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Game of Thrones leak and watermark: a stupid tracking system

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Re: Game of Thrones leak and watermark: a stupid tracking system

#221

Post by spb »

peeters wrote: post #66
madaxe_again wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While stego might be a route, blurring the watermark may not be enough to obscure the source. Given a known frame, they could blur the same portion of the same frame on all watermarked copies, and the one with a matching output is your culprit. Blurring loses information, but is more akin to a hash than a deletion, as it's a deterministic process. Edit: this sort of thing. http://dheera.net/projects/blur

It's a deterministic process, but it still has inputs. You'd have to know those inputs or test for every possible set of inputs to whatever blurring method was used.

I imagine HBO knows every reviewer they gave a watermarked copy to.

Re: Game of Thrones leak and watermark: a stupid tracking system

#222

Post by mappu »

HelloNurse wrote: post #83
jjoonathan wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you actually know that or are you speculating? I wouldn't be surprised if MP4 (or other video formats) provided a mechanism for tweaking the timing of a given frame. Of course, if you're using such a primitive watermark you might as well just add a note in the metadata...

Yes, we know that. Video playback has physical constraints; a file format where image elements are sampled at irregular time intervals is obviously possible and useful for very "scientific" purposes like measuring when images are acquired and interpolating the raw data, but not reasonable for playing back on a screen with good compression and easy decompression.

Huh? VC-1 in WMV and H.264 in MKV both support VFR. It's not uncommon for handheld video cameras or some anime sources.

Re: Game of Thrones leak and watermark: a stupid tracking system

#223

Post by nitrogen »

Phlarp wrote: post #219
anigbrowl wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entertainment industry operates some 40 actual satellites that were put up into space using actual rockets, engages in petabyte-scale asset management as a matter of course, and constantly reworks its content acquisition pipelines as new digital and analog technologies come to market. We're a little bit more technologically sophisticated than you seem to imagine.

>reworks its content acquisition pipelines as new digital and analog technologies come to market. I would have gladly paid them to watch a stream at 8pm last night, yet somehow that still isn't an option in 2015. Instead I ended up with 4 episodes from a torrent at 8:15. Tell me more about embracing new technology as it comes to market.

I thought HBO Now (I'm not a subscriber) allowed one to stream 5 minutes after air?

Re: Game of Thrones leak and watermark: a stupid tracking system

#224

Post by lmm »

mattchamb wrote: post #213
InclinedPlane wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that statement is really rather silly. It's a bit like saying "anyone who is going to drink coke is already drinking coke". There's a ring of truth to it, but it still falls flat. Edit: a few things: arguments based on the behavior of "the majority" and arguments founded on the principle that 100% of all people who have ever been Game of Thrones viewers are completely and utterly committed to viewing every si…

I don't watch game of thrones. If I was going to start watching it, I would start at the beginning of the series instead of just jumping straight into the leaked episodes. By the time I get to the latest season, they would be formally released.

If you were going to start, it might be because the folks at the water cooler were excited about it - and this leak makes that more likely. People who'd dropped off might be reminded there's a new season coming and feel inspired to catch up. It's a great way to build hype for the "real" start of the new series.

I think accident is more likely, but HBO doesn't lose much - anyone who watches these episodes is going to want to watch the rest of the series and is going to pay HBO (or else would never have done so)

Re: Game of Thrones leak and watermark: a stupid tracking system

#225

Post by lmm »

jjoonathan wrote: post #67
URSpider94 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. The minimum difference in scene length allowable would be a single frame.

Do you actually know that or are you speculating? I wouldn't be surprised if MP4 (or other video formats) provided a mechanism for tweaking the timing of a given frame. Of course, if you're using such a primitive watermark you might as well just add a note in the metadata...

VFR exists, but would be very obvious in the metadata and would make the file unplayable on many devices.

Re: Game of Thrones leak and watermark: a stupid tracking system

#226

Post by sln »

What a terrible post. Every single example is simply security through obscurity. Once a leaker understands the ways in which a file may be watermarked, they will likely be able to circumvent it. An example of a watermarking method that does not fall apart when people know what to look for would make a very good article. This is not that article.

Re: Game of Thrones leak and watermark: a stupid tracking system

#227

Post by sln »

What a terrible post. Every single example is simply security through obscurity. Once a leaker understands the ways in which a file may be watermarked, they will likely be able to circumvent it. An example of a watermarking method that does not fall apart when people know what to look for would make a very good article. This is not that article.

Re: Game of Thrones leak and watermark: a stupid tracking system

#228

Post by sln »

What a terrible post. Every single example is simply security through obscurity. Once a leaker understands the ways in which a file may be watermarked, they will likely be able to circumvent it. An example of a watermarking method that does not fall apart when people know what to look for would make a very good article. This is not that article.

Re: Game of Thrones leak and watermark: a stupid tracking system

#230

Post by monkeymolester »

The problem with least significat bit approaches mentioned by others is that they don't survive through re-encoding very well. A much better way of watermarking IMHO would be to add features (could be patterns, even images or text) in Fourier space- imperceptible if done correctly, and guaranteed to survive through encodings.
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