BD+ and Internet connection

[fengtao]

Dear all,

There are several reasons for which we have adopted a Internet based service, rather than decrypting the disc on user's computer.
1. Decryption is done once for a disc. All the other users that have the same disc will just receive the decrypted data from our servers rather than doing it again and again. For Internet connections that are getting faster and faster this is the fastest solution there can be!!
2. We also eliminate some cases when clients that are not updated could not open the disc, etc. So sometimes DVDFab without being updated can open new discs. That was the recent case with Avatar: when we added support for it on server... it simply worked for everyone
3. Protections get better and better because the people that design them can study the decrypters included in our competitors products, and counter attack. Our system is hidden on our servers so no counter measures can be made. Of course we are affected too by the evolution of the *game*, but at least there one less to "help" the protectors
4. To help users even more, we plan to include decryption data in DVDFab so Internet connection will not be needed for some discs. We will publish a chart with BD+ generations and the conditions when an Internet connection will be needed. Considering the above, new discs will always need Internet connection.


Below it's the list for all known BD+ generations:

WARNING! The following text is intended for tecky audience. Sorry, but only technical questions will be answered!

BD+ protection had several revisions over the past years. They've started with a simple BD+ machine that had few checks, most of them were making sure that the BD Player that runs the disc follows the BD+ specifications. Then they've started to make it more complicated, trying to stay compatible only with official BD Players. So discs pressed after a certain date were using the new revision. If we look back we can say that we have several generations of discs.
All generations, so far, started with a US release of a movie. The date is the date when the disc was created not when it was released. Street date is usually 2 months after the build date. I'll present the distinctive characteristics of each generation whether it was a feature or a new protection.

Generation 1
- started with "The Day After Tomorrow" on 08jun2007
- Cryptography Research, Inc. was making BD+ code back then.
- some FUEs (FixUp Element) were watermarked

Generation 2
- started with "Mrs Doubtfire" on 20dec2007 and not with Hitman as previously believed
- TRAP_MediaCheck() is used to check if the disc is original

Generation 3
- started with "Jumper" on 14apr2008
- Macrovision, Corp. bought the technology from CRI.
- useless FUEs were produced; when patching the movie, these have to be skipped
- TRAP_DebugLog() is used to print messages from BD+ code
- starting with the James Bonds movies a BDJ/BD+ Handshake is used

Generation 4
- starts with "Futurama: Benders Game" on 22aug2008
- Handshake becomes more complicated; the BDJ code, after exchanging data with BD+,
gets to decrypt and run a hidden Java object that does further checks (mk.enc)

Generation 5
- starts with "Slumdog Millionaire" on 02feb2009
- Handshake return codes are not standard anymore (1000=ok, 200X=error card, etc);
they are now different for each movie
- MKJ.enc fallback package disappears, MK.enc will do the checks

Generation 6
- starts with "Valkyrie" on 31mar2009
- MK.enc is moved from 77771.jar to 77773.jar

Generation 7
- starts with "Ice Age 3" on 18aug2009
- new 00003.svm appears; it was mentioned in the patents, but not used till now

Generation 8
- starts with "Avatar" on 06mar2010
- Macrovision Corp. gets rebranded to ROVI Corp.
- although still called Handshake, the BDJ/BD+ exchange becomes permanent, not just at the start of playback.
- the use of Native code begins; this adds support for new TRAPs on-the-fly

Generation 9
- starts with "Knight and Day" on 03sep2010
- new Native code, obfuscated this time
- new 00004.svm and 00005.svm
- first attack of ROVI on our BD+ machine becomes standard
- second attack of ROVI on our BD+ machine is avoided too; probably this explains the need of new svm files, cause they're wasting space with clones

Generation 10
- starts with "Rabbit Hole" on 28feb2011
- first BD+ title from Lionsgate
- the code is still made by ROVI

Generation 11
- starts with "Star Wars" on 01jun2011
- the code is still made by ROVI

Generation 12 & 13
- starts with "Contagion" on 16nov2011
- Irdeto bought the technology from ROVI
- first BD+ title from Warner Bros

Generation 14
- starts with "Prometheus" on 07aug2012
- the code is made by Irdeto

Generation 15
- starts with "Parental Guidance" on 25jan2013
- the code is made by Irdeto
- yet another attack on our BD+ machine is avoided

This presentation is intended to be used as a guide and a reference when we will mention a generation or another in the future.