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TiVo Tells You How To Defeat Their DRM To Keep You From Canceling

consumerist.com — Want to cancel your TiVo? When you call to tell them about it, they might just try to teach you how to defeat their DRM in order to keep you as a customer. That's what happened to Tino, and he wrote all about it....

Who dugg this? Made popular Mar 2, 2007

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33 Comments

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  • Skrilla360, on 10/12/2007, -3/+17where's the 'how'? burried as innacurate
  • secleinteer, on 10/12/2007, -1/+9Comment abuse, but here's the link to the actual blog: http://tinokaltsas.com/version3/?p=230
  • hansonc, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8The article said nothing about Microsoft Media Center....
  • bobpaul, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8I wonder if they were recommending any specific tools, or just alluding to them?
  • HashPipeK, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6Its not hearsay, it's me and I submitted the direct link to my blog to Digg last night. But Digg is broken and unless you have a huge group of friends that digg anything you submit you don't get to the front page period.
  • DontSayFanboy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4TIvo is not who you should be worried about. They do not own the copyright on that content. The networks do. Regardless of whether or not some low wage CS rep convinced you it was a good idea to crack the encryption in order to retain your monthly membership fee, you will have to answer to NBC, CBS, FOX et al if you are caught sharing any of their shows. They send out hundreds of DMCA complains a day. Trust me, I work at a university.

    TIvo has enabled encryption on those shows as a good faith measure. This is also why they do not allow you to do a 30 second skip over commercials unless you know the secret easter egg. They need to stay in good with the content providers to maintain their business model. What you're seeing here is the company trying to walk that fine line between keeping the paying customers happy and maintaining business relationships with the networks.

    Pretty tricky situation when the demands of the customer are at complete odd with how the networks want to do business.



  • colinnwn, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Ummm. While the post on Consumerist is technically hearsay, it links to Tino's blog which is a first hand account and NOT hearsay in the legal definition.

    You may have meant the popular definition as unverified information received from another. But then the reason it is hearsay is YOU personally haven't verified it. Since your experience with Tivo CSRs will be different than Tino's there is no way to authoritatively verify his account without a recording of the conversation. Hence, everything you are told in your life that you can't hear a recording or see a video of is hearsay. I think that use of the word defeats its intended meaning.
  • CanIGetAWitness, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I think it is sad when a blog, blogg's about a blog just so it can get get traffic on a whole 2 paragraphs with all those ads.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I love direct show dump....one of the most used utilities on my computer.
  • Saint3k, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Can't you just buy a piece of software from Tivo that lets you decrypt your movie files and burn them to DVD's?

    I haven't used a Tivo DVR in a while, but I'm fairly certain that's how it works. This sounds like a non-story to me.
  • xaotica, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Not all companies require customer service reps to read off a script or spout the party line. I doubt they train them or encourage them to tell people how to elude DRM. She was probably just talking to him like a real person. Everyone I know downloads movies/tv shows/etc. from time to time or watches them on youtube, and I doubt Tivo employees are an exception.
  • falloutsyndrome, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2TiVo, according to Robot Chicken. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UC-8edigJS8
  • hugehead83, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2If you have the time and know-how, build your own!!! MythTV + Orb are unbeatable. :D
  • bonexaw, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3This reminds me of the time I called Toshiba for my sister's laptop only for them to recommend that "borrow a friend's" copy of Windows XP.

    (on a side note.. Toshiba, worst customer service ever.. promised 3+ call backs "within 24 hours".. still waiting 6 months later)
  • hugehead83, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3OMG I love Toshiba hardware, but there tech support IS bad! Took me hours to get a receipt for my $35 support call that didn't even resolve my problem (turned out to be a design flaw on their end). It took a threatened call to my credit card company to get anywhere.... story goes on...
  • tidejwe, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3Besides, even if it is true, it's a desperate attempt by the CSR to hit their stats. Retention CSR's have to save a certain percentage of people requesting to cancel or they're in trouble. The rep was just desperately finding a way to convince the customer to stay...not following some script. It's not like TiVo told her to tell their customers to break the T&A or DRM.
  • djauto23, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Guess that makes him Tivo-Tino
  • inactive, on 09/08/2008, -0/+1The best mortgage rates, refinance, home loan, real estate, realty http://tophomemortgageloan.com
  • fani, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Tino uses Tivo.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1why not
  • ChildeRoland420, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1This "Orb" fellow intrigues me. Please elaborate.
  • bitmanx, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1When I cancelled two months, they were willing to give me 1/2 price off the monthly subscription to stay.. even if they offered opening up DRM, big deal..
  • MasherSCF, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1An angel appeared and said, "Behold, I give you tidings of great joy, Google: 'Direct Show Dump'" That is all.
  • dpoon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1If TiVo is the one who encrypted the files, and TiVo is telling you to decrypt them, then that would imply that they are granting you permission to decrypt the files. In that case, it would just a regular act of decryption, and not circumvention of DRM anymore.
  • bitterg, on 10/12/2007, -6/+7Stories based on hearsay are *****.
  • Wamzlee, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Okay this is complete crap. Here is the direct link to the original digg submission http://digg.com/hardware/TiVo_tells_me_to_violate_ToS_and_DMCA_to_stay_a_customer, and it only has FIVE diggs.

    Tino and I have noticed since digg underwent changes, that its been damn near impossible to get even 5 diggs! Before Digg 3.0 (or whatever), articles submitted would get atleast 20 or more diggs. Now my question is, what the ***** is going on?
  • Bluetech, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I'm so happy I got my tivo a few years ago and got a lifetime subscription.
  • ChrisMR, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2The point is that DRM sucks and at least one company has, on some weird, covert level decided to acknowledge that fact.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1nice story...liked it
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1nice story...liked it
  • hansonc, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1Blogspam.

    How about we link to the actual source once in a while?
    http://tinokaltsas.com/version3/?p=230

    Seriously why link to Consumerist/engadget/gizmodo who just steal from others?
  • YourDoom123, on 10/12/2007, -5/+2blog spam...
  • Lasthorseman, on 10/12/2007, -6/+0THOU SHALL NOT SUPPORT THE TECHNOLGY OF THE ANTI-CHRIST!

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