Chinese defend the right to break HDCP protection for 4K video

The Chinese company LegendSky, which manufactures a device for removing HDCP protection from video, has officially notified the court that it does not consider the release of this device to be a violation of the law. The company is a defendant in a court in the case of the leak of several copies of high-quality films on the Internet. The lawsuit was filed by Warner Bros. and Digital Content Protection, a subsidiary of Intel.

HDCP (High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection) is a media content protection technology developed by Intel Corporation that is designed to prevent illegal copying of high-quality video signals transmitted via DVI, DisplayPort, HDMI and others. The encryption system first appeared in 2000, was licensed in 2004, and was finally hacked in 2010.

The system protects the content from “illegal copying”, but it creates problems for device owners - the protected video signal can only be played on equipment that supports HDCP. If your TV or monitor does not support this technology, you will not be able to enjoy high-quality video.

Unless you buy, for example, a device that turns on between the video source and the receiver, and removes this protection from the content. For example, one of the devices of the brand HDFury from the Chinese company LegendSky. They will allow you to watch video with HDCP 2.2 encryption on any device that does not support this encryption.

Of course, since such devices remove encryption, they can serve as a tool for illegal copying of content with a view to its distribution. On this basis, Warner Bros. and Digital Content Protection, and sued the Chinese in January 2016, apparently in retaliation for several films leaked to the network (in November 2015 , 4K films from Amazon and Netflix appeared on the network ).

The dissatisfaction of copyright owners can be understood. But the Chinese company does not consider it proven that the leak into the film network is directly related to its activities. In addition, from her response to the court, it follows that the manufacture of devices that remove HDCP protection does not contradict the laws.

The Chinese point to a note in the Digital Age Copyright Act (DMCA), which allows you to reverse engineer a program in order to figure out how you can set up data exchange between it and other programs.

LegendSky also claims that the plaintiffs sued with monopolistic intentions - they want to extend their influence even to those areas that do not belong to them. In addition, the company is confident that the DCP jurisdiction does not extend to Chinese companies, and therefore asks to withdraw the lawsuit.