Chips on DVDs Make Them Unreadable Until Activated at the Cash Register

The electronics industry is confronted with an increasing number of thefts and is continuously developing new technologies to prevent this. Theft accounts for as much as $400 million in annual losses for the manufacturers.

A new technology is hoped to do just that with the help of a small chip installed on each DVD. The chip and a thin coating will be placed onto the DVD to block any DVD players from reading information on the disc until it's activated.

The activation takes place at the cash register of the shop, where the activated chip will send an electrical pulse through the coating, turning it clear and making the disc playable.

The chip is based on radio frequency activation and is made by NXP Semiconductors, based in the Netherlands and the Radio Frequency Activation technology comes from Kestrel Wireless Inc., based in Emeryville.

The makers are already engaged in negotiations with Hollywood producers to enforce movie and music piracy around the world.

The applications can also be used on other electronic devices, like flash memory drives, ink jet cartridges, electric shavers and even LCD and plasma TV sets, where the chip could be installed on vital parts to prevent them from functioning.

There is now a 100 percent effective method of preventing theft and piracy and the makers hope that their product will reduce, if not completely halt, this expanding phenomenon.

Usually, anti-piracy and theft technologies rely on protective softwares that require a password or license key to enable the end user to benefit from the product, but it seems that every encryption method has a hacker and a cracker on its tale as soon as they're released.

What this new protection method can do is to at least make it harder for pirates around the world to distribute stolen and cracked products, since the DVDs will now have a physical encryption method that wouldn't be able to roam the Internet like the license key generators, thus limiting the number of people having access to the decrypting technology.

The one thing this method is ineffective against is the human factor, since many Hollywood productions can be found on the black market even before the official premiere, which means that the problem often originates from inside the producing companies themselves.