None other than a large studio could afford what they charge! Perhaps I should have taken out shares...

-- RANT BEGIN --

Am I the only one that finds it interesting / disturbing that $ony is the ONLY company that not only makes content (movies/music) but also makes technology (players/recorders). It comes as absolutely no surprise that they are one of the main perpertrators in the DRM scene. Just think back slightly to the '$ony rootkit fiasco'.

I personally will NEVER buy a $ony product. They continually push their own proprietry formats (beta, mini-disc, memorystick, DAT, and the list goes on) and don't allow other manufacturers (with incredibly few exceptions) to make equipment that uses their technology.

I know people who (sadly) only buy $ony because of their reputation in quality. I also have a damn good laugh when they pay top dollar for a system that bugs out with some DRM issue that my cheapie no-name brand cobbled together system works just fine with!

That $ony are right on board with Verance and Cinavia comes as absolutely no surprise.

-- RANT OVER --

What does interest me is rather than removing cinavia from a stream, is actually reading cinavia from a stream. And then being able to add my own 'cinavia' like data to the stream.

Sure, one method of defeating this horrible DRM scheme is to remove it, but another is adding 'scrambling' data to the cinavia stream so the BD (etc) reader can't figure out what it is getting.

There would be other uses as well, like embedding useful information into an audio stream rather than just the DRM crap that studios force upon us mere 'mortals'.

Cheers,
MM

Ghitulescu · 5th March 2014, 09:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by mustardman

From my reading on the matter, the licencing fees that Verance charges are truly extraordinary! Like 10K to 300K, and then per film and per disc charges on top of that. None other than a large studio could afford what they charge! Perhaps I should have taken out shares...

Well, the situation is a bit different, yet you hit the nail in the head.
The consortium has agreed that cinavia will be mandatory. Also the fees are generally "solved" internally.

That means that not only Verance has to gain from this, but also the studios, because this way they prevent a newcomer from entering the club.
Because, in the DVD world, one could optionally implement eg CSS, let alone other protections, ie he was not forced to pay CSS royalties.

mustardman · 5th March 2014, 09:35

Now that is something that I didn't even consider...!

It really does turn the whole bunch of them into one big club. The RIAA & MPAA were bad enough by themselves, now they are making DVD manufacturers join the club!

What we need is an insider to release the tech details so we can have our way with it... remove it, or turn it into something that is actually useful!

MM

Ghitulescu · 5th March 2014, 10:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by mustardman

What we need is an insider to release the tech details so we can have our way with it... remove it, or turn it into something that is actually useful!

I am tired of repeating that the algorithms are public for years (2006-2007).

mustardman · 5th March 2014, 11:09

Hmmm, my apologies. I didn't realise that. Has anyone done anything with those tech details... apart from DVDranger?

Also, additional apologies for my assertion earlier, Verance charges BD-player makers between 10K and 300K per licence (according to wikipedia), not studios. My suspicion is that the studios have to cough a LOT more than that, I don't think that Verance would settle for only charging for an occasional 'track' encoding, even with the per-disc charges added on top. Certainly not when the studios are rolling in it.

After all, if Verance spent 10 years developing it (wikipedia again), that amount of R&D would not come cheap.

MM

Ghitulescu · 5th March 2014, 13:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by mustardman

Hmmm, my apologies. I didn't realise that. Has anyone done anything with those tech details... apart from DVDranger?

Also, additional apologies for my assertion earlier, Verance charges BD-player makers between 10K and 300K per licence (according to wikipedia), not studios. My suspicion is that the studios have to cough a LOT more than that, I don't think that Verance would settle for only charging for an occasional 'track' encoding, even with the per-disc charges added on top. Certainly not when the studios are rolling in it.

After all, if Verance spent 10 years developing it (wikipedia again), that amount of R&D would not come cheap.

MM

The official sources are the patents Verance filed since 2003 or so. Cinavia cannot be reverse engineered, at least not like it was tried by amateurs. I doubt DVD Ranger would get something out of it in due time, let alone the legal complications that may follow.

The research power (man-hours) was not that problematic, as the algorithms were already known, all of them, Verance took the the unfinished work of SDMI and tested it against a few common methods the "damn pirates" usually employ (like conversion to MP3).

The whole issue is to let the audio unchanged while removing the "noise". And since this is quite impossible now, the only weapon against this is the boycott. The problem with boycott is that no alternative exists - this is the power of monopole.

Kerry56 · 6th March 2014, 18:56

DVDRanger has released a version of their software that works reasonably well. Not HD level audio, but far better than anything else. There's been a lot of discussion on what it does exactly.

http://club.myce.com/f62/dvd-ranger-releases-cinex-hd-promises-unsurpassed-sound-quality-335484/

His database files do contain full length versions of the movie soundtrack. Mangled, but easily recognized as part of those movies. I just don't see how they are going to survive any legal challenge to distributing copyright protected material.

Ghitulescu · 7th March 2014, 09:54

They will survive as AnyDVD does

Nevertheless I see a problem in having an online database. First of all, anyone can monitor who's accessing it (and combined with BD-live to identify the legal owners and the pirates - even if the detection is false one can still have problems). Secondly, the provider of the database may be legally forced to close it or the IP might be blocked. A third aspect is that a computer has to have access to internet (I won't repeat why).

rotty · 7th March 2014, 22:54

DVDRanger system

The "so called database" is purely a collection of scrambled (so they don't look like audio files) AC3 audio files that are NOT Cinavia infected.

These files only contain the middle frequencies (cut off at 4K) and therefore are relatively small.

The process works by replacing the middle frequencies of your original sound track and uses your original track for the upper and lower frequencies.

The result is a very average quality AC3 audio track, (and of course it is AC3 no matter what your original format was).

This is NOT a cure nor is Cinavia cracked in any way.

SamuriHL · 8th March 2014, 01:56

I'm not defending them with this next statement, BUT, we can't know for CERTAIN how they obtain the mid-range Cinavia free audio. It's entirely possible that they're using their removal process to generate it. I grant you this isn't overly LIKELY, but, since NONE of us know for SURE, we have to at least entertain the possibility that they're generating it instead of ripping it from Cinavia free sources.

That all being said, it's AC3 and not HD audio and therefore not a solution I personally accept.

Guest · 8th March 2014, 02:52

Seems to me they don't have the right to distribute these things. Anyone trying to discuss specific files here risks rule 6. General concepts, OK, but please don't start talking about specific files. We don't want to jeopardise this forum. Thank you.

rotty · 8th March 2014, 12:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by SamuriHL

I'm not defending them with this next statement, BUT, we can't know for CERTAIN how they obtain the mid-range Cinavia free audio. It's entirely possible that they're using their removal process to generate it. I grant you this isn't overly LIKELY, but, since NONE of us know for SURE, we have to at least entertain the possibility that they're generating it instead of ripping it from Cinavia free sources.

That all being said, it's AC3 and not HD audio and therefore not a solution I personally accept.

Hi Samuri

It is possible that they are generating the Watermark Free audio themselves, but if that is the case, I would have thought we would NOT need the "Database", all this could be done on our own PC's running their s/w.

i.e., their s/w running on our PC could strip the middle frequencies from our audio, process it, then mix back.

Obviously, a "pre processed" version does offer a speed advantage, but as Neuron says, very very dodgy legal issues. If I remember correctly, reading the posts, there was an option on their s/w for this, im not sure, but I don't think anybody got it to work.

Also, I totally agree, AC3, plus the distortions in the processed middle frequencies, is NOT acceptable.

SamuriHL · 8th March 2014, 14:18

They've said they may offer it as a cuda driven process in the future. If they do then you'll be able to process your own titles. Right now they're saying it takes 3 hours per 30 minutes of audio to process. So they created the database with what they call a "first pass". Given that it supports under 20 titles so far and there are 127 titles with Cinavia and growing, well, the math doesn't work out well at present.

Sent from my SM-P600 using Tapatalk

Guest · 11th March 2014, 19:09

An item originally posted here by Ch3vr0n was moved to News:

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=170339

Please let's not start a discussion here about legal issues. This thread continues to be about the technical aspects of Cinavia.

johndough · 24th March 2014, 12:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by SamuriHL

They've said they may offer it as a cuda driven process in the future. If they do then you'll be able to process your own titles. Right now they're saying it takes 3 hours per 30 minutes of audio to process. So they created the database with what they call a "first pass". Given that it supports under 20 titles so far and there are 127 titles with Cinavia and growing, well, the math doesn't work out well at present.

Sent from my SM-P600 using Tapatalk

lol, Don't be so gullible. DVD ranger hasn't broken anything. They are likely using the old fashion technique, "audio replacement" which was used when Cinavia became a nuisance. mark my words: you will never see manual Cinavia removal with clear quality coming from them.

SamuriHL · 24th March 2014, 12:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by johndough

lol, Don't be so gullible. DVD ranger hasn't broken anything. They are likely using the old fashion technique, "audio replacement" which was used when Cinavia became a nuisance. mark my words: you will never see manual Cinavia removal with clear quality coming from them.

Who said I was gullible? I never said I believed it one way or the other. I simply repeated what they claim. I have zero intention of purchasing their "solution" regardless of how it works as the end result is not hd audio. Cinavia removal with lost quality is pointless IMO. Avoidance with no loss in quality is far simpler. For the record I'm highly skeptical we'll see them release support for a movie that doesn't already contain a non-cinavia ac3 track. I'll leave it at that.

Sent from my SM-P600 using Tapatalk

johndough · 26th March 2014, 13:21

This is in case you wanna stick to a Cinavia infected machine:
currently a solution to remove cinavia that has become viable for most users is: using Audacity, just extract the audio from the video, run Audacity and load the audio file from the video source then, go to 'effect' go to change pitch you will see percent change enter: negative 13 and simply press 'OK' export to desired audio output and mux to video.

It's totally free.

Ch3vr0n · 27th March 2014, 01:22

not that audacity crap again. That's not a solution, thats a workarround and it distorts the audio

Ghitulescu · 27th March 2014, 11:21

That's an improvement since the last "efficient" way of removing cinavia required a change in pitch of -14

I maintain my comments and happy watching Alvin and the Chipmunks

1Bullet · 1st June 2014, 03:43

Rant
First let me start by saying "If Sony wants to Install Cinavia into their Movies so I can't Back them up! Then they should provide a Lifetime Warranty to evryone who purchases their BD's for what ever reason including physical damage. Unit then I will continue to work to find A hack or a fix for Cinavia.
End of Rant

I have been focusiing my efforts on the the firmware of the the standalone Blu-ray players and still am.
Before I was working on something similar to Possible DVD rangers Cinex. I was comparing the DVD audio to the Bluray audio. Then creating a patch. Then running the patch against the Blu-ray audio. Unfortunatley this did not work as it to damaged the audio.
I just got the DVDRanger Database of their Exe's. I found I could you the trial version if I had installed the Exe's. So I tried to do a back up of my disc of Zero Dark 30. First if not mention elsewhere. DVDRanger will only allow for Movie only and will under size the video. Could have been me too but don't think so. It will convert DTS MA to AC3 or DD 5.1 at 640kb/sec.
On the trial version it Places the DVDRanger Logo and Trial version onto the Vidio in the centre for the entire movie. Geat trial you get nothing for your work. However I demux the Audio and Remuxed both My Stream with their Audio. So in short I now have a remuxed Zer0 Dark 30 that is Cinavia free.
Then I started to look at DVDRangers Database. I only own 8 of the 100 that they have released. In the 8, I own the DVD is exactly the same size as the the blu-ray. Minute by minute and no changes between them. They are exactly the same movies. So this got me wondering are the just offerring the DVD audio and remuxing it back into the Blu-ray?
I am waiting for their release of some movies like Total Recall with Colin Farrell which are not exactly the same, scenes have been added and shortened so audio will not sync.
This just my thoughts but may bay some one else can comment on the other 92 releases.

7th March 2014, 09:54	#2008 \| Link
Ghitulescu Registered User Join Date: Mar 2009 Location: Germany Posts: 5,769	They will survive as AnyDVD does Nevertheless I see a problem in having an online database. First of all, anyone can monitor who's accessing it (and combined with BD-live to identify the legal owners and the pirates - even if the detection is false one can still have problems). Secondly, the provider of the database may be legally forced to close it or the IP might be blocked. A third aspect is that a computer has to have access to internet (I won't repeat why). __________________ Born in the USB (not USA)

7th March 2014, 22:54	#2009 \| Link
rotty Registered User Join Date: Dec 2004 Posts: 518	DVDRanger system The "so called database" is purely a collection of scrambled (so they don't look like audio files) AC3 audio files that are NOT Cinavia infected. These files only contain the middle frequencies (cut off at 4K) and therefore are relatively small. The process works by replacing the middle frequencies of your original sound track and uses your original track for the upper and lower frequencies. The result is a very average quality AC3 audio track, (and of course it is AC3 no matter what your original format was). This is NOT a cure nor is Cinavia cracked in any way. Last edited by rotty; 8th March 2014 at 00:00.

8th March 2014, 01:56	#2010 \| Link
SamuriHL Registered User Join Date: May 2004 Posts: 5,351	I'm not defending them with this next statement, BUT, we can't know for CERTAIN how they obtain the mid-range Cinavia free audio. It's entirely possible that they're using their removal process to generate it. I grant you this isn't overly LIKELY, but, since NONE of us know for SURE, we have to at least entertain the possibility that they're generating it instead of ripping it from Cinavia free sources. That all being said, it's AC3 and not HD audio and therefore not a solution I personally accept. __________________ HTPC: Windows 11, AMD 5900X, RTX 3080, Pioneer Elite VSX-LX303, LG G2 77" OLED

8th March 2014, 02:52	#2011 \| Link
Guest Guest Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 21,901	Seems to me they don't have the right to distribute these things. Anyone trying to discuss specific files here risks rule 6. General concepts, OK, but please don't start talking about specific files. We don't want to jeopardise this forum. Thank you. Last edited by Guest; 8th March 2014 at 02:54.

8th March 2014, 14:18	#2013 \| Link
SamuriHL Registered User Join Date: May 2004 Posts: 5,351	They've said they may offer it as a cuda driven process in the future. If they do then you'll be able to process your own titles. Right now they're saying it takes 3 hours per 30 minutes of audio to process. So they created the database with what they call a "first pass". Given that it supports under 20 titles so far and there are 127 titles with Cinavia and growing, well, the math doesn't work out well at present. Sent from my SM-P600 using Tapatalk __________________ HTPC: Windows 11, AMD 5900X, RTX 3080, Pioneer Elite VSX-LX303, LG G2 77" OLED

5th March 2014, 09:35	#2003 \| Link
mustardman Registered User Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Australia Posts: 264	Now that is something that I didn't even consider...! It really does turn the whole bunch of them into one big club. The RIAA & MPAA were bad enough by themselves, now they are making DVD manufacturers join the club! What we need is an insider to release the tech details so we can have our way with it... remove it, or turn it into something that is actually useful! MM

5th March 2014, 11:09	#2005 \| Link
mustardman Registered User Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Australia Posts: 264	Hmmm, my apologies. I didn't realise that. Has anyone done anything with those tech details... apart from DVDranger? Also, additional apologies for my assertion earlier, Verance charges BD-player makers between 10K and 300K per licence (according to wikipedia), not studios. My suspicion is that the studios have to cough a LOT more than that, I don't think that Verance would settle for only charging for an occasional 'track' encoding, even with the per-disc charges added on top. Certainly not when the studios are rolling in it. After all, if Verance spent 10 years developing it (wikipedia again), that amount of R&D would not come cheap. MM

6th March 2014, 18:56	#2007 \| Link
Kerry56 Registered User Join Date: Sep 2003 Location: West Texas Posts: 32	DVDRanger has released a version of their software that works reasonably well. Not HD level audio, but far better than anything else. There's been a lot of discussion on what it does exactly. http://club.myce.com/f62/dvd-ranger-releases-cinex-hd-promises-unsurpassed-sound-quality-335484/ His database files do contain full length versions of the movie soundtrack. Mangled, but easily recognized as part of those movies. I just don't see how they are going to survive any legal challenge to distributing copyright protected material.

11th March 2014, 19:09	#2014 \| Link
Guest Guest Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 21,901	An item originally posted here by Ch3vr0n was moved to News: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=170339 Please let's not start a discussion here about legal issues. This thread continues to be about the technical aspects of Cinavia. Last edited by Guest; 12th March 2014 at 17:49.

26th March 2014, 13:21	#2017 \| Link
johndough Registered User Join Date: Aug 2013 Posts: 6	This is in case you wanna stick to a Cinavia infected machine: currently a solution to remove cinavia that has become viable for most users is: using Audacity, just extract the audio from the video, run Audacity and load the audio file from the video source then, go to 'effect' go to change pitch you will see percent change enter: negative 13 and simply press 'OK' export to desired audio output and mux to video. It's totally free.

27th March 2014, 01:22	#2018 \| Link
Ch3vr0n Registered User Join Date: Jan 2009 Posts: 1,368	not that audacity crap again. That's not a solution, thats a workarround and it distorts the audio

27th March 2014, 11:21	#2019 \| Link
Ghitulescu Registered User Join Date: Mar 2009 Location: Germany Posts: 5,769	That's an improvement since the last "efficient" way of removing cinavia required a change in pitch of -14 I maintain my comments and happy watching Alvin and the Chipmunks __________________ Born in the USB (not USA)

1st June 2014, 03:43	#2020 \| Link
1Bullet Registered User Join Date: Feb 2005 Posts: 35	Rant First let me start by saying "If Sony wants to Install Cinavia into their Movies so I can't Back them up! Then they should provide a Lifetime Warranty to evryone who purchases their BD's for what ever reason including physical damage. Unit then I will continue to work to find A hack or a fix for Cinavia. End of Rant I have been focusiing my efforts on the the firmware of the the standalone Blu-ray players and still am. Before I was working on something similar to Possible DVD rangers Cinex. I was comparing the DVD audio to the Bluray audio. Then creating a patch. Then running the patch against the Blu-ray audio. Unfortunatley this did not work as it to damaged the audio. I just got the DVDRanger Database of their Exe's. I found I could you the trial version if I had installed the Exe's. So I tried to do a back up of my disc of Zero Dark 30. First if not mention elsewhere. DVDRanger will only allow for Movie only and will under size the video. Could have been me too but don't think so. It will convert DTS MA to AC3 or DD 5.1 at 640kb/sec. On the trial version it Places the DVDRanger Logo and Trial version onto the Vidio in the centre for the entire movie. Geat trial you get nothing for your work. However I demux the Audio and Remuxed both My Stream with their Audio. So in short I now have a remuxed Zer0 Dark 30 that is Cinavia free. Then I started to look at DVDRangers Database. I only own 8 of the 100 that they have released. In the 8, I own the DVD is exactly the same size as the the blu-ray. Minute by minute and no changes between them. They are exactly the same movies. So this got me wondering are the just offerring the DVD audio and remuxing it back into the Blu-ray? I am waiting for their release of some movies like Total Recall with Colin Farrell which are not exactly the same, scenes have been added and shortened so audio will not sync. This just my thoughts but may bay some one else can comment on the other 92 releases.