Re: How to retrieve serial number of OS or CPU for copy protection?

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From: R.Wieser (address_at_not.available)
Date: 09/10/04 

Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 16:23:39 +0200

Slava M. Usov <stripit.slough@gmx.net> schreef in berichtnieuws
uyfj5UylEHA.3872@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...

Hello Slava,

> "R.Wieser" <address@not.available> wrote in message
> news:uM4mw2wlEHA.3760@TK2MSFTNGP12.phx.gbl...
>
> [...]
>
> > Sorry, but this (ages +/10 thru 18) is the largest group of offenders.
> >
> > > This has a lot more to do with social and educational
> > > aspects than with lost revenues.
> >
> > Which is again why the youth should not be discarded as
> > being non-important: It's those people that should be made
> > aware of the implications of not honoring interlectual property.
>
> I must confess I do not have a solution. I know that if everybody
> believes that copying software, books, films, etc is "OK" then
> many will do so and that will affect the producers severely. It is
> easy to pass a law that says "copying is forbidden" and many
> adults will abide,

> but with kids and teenagers it is a different story. I still believe
> that the only kind of software that really suffers from unauthorized
> copying by kids is games, and that makes the problem moot, for me.

Not to the games-industry (which is software too), who complains loudly :-)

> [...]
>
> > *Only* when the software-company thinks it's benificiary to
> > do so. And only for the time that you are a student.
>
> There are many such companies and a person is a student for a
> long time. This may not be a perfect solution, but it is as best as
> it gets now.

It's not *a solution* at all. It's what you get, only because the
software-companies think they will benifit from it. That the students can
use the software for lower prices than other people, is nothing more than
a(n un-wanted) side-effect.

> > And that means that at the moment you are no student anymore,
> > you should remove the software from your computer. And that
> > gives you two choices : buy their software for it's "normal" price
> > (enabeling you to continue working with a known product,
> > continue using your build-up knowledge & created data, *or*
> > find another (maybe even cheaper and/or better) package, and
> > having the re-learn about everything, as well as having to re-create
> > old work .... I think we can make a safe gues that the first
> > option will be choosen, generating new revenue for the
> > software-company.
>
> Option three: find a job that will provide you with this software.

Same problems apply : Those persons will have to learn a new package, which
(outside of people like in this newgroup) they might not desire ...

> This is way to go, at least for me. Home use does not require
> all these expensive applications -- most of the time you can
> buy a PC and it will have more than adequate software installation.
>
> > Yes, they are called "microcontrollers". The only problem is
> > that the bottle-neck of such a solution (letting all calculations
> > be done in such a "dongle") is the transfer-speed of the data,
> > as well as the easiness of replacing such modules (by another
> > piece of "software").
>
> You misunderstood. There is no transfer. Everything is done in that
> "super-dongle". A play station does not even have a CPU, it only has
> video/sound/networking/HID and possibly external RAM.

Well, I just can imagine a cubicle for a software-engeneer, having (quite a
number) of those "super dongles" sitting around :-)

But, maybe they could be linked to the LAN, which would take away the need
for having them in the persons vincinity ... Ofcourse, these kind of
solutions would only apply for companies, as now the software *as well as
the protecting hardware* have to be payed for.

Funily enough, that is mostly the very reason why most software-companies
have not applied such methods :-) Complaining about others being "wrong"
is a lot cheaper, and may actually, with aid of some horrendous laws, be
even more benificiary to them ...

> This solution is not appropriate for a general purpose computer
> where multiple applications must coexist, but it is entirely
> appropriate for a play station.

Alas, playstation software has allready been cracked, and can be copied too.
The only reason why it does not happen on a wide scale is because they need
a sort of Mod-chip, which is quite difficult to come by, costly to install,
and will disable the persons ability to get on the play-stations
internet-servers. No such restrictions apply (yet) for PC's.

> > And, in the past any kind of external device ment for continuous usage
has
> > been cracked.
>
> You would need an electron microscope and a high precision laser slicer to
> crack that dongle. Not impossible, but very expensive.

Maybe. But just *one* crack would be enough, the internet would take care
of a rapid spread of the resulting, unencumbered software.

Regards,
  Rudy Wieser

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