Top Japanese DVD makers are postponing the launch of long-anticipated new equipment, thanks to a Norwegian hacker who cracked DVD copyright protection open and stirred new piracy concerns, Wired is reporting.
The magazine's Web site says Matsushita has postponed launching new DVD audio/video players to next May or June, and Victor Company of Japan will withhold releasing its new equipment indefinitely, while Pioneer is considering a new equipment postponement on materials it might have released later this month.
The Norwegian hack shocked the DVD industry, where sales of DVD players have just picked up steam after a slow start, with Wired saying the industry was gearing for a major push to market DVDs as a better alternative to standard compact discs.
A Matsushita spokesman tells Wired the setback came after a Norwegian hacker posted instructions on a Web site in November giving details on overriding the copy-protection function installed in software for connecting computers to DVD-ROM drives. "The instructions showed it was effectively possible to download DVD data such as songs onto a computer hard drive, potentially allowing audio files to be copied and distributed freely over the Internet -- a major breach of copyright," says Wired.
The Norwegian apparently cracked Xing Technology's software, American-made, which lets a computer read DVDs. The hack cost Xing its DVD licensing for now.
And DVD content providers such as music and film industry representatives appealed to the Japanese firms to hold off on bringing forth the new DVD products. But Matsushita tells Wired existing DVD video players now on the market weren't made for computer use and won't be affected by the decoding concerns.
"Although the latest incident merely showed that the decoding is possible only on Xing's software, we will delay the launch of DVD audio equipment and devise a new encoding format to ensure the content providers that sufficient copy-protection is provided in the new products," says Matsushita to Wired.
The incident will delay, among other things, Matsushita's planned DVD car audio device later this month and a wide-screen television system with DVD audio/video players toward month's end. Pioneer was also planning to roll out a pair of new DVD audio players later this month. Wired says Pioneer will, however, go ahead with next year's planned sales of new recordable DVD player and disks in North America and England.
