The DVD Copy Control Association (DVD CCA) has filed an appeal in
the California Supreme Court in one of a number of cases over the
anti-copying system that comes with DVDs.
The DVD CCA is a not-for-profit corporation with responsibility
for licensing CSS (Content Scramble System) to manufacturers of DVD
hardware, discs and related products. On 1st November, the DVD CCA
lost a case in California’s Court of Appeal over the posting on a
web site of the source code for DeCSS, a program that decrypts
CSS-protected discs, enabling copying and distribution of DVD
movies. The court ruled that an injunction against Andrew Bunner
and others was in breach of their Constitutional rights to freedom
of speech. It said that DeCSS is “pure speech”.
The DVD CCA is now arguing that the decision is inconsistent
with a separate ruling of last week in which a New York district
court upheld a ruling against Eric Corley, publisher of hacker
magazine 2600, that forbids him posting or linking to the
controversial DeCSS. The appeal to the Supreme Court also argues
that the Court of Appeal erred in failing to protect trade secrets
from unlawful dissemination.
