- From: Konstantinov Sergey <twirl@yandex-team.ru>
- Date: Tue, 04 Feb 2014 18:54:53 +0400
- To: www-tag <www-tag@w3.org>
I made some research on this topic, and I found a couple of aspects of this problem which we, in my opinion, should consider. 1. Anti-circumvention law Copyright law (notably, DMCA[1]) prohibits any attempts of searching for vulnerabilities in DRM systems. There were notable cases when IT security specialists and academic researchers were arrested or threatened with legal actions under DMCA[2][3]. This practice is totally incompatible with modern Web where IT companies pay to researchers for vulnerabilities found, not get them arrested. As we all know, proprietary browser plugins are at present moment the most vulnerable part of the web platform. Introducing new category of such plugins coupled with prohibition of any security testing is insane idea, IMHO. 2. Accessibility issues. DRM systems usually prohibit any manipulations with content including displaying third-party subtitles, or (in case of e-books) reading a book using system voice-over engine, thus making a content less accessible by disabled people. This practice is totally incompatible with an effort to make Web more accessible. As a conclusion: in my opinion, allowing development of DRM systems would make the Web less safe and less accessible; these problems come directly from the copyright law itself and cannot be resolved until the law itself is changed. -- [1] http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/1201 [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sklyarov [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_felten#The_SDMI_challenge -- Konstantinov Sergey Yandex Maps API Development Team Lead http://api.yandex.com/maps/
Received on Tuesday, 4 February 2014 14:55:22 UTC