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'
All that support and potential money is going down the drain now, along with any repuation they had. the only ones happy about this are the people who bought the game and love to see people suffer who didnt have to spend money on it.
I'm sorry, but the world doesn't operate that way.
taking them at their word i would say awesome! it sounds foolproof! 100% accuracy in detection, doesn't affect legitimate players, and protects their investment, deservedly.
i do have an inclination to question how they can be sure it's so accurate. i would like to know what company they are using. i want to give them the benefit of the doubt, but the whole announcement is just a little too... shady for me.
still, i won't boycott them. i'll just wait for specifics. we'll find out what it is, who the company is, how it works and all that soon enough. i actually buy all of my games and so would like to see a solution that doesn't affect me become mainstream.
we've already covered this subject across the net...
at the end of the day, those that can afford to buy the game...buy it...
those that have no money to purchase ANY game may have to make do with an uploaded copy...
the company doesnt lose out here.... poor people have no money to waste on a computer game...
their too busy paying their mortgage and keeping their family fed and watered...
this is just a rich company trying to get more from less... suck me off !!! project red
You write fantastic utilities and have been making them available for free. Thank you.
Let's say you decided that you wanted to go commercial and make a living from your work.
You figure that if you sell 5000 copies at $10 each you can make $50K a year (a reasonable income).
Instead, 50 people buy your utility and 4950 people pirate it, so you only make $500.
Maybe it's just me, but I don't want to put my heart and soul into an application and end up eating catfood for the rest of my life.
People dont bother pirating shit games. It was only £20 on preorder for the premium edition, hardly a massive price for such a good game.
But with market research and even minor demographic surveys you can at least get a feel for how your product is perceived, even though that may not directly relate to sales numbers.
When a new product is bound for the market, those kinds of numbers are all you have to try and estimate what you need to do to make it happen.
Releasing a demo can be an invaluable tool, but is not always an accurate gage of what will happen. Creating a demo means you walk a fine line between giving too much (demo is good don't need full version) and not enough (demo is too crippled not going to buy).
There is no simple solution and I honestly think that many of the game devs and publishers are trying just about anything they can think of. You will notice that a lot of the MMOs are going to a "Freemium" model. This is easiest described as an MMO demo. The players who become real fans will stay and buy into the game (through whatever revenue stream you are trying to generate).
You also see the "Idie Bundles". This does not make an indie developer diddly, but it gets their game and name out. This is a crap shoot for them in terms of any viable revenue.
In my opinion, what game companies need to do is a "shifting revenue" model. There is no reason that a company has to stick with a single method of generating income over the life of a product. You see this a lot in the movie industry (Theater release -> DVD -> Netflix -> general OTA viewing). As one model starts to decline, create a new one and keep your product as relevant as you can, for as long as you can.
Okay this really diverged from DRM to market analysis, but oh well. lol
As always, just my opinion. :toast:
I always buy the games that I like, I pirate those that have no replay value. Still I approve of CDProjeckt's sneak attack presuming no additional info is being harvested/abused.
The only thing I take issue with is someone else making a profit off of my work without my consent. They are literally stealing money from me. It should be easy to figure out how much they stole and get the name of the individual(s) responsible and take them to court.
Why would anyone come to your theater (and buy your overpriced popcorn and soft drinks)?
NM wrong bit lol
As for how they are tracking people, my bet would be on the Arena minigame that got introduced with one of the many free-content adding patches. If you have a pirated copy, give the minigame a try and afterwards think about the way it works. Post back if you think I'm correct.
:ohwell: