Manage updates with the Download AppJune 1, 2007 6:15 PM PDT
Apple criticized for embedding names, e-mails in songs
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It used to be that music fans believed cryptic messages about Satan or the death of a band member were hidden within rock albums.
Nowadays, the secrets buried in digital music are way too easy to find, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). The consumer watchdog group, which focuses on the Web, is taking issue with Apple's practice of embedding customer information within iTunes music.
Apple includes customer names and e-mail addresses within song files purchased from iTunes, according to Fred von Lohmann, an EFF attorney. Several tech blogs wrote about the embedded information this week after Apple launched iTunes Plus, a service that features music stripped of controversial copy-protection software.
Von Lohmann pointed out that data could easily be compromised if an iPod is lost or stolen.
"It's not as bad as losing a credit card number," von Lohmann said, "but it's still information that people wouldn't want floating around out there--especially without them knowing about it."
Apple hasn't said why the company would leave customer information exposed. But some observers have speculated that Apple is adding watermarks to music files. Watermarking describes the practice of inserting identifying information into digital files so they can be tracked. Privacy groups frown on such practices, but von Lohmann doubts that these were Apple's intentions.
Mike Goodman, a Yankee Group Research analyst, argued that watermarking is "certainly better than digital rights management.
"Watermarking does not treat the consumer like a criminal," Goodman said. "DRM is also restrictive, telling you how many times you can play a song or which device it can be played on. Watermarking works on the assumption that a consumer is innocent but provides the industry an opportunity to catch someone that breaks the law."
Ars Technica and Tuaw earlier reported on the personal information within iTunes' music.
See more CNET content tagged:
Apple Computer, Apple iTunes, personal information, practice, digital-rights management
110 comments
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You got to be kidding.
Is Fred/EFF so naive? Oh right, they have their own agenda.
some encrypted info in it that can identify you - a bit...
Big fkin' deal.
You also have your details in your address book file on your
computer & in the CV you wrote in Word. The cookies saved by
your browser have your usernames & password in them. The
countless emails you have backed up all have intimate details
about your life.
Since it would be illegal to share/sell the music file you own, you
really have no problem do you? I mean, you wouldn't put your
browsers cookies on bittorrent would you?
Everyone has moaned that Apple's DRM is a bad thing & ranting
"I will never buy iTunes music until they remove the DRM!"
OK, so now they remove it & people still need to complain about
it - "you have to pay 20p! outrageous! It's only 256 bit, i wanted
512 bit! Ripoff!"
It seems that the same people were saying "I will never buy a
Mac until it can run Windows & has a 2 button mouse" - OK, so
now it does (& has) they have to find another stupid reason to
complain.
Give me a break you moaning b'stards. This a great moment in
the history of online music & your getting a great deal. It's
exactly what we've asking for - hurray!
Stop complaining about a trivial stuff & enjoy your DRM free
music.
So, what was the problem with the new files?
There is absolutely no reason for this, therefore there is no reason it should exist.
supporters have made for the LAST FIVE YEARS, legions upon
legions of Mac Haters have said "Ohhh!!! It's SOOOO HARD to re-rip
a file that WE HATE APPLE for forcing us into it!
Everyone and their mother has cried and screamed for DRM Free Music, so that you could play "Your Music" on any device you want, whenever you wanted...well now you have it. So what if Apple embeds some watermark in it? If you are not sharing the files you have nothing to worry about. If you are really paranoid convert them to another format, or burn them to a CD an rerip them.
This criticism is just silly, we finally get what we want, and just cause they stuck our name on our file people are getting their panties in a bunch?
You don't like it, buy a Zune!
Where are the music files that contain nothing more then music.
There is no reason for this, nor any valid excuse.
noone but the purchaser has that information. Oh no, my own
name and email on my computer, what a horrible thing. The only
people that care about this is people who want to illegally share
these files.
This information is in my local telephone book for goodness sake.
Let's not sue every last person on Earth over rubbish like this.
It is amazing how few people grasp legitimate privacy and security issues.
If you're not illegally sharing your files with others, this information would not be "floating around out there". If I buy tracks on iTunes and play them only on devices which I own then no one else is ever going to see my name and email address in them. I think it's perfectly legitimate to put this in as a deterrent to illegal sharing in a way which in no way whatsoever affects legal fair use by the purchaser.
Lets see how much these anti-whiner whiners whine when their machines get hacked and their music files that pointlessly and stupidly contain private information gets spread around and not only do you get an avalanche of spam, ans also, the RIAA comes knocking on your door with a $10000 lawsuit against you.
Lets see how little you care, when people embed your name and email in files not even yours and the same things happen.
Seriously, there needs to be a battery of tests required before you are allowed to operate a computer.
forum comments ever! It's rare this day and age to see an entire
thread of mostly-sensible responses.
To reiterate the points that have already been stated: the big
story here is that you can now download DRM-free music legally
and efficiently.
So they embed your name in a file you purchase? Big deal. DRM-
free music is about fair use, and fair use doesn't include
distributing your music to the general population.
As for "losing an iPod" - I'm sure most iPods are full of personal
information such as name, etc. Having the users name
embedded in the audio files is trivial at best.
Quit whining and enjoy what you now have: a legal means to
acquire DRM-free music!
you're getting hysterical.
At 1st, I thought it was funny, but I'm becoming a little concerned
for your mental health.
Back away from the forums for a day ot two, take a deep breath,
buy a Zune (where I'm sure you'll find True Happiness), and check
in with us later.
Hopefully they will correct this oversight and we'll all blissfully forget these issues.
rationally (or frankly doesn't care). If you don't give away the music,
then your privacy has not been invaded as no one will ever see your
info. If you give away the music, then you have committed a crime,
and you have voluntarily waved your privacy rights. DRM-free
doesn't mean responsibility free.
about this are the people who are breaking the law. It seems a very
reasonable trade-off in my mind for enjoying the ability purchase
DRM-free music. I wish the EFF and others would stop hiding
behidn the "privacy" issue in an effort to defend illegal filesharing.
It's getting old.
Now imagine if the dealer had put all your personal information inside the trunk and had never told you that they did this on all their cars they sold. You *thought* it was all secure, but now you learn that the dealer has now delivered your information to those who want to do you harm.
That is simply irresponsible by the dealer. The fact that they never told you this until it was too late is even more so.
one of the Watermarked songs . . . then uses a P2P Website to
"share" it. Your name & email Watermark could end up in the hands
of hundreds (thousands?) of file sharing users.
That scenario makes me uneasy.
mean?
You have to take some personal responsibility in having it. Create a guest account that anyone can use but is so completely restricted that it can't view any files other than what is necessary to conduct whatever business they need to.
Most people won't bother and it's those people that will have the toughest time in proving they are not in willful violation of any contract or law.
If you want to be lazy and not do that one simple thing, then you deserve to have your computer ransacked by your 'friend.'
That is one of dozens of realistic and probable scenarios that will happen because of the stupidity of Apple.
Should you be fined or go to jail for this? Hell no.
But your scenario for justifying your protest is invalid because it isn't legal to begin with.
They would have had they know about it.
Could have, should have, would have?
Can you really complain? This is so much better than having
someone tell you how you can use the music and how many
times you can play it. And given how much people "borrow"
music and how long they "borrow" it, can you blame them for
marking it in a way that ties it to the original owner?
It all comes down to this; copying music and giving it away is
stealing. Do you do your job for free? If you don't like the price
for what you are getting, don't buy any of it. The artists and
recording companies will lower the price to meet market
demand.
What a tired, unintelligent argument.
year ago. I opened it in TextEdit and my name and email is clearly
visible.
Old news, just tring to **** on Apple's parade.
Move along folks., nothing to see here.
However... current licensing restrictions do not permit this, so you really wouldn't need the ability to do this.
Focus your energies on reforming the market, not fighting faux privacy issues.
No, it's more like having the store that sold it to you putting your name and personal information inside the shirt sleeve and then never telling you about it so you have no idea you have any sort of exposure of personal information.
Apple can easily have a class action lawsuit on their hands if they aren't careful with each and every song purchase of this format coming back to fine them. They will be quick to quietly address this situation before it gets out of hand.
I hope.
Did you take two songs you bought, one .99 and one 1.29, and open them in someone else's copy of iTunes? Did you check "Get Info"? Did you see that both copies of the song have the person's name and email address clearly visible? So if your iPod was stolen or lost, people can get your personal information REGARDLESS if it was an iTunes or iTunes Plus song. The EFF guy is completely wrong on this issue, and this new "fear of loss of privacy", or at least this example is completely fallacious. Has he issued a retraction?
users ... for me watermarking is necessary ... putting the
information in the clear too for the following reasons :
A) Sharing Lending your DRM-Free files breaches the articles of
fair use in a major way ... Sharing it on P2P also does break that
agreement.
B)if someone wants info on your machine ... there are MANY
easier ways than to hack into an Ipod ... Messenger Outlook and
IE do the job MUCH MUCH easier than Itunes does.
C) The privacy concerns in this matter are trivial when you know
some chat servers i would not name use BASE64 to encrypt your
conversations over the web when we all know this is easy to
break.
On a side note i would like to remind Apple users here we are
facing a distinguished audience of people that whine about
Apple constantly when they shall take their complaints to
another company that stiffle their rights of ownership and
endrangers their privacy in so many ways we cant even count.
Also to add salt to the comment i remind that a large number of
PC software is either hacked warezed etc etc .... That some of
the people posting here are not looking forward to respect the
rules of any normal software market but the ones they want for
themselves and themselves only.
I hope on a lighter note that i am wrong but some of the
comments including the one before me about the shirt shows
may be otherwise .
It's that level of intentional ignorance that really makes me worried about others that share the same opinion. How many are willing sheep heading to the wolf?
Personally, if I ever download music from iTunes, or anywhere else for that matter, I'm not going to share what I've purchased with anyone - it's mine. I bought it. The last thing I want is to put it up on a P2P network where some RIAA monkey can tag my IP address and send me boatloads of junk mail. And that's not even with concern of my personal information embedded in the track that I've downloaded to begin with. I'm simply a stingy bloke and if you want a track, you'll spend $1.30 (or whatever the price is now) for it. Don't enjoy what I've bought on my dime.
One thing Apple should have done was publicly state, "we embed your personal information in the track for this and that purpose..." If it's stated somewhere that is publicly accessible, please point me to it. I really don't know that's the case, but the last two or three articles within the past couple of weeks are the first I've heard about this.
I think that would have been acceptable, it would have been common knowledge, and thus, a reasonable deterrent.
Regarding fair use of DRM content, I do believe that if you're purchasing an album online, you should be allowed to burn that album to CD a certain number of times and play it in your car, home stereo, however, re-ripping it for the purposes of playing it in a player not authorized (a non-DRM capable DAP) is against the licensing and should be discouraged unless you've paid the DRM-tax to remove the DRM.
Apple, despite my dislike for the overpriced iPod, is making an effort at balance - make the music houses happy by deterring cost-consuming sharing and providing the music DRM-free at a premium for play on just about any player that supports unprotected AAC.
This is a business model, and it's a fairly sound one, IMHO. I give Apple a B+ for effort.
As for privacy advocates and the EFF, waste your energy on more pressing issues - it's doubtful Apple is going to change this anytime soon. If you don't like how they conduct their business, you could always go to eMusic and download some Don Ho.
suspect RIAA/big content planting these. The reason, they lose
their argument if people buy DRM free tracks. They need
something to frighten the consumer.
The plot is already extending, basically suggesting that you
leave a song accidentally on someone's computer (or have your
ipod stolen) someone may post those files, but with your
account name and email attached to them, you'll be liable.
Of course that probably means, it shouldn't be too hard to
modify that info, or have someone spoof it.
Besides, that info has always been in iTunes tracks since day
one. If I remember correctly, didn't Hymn give you the ability to
remove that info?
It really doesn't make a difference. Having your email and
account name on the file is a good way to keep customers more
cautious with their music files.