Saturday, December 17th 2011
The Witcher 2 Contains Secret Sauce To 'Catch 100% Of Pirates'
Yes, really - 100% of those pesky "pirates" will be brought to book! The game's studio, CD Projekt RED (CDP Red) isn't letting on how it's doing so, either, claiming it's a "trade secret" and not giving out the name of the external company that's implementing the anti-piracy technology, claiming that to do so would damage their business. Seriously. The problem with identifying a dodgy copy of something is that the main info they have to track them down, are the IP addresses of the suspect. This has been shown many times over now, not to be a reliable tracker of who's doing what. At the most, it will pinpoint the account holder that it relates to, in some cases. However, this outfit reckons they've nailed this dealbreaking problem once and for all - and without any evidence on how they go about it. Snake oil, perhaps? The Polish company have therefore been sending out legal notices to thousands of suspects in Germany, chosen because this country has some of the strictest copyright laws in Europe. Presumably, they must be leaning on the ISPs to hand over customers' physical street addresses, although this isn't made clear, but read on for how this might be accomplished. In an email to PC Gamer, CDP Red VP Michael Nowakowski made the following statement:
So, there appears to be two options to how this tracking technology works:
1 There is no technology and this is just smoke and mirrors (with a dash of snake oil) designed to extort marks into coughing up money to make CD Projekt go away
2 They really do have some "tracking technology" in their games. Now, what could this be? Well, as they're not telling us, it's only right and proper to be highly suspicious of what it actually does and to put it in the same class as common criminal malware. This is because the only logical way that they can track the individual in any semi-reliable manner, is to lift personal information off their computer. Let's speculate on how this could be achieved. It would include stuff such as email logins, bank logins, Facebook logins, network traffic sniffing to read the contents of highly personal and confidential messages and any other login where personal information such as a name and address might be kept. You name it, they might be doing it. This kind of activity is of course highly illegal everywhere, so no wonder they'd want to keep quiet about it. It makes traditional draconian DRM schemes such as SecuROM and the like seem like a walk in the park by comparison, doesn't it?
So, do you really want to install software that does some or all of this on your computer, just to play a lousy video game? Obviously, that's a resounding NO!
Regardless of how they track down suspects, this exercise is extortion with a legal veneer, pure and simple. This is because there haven't been any independent studies showing that "piracy" reduces profits and makes companies go to the wall - they have all been big media industry sponsored. However, there are several independent studies that show it does nothing, or actually enhances sales by indirect means, such as reputation spread by word of mouth. Of course, the powerful media cartels based in America, are able to buy government reps all over the world to make them pass corrupt laws as if all this "piracy" really was hurting them - three strikes, PROTECT IP & SOPA are just three examples. Consider the blockbusting sales here and here of Modern Warfare 3 recently. This will be the most "pirated" game of all, yet it still outsold all of Hollywood put together...
There is of course, one sure fire and legal way to beat a company that tries such dirty tricks: the boycott. Don't buy their products and don't pirate them, then laugh as you watch them go under (all the while still blaming alleged "piracy", of course). I personally wholeheartedly recommend this course of action. Once again www.techdirt.com is recommended as the site to go to, as they expose abuses like this daily.
Sources:
TG Daily, PC Gamer
We're addressing only 100% confirmed piracy causes that are 100% possible to prove. We are not worried about tracking the wrong people. As this is the trade secret of the company working on this, I cannot share it. However, we investigated the subject before we decided on this move, and we aware of some past complications (the famous Davenport case). The method used here is targeting only 100% confirmed piracy cases. No innocent person was targeted with the letter so far. At least we have not received any information as of now which would indicate something like that.Notice how the Davenport case is "famous" rather than "infamous" - they actually went down in flames over their extortion tactics. Also notice how they covered themselves by saying "At least we have not received any information as of now which would indicate something like that." So, they could be targeting the innocent after all, they just haven't heard about it. Nice.
So, there appears to be two options to how this tracking technology works:
1 There is no technology and this is just smoke and mirrors (with a dash of snake oil) designed to extort marks into coughing up money to make CD Projekt go away
2 They really do have some "tracking technology" in their games. Now, what could this be? Well, as they're not telling us, it's only right and proper to be highly suspicious of what it actually does and to put it in the same class as common criminal malware. This is because the only logical way that they can track the individual in any semi-reliable manner, is to lift personal information off their computer. Let's speculate on how this could be achieved. It would include stuff such as email logins, bank logins, Facebook logins, network traffic sniffing to read the contents of highly personal and confidential messages and any other login where personal information such as a name and address might be kept. You name it, they might be doing it. This kind of activity is of course highly illegal everywhere, so no wonder they'd want to keep quiet about it. It makes traditional draconian DRM schemes such as SecuROM and the like seem like a walk in the park by comparison, doesn't it?
So, do you really want to install software that does some or all of this on your computer, just to play a lousy video game? Obviously, that's a resounding NO!
Regardless of how they track down suspects, this exercise is extortion with a legal veneer, pure and simple. This is because there haven't been any independent studies showing that "piracy" reduces profits and makes companies go to the wall - they have all been big media industry sponsored. However, there are several independent studies that show it does nothing, or actually enhances sales by indirect means, such as reputation spread by word of mouth. Of course, the powerful media cartels based in America, are able to buy government reps all over the world to make them pass corrupt laws as if all this "piracy" really was hurting them - three strikes, PROTECT IP & SOPA are just three examples. Consider the blockbusting sales here and here of Modern Warfare 3 recently. This will be the most "pirated" game of all, yet it still outsold all of Hollywood put together...
There is of course, one sure fire and legal way to beat a company that tries such dirty tricks: the boycott. Don't buy their products and don't pirate them, then laugh as you watch them go under (all the while still blaming alleged "piracy", of course). I personally wholeheartedly recommend this course of action. Once again www.techdirt.com is recommended as the site to go to, as they expose abuses like this daily.
345 Comments on The Witcher 2 Contains Secret Sauce To 'Catch 100% Of Pirates'
first of all let me say that the "technology" that this blog is bashing is not owned by CD projekt but by the legal company that has been hired by them and it is not something that has been sneakily installed on our computers by CD projekt. what they are saying is the legal company has some tech that can track the downloaders of witcher 2 torrents from torrent sites.
if CD projekt had installed something nasty then that would need constant internet connection but witcher 2 is DRM free. they even took the effort to remove DRM from non GOG copies. this post is factually wrong and should be considered as such
This article is not in any way a news article!
It's a onesided comment of qubit about what he himself thinks is bad about the way cd project has chosen to deal with piracy.
You can offer your opinion in an additional post or even in an editorial if you like to, but please don't call this a news post because it just isn't.
There is nothing objective about this post and it doesn't deal with facts but with assumptions by the author.
Or are all your other games "try before you buy" too?
Anyway, there's a comments section which I subscribe to, so comments like this need to go there, please.
How anyone can suggest that someone who's spent $1000 on games such as yourself is a "pirate" is beyond me.
-----------------------------
I'm gonna get flamed for this, aren't I? :laugh:
So someone who spends more money than the normal person on games is allowed to break the law for their own gain?
Right....
You got a problem with the current model? Vote with your feet (go and pester your local political representatives), your voice (vote for those who support copyright law change) and your wallet (do not buy a game if the company does not provide an adequate demo).
Downloading an illegal copy is copyright infringement as our laws (in most places, at least, it seems) are currently written. So it does not matter whether he has purchased 1,000 USD worth of games, or has not spent a single dime: He is a "pirate".
End of story.
Indeed, there's a lot of games I don't buy because I'm not sure of them and I never download a dodgy copy of anything. I also bought Crysis 2 on Steam a while back, which came with undisclosed DRM and I forced Valve to refund me on that POS. Note that the POS refers to the DRM, not the game, which I really liked, so it proves that I stuck to my principles here.
Note that you can't get Crysis 2 on Steam any more, because of politics between Valve and EA.
I am a bit of a "Steam Junkie"
steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561197976809289
However, my post was directed at the statement:
"How anyone can suggest that someone who's spent $1000 on games such as yourself is a "pirate" is beyond me."
You have not addressed the criticism I've directed at that statement. Cheers!
In my case with Crysis 2, if I'd been able to try a demo first, I would have noticed that it had that Solidshield or whateveritwas DRM and decided not to buy. As it was, it about a month of hassle and waiting to get my refund. That's not the way to treat your customers.
So yeah, if the games companies can play dirty tricks like this, then so can their potential customers. ;)
He doesn't have to spend all that money on them, he is free to exercise his choice and not buy a game if he is not sure about it. Computer games are not the only sphere of life where we have to make the choice between buying something or avoiding it because we are not sure about whether it is worth the price of admission. I see no reason why it should be any different.
Don't get me wrong: I agree with the need for demos and I agree with the fact that games are overpriced (I rarely if ever buy a game at launch: I buy them when they are on sale a year down the line. Other games I simply ignore). However, this does not place a so-called "pirate" on the high moral ground if he uses these (or similar) reasons to justify dodging the purchase in the first place. It does quite the opposite.
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Let them try this. It will be hilarious. Not only can they not afford the legal fees to sue everyone, they will be getting sued for it in the process.
Also, you can't get a name from someone's IP whose mac isn't registered to them :D
Best of luck to these bozos.