[QUOTE=Wombler;2722473]Fascinating stuff cienoway and thanks for sharing all this.
[B]Wombler[/B][/QUOTE]
I still do not know what exactly do they want to accomplish by invoking FBI here. The FBI seized a tiny C program of an insultingly tiny size, which contains no secret whatsoever and can be explained to any one how it works in five minutes. They can compiled it and see that it works. So that pretty much defeats any claim that my program was based on stolen secret. They know full well that I come up with my idea, after my first idea does not quite work. They know I improved it over time.
It is as if two people communicate secretly using some secret encroption key. How do you stop them? How do you steal their key so that they can not use the key to talk any more? The answer is you don’t. You simply grab a scissor and cut the phone line. Pause here. To the secret FBI agent reading here, I have just leaked a Verance trade secret because they thought no one in the world knows that you can stop a secret phone call by just use a scissor to cut a phone line, and now I tell the whole world to leak out the secret that a scissor can be used to cut phone lines. What a federal offense that is!
I have the constitutional right to conduct any science research freely, and publish and or transfer my research result as I see fit. Some how I got the impression that they want me to stop all audio watermark research altogether in my future and just walk away from this field, because they fear what else I can come up next if I continue my research. To me, for any one to tell me to stop any research in any field is to infringe on my first amendment right, and is not acceptable. Let me make it clear, I do not support any effort to infringe on other people’s copyright or intellectual property. I support the industry’s effort to develop better copyright protection methods. This is why it is important to discuss and identify inherent weaknesses of certain methods and exposed them as weak and ineffective, so other stronger and better methods can be developed to replace the inferior methods.
I believe that my research has shown that Cinavia has failed Epically in a huge disgrace as it is defeated by a simple program of three hundred some lines of C code, which looks nothing unusual and can be explained in a few simple English sentences.
There is a danger that this FBI investigation could turn around and probe what Verance is trying to do amid the clear knowledge that Cinavia has been soundly defeated. As producers of a commercial product, they have the legal obligation to disclose that discovery to customers and shareholders promptly, and immediately begin to work on a solution. Are they trying to harass me to shut up, are they trying to cover it up?
Life is too short. I want to spend the rest of my life doing something useful and leave some good legacy to my kids. A federal lawsuit is extremely costly in terms of time, energy and money to an individual, regardless of the outcome or how groundless the case is. The FBI now has my program. I hope Verance cooperate with FBI and provide truthful and ethical expert opinion what the program looks like, what it contains or does not contain. There are only 300+ lines of code which does hide any secret. It does not take five years or ten years to determine that it contains no trade secret of Verance. FBI can draw a quick conclusion to clear me, and I can move on, and they do not need to waste million dollars of tax payer money scrutinizing 300+ lines of innocent computer code.
Not all hope is lost in the watermark industry. At the same time I identified how easily current generation of watermark technology can be easily defeated, rendering thousands of existing patents worthless, there is hope. There is solution of a radically different approach of watermarking possible and I have identified one possible approach already. It can tremendously enhance security of audio watermarks so it has extreme value. At this point I have no desire to sell it to Verance though.
