Microsoft and the MPAA reached ‘a mutual understanding’ on how Wi...
Microsoft and the MPAA reached “a mutual understanding” on how Windows Media Digital Rights Management (WMDRM) can be used in software and hardware devices to protect “marked” content under the FCC’s DTV broadcast flag rules, they told the Commission…
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in a joint ex parte filing. As a result, the MPAA and its member companies now support the bid to have WMDRM certified as an approved technology for broadcast flag applications. That marks a reversal for the MPAA and its member studios, which had opposed WMDRM on the grounds that it didn’t: (1) Place meaningful restrictions on the redistribution of content. (2) Contain adequate compliance or robustness rules. (3) Provide for effective revocation and renewability or for adequate enforcement. Microsoft and the MPAA told the Commission they believe the authorization of remote access to DTV content under broadcast flag “raises numerous interrelated and complex business, legal and technological issues that require careful FCC consideration.” As a “reasonable measure to address this issue” until a more comprehensive remedy can be found, the MPAA “recognizes Microsoft’s incorporation of specific local proximity content controls” in WMDRM as an interim solution, the ex parte said. The parties also agreed to continue working together “to develop even more effective and commercially reasonable technological means of achieving proximity control in future versions” of WMDRM, the filing said.