Protecting Images on CD's?

[CaseyScofield]

I have seen photographers that will burn their photo’s onto a CD, and the files are protected so that the client can see the photo, but has no way of printing any of the photos. (I’ve mainly seen this happen with wedding packages).

My question for those who are in the know, is how? :confused: What program they use? Is it not a program at all, but rather some code that they’ve written onto the CD to protect the photos? Anyone had any experience with this?

[tim]

AFAIK if you write JPG files to a CD, there's no way to prevent people copying them. Perhaps it's done with some special viewer program that puts the images on the CD in a format that most programs can't read.

btw if someone can see an image on the screen they can copy it, though the quality might not be 100%. That's why you add watermarks and/or copyright notices.

[CaseyScofield]

Thanks for that Tim.

Perhaps it was a viewing program. What I remeber (it has been about 2 years since I've seen such a thing) is that you could view any of the 360 photo's on the CD, but there was no way of sending them to the printer, and when I tried to copy the images (either by highlighting them or pressing Ctrl-C) a very polite "This image is Copywirte Protected" announcement popped up on my screen.

Since then I havn't seen anything like it, and I cringe every time I sell a CD of my images.

[tim]

You can always do a screen capture with alt-printscreen, so there's no way to absolutely protect digital works. Worst case someone can take a photo of the monitor, although that comes out looking terrible.

Someone should be able to tell you about a product that should help you out.

[Avalonthas]

The CD was encrypted with copyright protection software. You have to buy a lisense to use such software to encrypt the CD's but basically it makes the CD's copy proof and also prevents you from printing/copying, which is why u must use special software to open the images which has been coded to bypass the encryption and open the photo. (and in turn that browsing software probably has no copy/print capability and the same ctrl+c prevention in the software. It was a good investment many years ago when photo CD's were trully "in", but today all of the security software and encryption used on CD's can be easily cracked or bypassed with other third party software. Similar type of encryption is used on many game CD's these days which primarily focus on prevention of burning the CD and copying key files. However once again there is really no purpose as if someone wants to bypass it they can with some easily obtained software.

Also the top 2 companies who develope commericial encryption and burn proof software and technology are Securom, SafeDisk. They have some of the bets techniques and latest tech, however they have been easily cracked. There are also another dozen or so important companies who develop similar copyright protection but they are just as easily cracked.

I know for sure that there is one piece of software, particularily used in bypassing Game and Application protection called something like Daemon Tools, and it can crack any major protection technqiues. I forgot the name but there is a similar program that was developed last year specifically for photo CD's, and it bypassed all the protection.

However most people who buy photographs and stuff from me are adults, and most adults do not know much about computers (I just learned 4 years ago) so they wouldnt neccessarily pursue sucha thing. However like i said, if someone wants to rip the photo's they evetually will once they make a google search for capable software. So save ur money and dont invest in those kind of techniques. Either raise ur prices for a photo CD or dont offer them at all, offer large 8x11 or other formats with small thumbnails (charge a small fee of like a buck or two if u want incase they dont want many or no photos) and let them choose what they want to be printed. I always offer digital prints (JPEG files or photo CD's) however it is usually at a much higher price then a physical print as i know it has the potential not only to be ripped, but to be given to friends and/or uploaded to the net. So u gotta manage the risk by setting higher prices for digital copies.

[CaseyScofield]

aahhh!

Thanks Avalon! Very informative. Rather than stress over who rips me off, I'll take your advice, raise my prices, and live with the fact that I worry too much! ;)

Glad to have you in our knowledge base!

[Avalonthas]

:P If there is one thing im good at, its not photography, its technology and computers :P. Plus i have a son who loves to rip games, music, etc etc (And no i dont encourage it lol, and i draw the line at ripping pics hehe...ripping pics = beatings with a tripod leg) so he teaches me a thing or to about the latest illegal tools of the trade. So between the two of us we got quite a good background in the tech area.

The only time you should give cheap rates for digital photography is for stockphoto sites, which are a good source of income that will pile up and eventually u can buy a memory card with that spare cash with all ur useless digitals. But if there good pics or for a client, jack the prices up for digital and encourage them to go for prints (that way if they need more prints, they come back and give you more money hehe), where as a CD, they have a lifetime supply of your work at no cost once they absorb the initial cost of the purchase. So yea stop worrying to much lol

And remember not to slip from such a policy. Always remember that a soccer mom may look innocent, but deep down she has a hidden agenda (sorry im bad with analogies, so take that as it is lol)

[Ikinaa]

You can also put the files in a PDF and tell the PDF to not allow copy/paste, printing, etc, only viewing..., or when printing putting a big copyright over the page.

A nice example is the 20D-Manual you can download from Canon-Site. Try printing it and you'll see the copyright-notice over all pages...

[kb244]

Hrm what I've had clients do in the past was create flash based profiles and portfolios then burn to CD , thus eliminating the bandwidth and size constraint normally on the web, and protecting certain aspects of images at the same time.

[Jesper]

You can also put the files in a PDF and tell the PDF to not allow copy/paste, printing, etc, only viewing..., or when printing putting a big copyright over the page.

A nice example is the 20D-Manual you can download from Canon-Site. Try printing it and you'll see the copyright-notice over all pages...
Those are all good ideas to make it more difficult for people to print a photo, but there's no way you can really make it impossible. If it is possible to display a photo on screen, it is also possible to make a screen capture (in Windows with the Print Screen key, like Tim already said), and if the viewing software is smart enough to also block the Print Screen key, you can probably find a little program on Internet that lets you capture the screen in an alternative way.

In principle it's not possible to completely prevent it, the best you can do in practice is make it very difficult to do so.

The only really good way to prevent people from making high quality prints is to not give them high resolution versions of the photos. For example, resize the photos to 800 x 600 pixels, which is enough for viewing on screen, but not enough for a good print.

[Ikinaa]

Those are all good ideas to make it more difficult for people to print a photo, but there's no way you can really make it impossible. If it is possible to display a photo on screen, it is also possible to make a screen capture (in Windows with the Print Screen key, like Tim already said), and if the viewing software is smart enough to also block the Print Screen key, you can probably find a little program on Internet that lets you capture the screen in an alternative way.

In principle it's not possible to completely prevent it, the best you can do in practice is make it very difficult to do so.

The only really good way to prevent people from making high quality prints is to not give them high resolution versions of the photos. For example, resize the photos to 800 x 600 pixels, which is enough for viewing on screen, but not enough for a good print.

I agree... Nothing's really uncrackable.
But I guess the average private customer which you give a CD with a PDF-SLideshow that's protected does probably not have the technical knowledge are time or... to remove the protection and make the prints.
Anyway, Pictures that are nice on a screen (like 800x600 <- enough for a slideshow and to present results to the customer) are not necessarily enough for printing, perhaps smallest print size, but no 15x20 or 20x30 (cm)

[Avalonthas]

You can also put the files in a PDF and tell the PDF to not allow copy/paste, printing, etc, only viewing..., or when printing putting a big copyright over the page.

A nice example is the 20D-Manual you can download from Canon-Site. Try printing it and you'll see the copyright-notice over all pages...

Nope the PDF files are just as easily cracked as a CD encryption. Even the latest Acrobat 6 Pro has been cracked. The program which does this is called "PDF Password Remover v2.2". Basically the program removes the admin password and then you are able to remove all the security features urself. And to get rid of the watermark (Canon uses a "COPY" watermark) all u have to do is go to "file > reduce file size" which basically compresses the file and since the program is reducing file size just like a RAW to JPEG, some information is lost, including the watermark. So u now have a clean file without security and watermark, free to print. And with Acrobat 6 Pro, you can even reduce the compression by using some of there in program optimizing software to make it even better for printing, and so u basically get a near original quality file without any security or mark. I have tested such a process to check if my statements are true and they are. And I printed out a test page and the text was extremely crisp and it looked like it was a 300dpi printing file.

Software security is much much more vulnerable then hardware or media security, so a PDF file would just make it much easier to access the photo's. So dont go anywhere near a PDF document.

Note: By providing the name of cracking software, i do not encourage the use of such a program, I am only demonstrating how easy it is to obtain such software.

[Avalonthas]

And I agree with Jesper, and might actually adopt a similar but different apprach to his suggestion. If you want to add convenience to ur services, then offer a CD for sampling purposes so they can select which files they want to purchase, and then they would pay the appropriate fees for a digital or chemical print. But on the CD, make all the pictures like 260x in width, so that the only possible print the person could make is a bad quality wallet size. I might do such a thing, but the files would be no larger then 200 or 260 pixels in width. So it would be like a double the size version of the thumbnails u get on the cover of a lab CD.

[DwightMcCann]

Did I miss the name of a program to create a CD of images that are encrypted, can only be viewed by a program on the CD, has password and date expiration? If someone "breaks" such a program they would have to go to some effort and I'm willing to allow that. I want something that helps honest people stay honest and to believe that I control my images. Anybody know of such a program?

[detzX]

This is an intersting topic but I've been cracking things since I was a kid(I know, bad right?) and I've learned that NOTHING is uncrackable. ;) Some of the suggestions on here are good but I think the best approach is to change the resolution so it's not printable and put watermarks. No program can stop someone from getting the image if you can see it on the screen(like said many times before).

Also, most of you deal with "normal" users that would not know how to do this but if you're dealing with someone "smarter" with computers they can get your images...I know, I'm guilty of doing it.(don't judge!)

Oh, and if you guys are interested I can make a program that will embed all the images in an exe file and can only be viewed by running the program so they can't get the originals..it would make a big exe but if it's on a CD anyways who cares. :)

[DwightMcCann]

Well, I have mixed feelings about hacking ... certainly if something is encrypted to keep the honest people honest then you have to consider what that makes the hackers ... and of course we are going to judge anyone who we know violates this intention. We know that we lock our doors with keys even though we know they can be "picked" but that doesn't mean that we don't find the "pickers" to blame ... the idea that if you can break security then it has no value or should be scorned or ridiculed is somewhat immature.

OK, with alll that "oldster" stuff said, I'm still looking for a commercial (meaning supported by an ongoing business) product that will encrypt CD images and has both password and date protection. I'll send detzX a plaintext version of anything he wants on these CDs so he doesn't have to commit crimes or even do screen captures.

[robertwgross]

If all of your images are packaged into a Flash presentation, aren't they hard to grab hold of individually?

---Bob Gross---

[DwightMcCann]

That's a good question, Bob ... I wonder how much effort to put 200 to 300 images into a Flash presentation? Is there a script for this in Flash?

[Palladium]

Flip Album Pro has a security feature

[detzX]

Well, I have mixed feelings about hacking ... certainly if something is encrypted to keep the honest people honest then you have to consider what that makes the hackers ... and of course we are going to judge anyone who we know violates this intention. We know that we lock our doors with keys even though we know they can be "picked" but that doesn't mean that we don't find the "pickers" to blame ... the idea that if you can break security then it has no value or should be scorned or ridiculed is somewhat immature.

OK, with alll that "oldster" stuff said, I'm still looking for a commercial (meaning supported by an ongoing business) product that will encrypt CD images and has both password and date protection. I'll send detzX a plaintext version of anything he wants on these CDs so he doesn't have to commit crimes or even do screen captures.


What are you actually looking for with this, are you just trying to stop people from having access to your images if they fall into the wrong hands(lost Cd)?

A protection I did for someone online who didn't want people to be able to right click save was I wrote a program that broke an image up in many many small pieces with weird filenames...the script would lay the images out correctly to be viewed online but if you saved any images it was just that one block and would take some serious work to save them all and not worth it. This did not stop people from taking a screenshot but it stopped the majority of people from saving it to their computers.

As to your question about people being dishonest or hacking...think of it as we wouldn't know how to protect things if these people did not exist. Why do I crack things...because I can and it's teaching me how to build better programs to stop it(even though I think it's impossible). I've helped people hide/encrypt many things, it's not like I do it because I'm bad or like to do illegal things, it's more educational.

This is going in a different direction...back to the main question, from my experience in this it's impossible to show the user a picture and not allow them to save it in some way. Impossible. If you want to stop them from printing the images use watermarks.

Actually, to go even further it wouldn't be that hard to take one of those digital picture frames and do this...

[detzX]

How do you present these images, one option I just thought of was to lend them a laptop that only allows viewing and selected images...so they can view full images at will and select which ones they want but can not access other computer areas to save/move images. This would require this special software and hardware that you can lend out but it's an option.

Pictures this if you will.

Wedding pictures, you've taken them and you compile them into this CD the way you want them. You put the CD into this laptop, it reads the images and stores them on it's HD. You then give the laptop to your customer and when they turn it on they are presented with a slideshow of the images and some buttons(Want, Don't want, etc..). They go through the images(go back and forth at will) and select the ones they like, maybe even a ranking system. Once they're done they just push a button, the computer shutdown and they give it back to you. You boot it up and have access to what they want for images and there is no way they can access the images directly unless they want to take a picture of the screen(with a camera)

Sounds far fetched but with todays small laptops I think it could be done.

[Jaymz]

Flash is "hackable", you can easily get any image or sound out of a flash file within minutes. I have seen some commercial software that claims to be able to do it, never used it but I have used (and created my own) free versions. As stated before, nothing is 100% secure. The best way I could think of off the top of my head would be to write your own encryption and viewing software. Using your own very complex encryption will decrease the chances of someone just downloading a "hack". Yes someone who had the knowledge and desire would eventually hack it.

But you might check out Artistscope (http://www.artistscope.com/techniques.htm) , I have used this before for other purposes than a cd.

[photoshooter]

http://www.availasoft.com go there get photo 2album ive had hackers try to print off this and they couldnt do it i use it on all my photos and even if they could the pic will look bad btw you can use it on a cd too

[DwightMcCann]

detzX, I have been a computer programmer (mainframe assembler for many years) for 30 years. I know all of the geeky rationale for hacking and am relatively familiar with all the structural deficiencies in most of the intel hardware operating systems including stack overflows and the various programming language exposures. I am also intimately familiar with how web browsers work, webservers work, a hell of a lot about TCP/IP and Ethernet as well as other protocol stacks and underlying hardware (SNA and tokenring come to mind.) I have written programs in at least 20 languages on five platforms. I say this so you will read my request with the belief that I understand what I am saying and that I appreciate all the implications. You hack because it is fun. Depending on what you hack it may be interesting, unethical or even illegal ... I have no sympathy for it ... you can learn to program securely by reading the myriad tomes written on the subject by those who study these things much more effectively than hacking.

I am looking for a program the encrypts the images, contains a decryption engine that is integrated into a display engine and includes a date kill feature beyond which the engines don't run. I know they can set the clocks back. I know they can do screen dumps. Give the rest of us a little credit. I know I can turn off Javascript and all the trivial right click interceptions in a web browser. I am not the least interested in something that displays the images online. I want to be able to create a CD or DVD with the decryption engine (probably using a asymmetric key), the display engine and the encrypted images that can be accessed by a friendly GUI by the user so that I can keep 99.9% of the people honest. I can figure out what size images I am willing to share. I can put copyright notices across them if I want. I, and a huge number of others, know what we are saying. Get a grip! There are thousands, maybe millions, of computer science graduates floating around. They are a dime-a-dozen.

[detzX]

detzX, I have been a computer programmer (mainframe assembler for many years) for 30 years. I know all of the geeky rationale for hacking and am relatively familiar with all the structural deficiencies in most of the intel hardware operating systems including stack overflows and the various programming language exposures. I am also intimately familiar with how web browsers work, webservers work, a hell of a lot about TCP/IP and Ethernet as well as other protocol stacks and underlying hardware (SNA and tokenring come to mind.) I have written programs in at least 20 languages on five platforms. I say this so you will read my request with the belief that I understand what I am saying and that I appreciate all the implications. You hack because it is fun. Depending on what you hack it may be interesting, unethical or even illegal ... I have no sympathy for it ... you can learn to program securely by reading the myriad tomes written on the subject by those who study these things much more effectively than hacking.

I am looking for a program the encrypts the images, contains a decryption engine that is integrated into a display engine and includes a date kill feature beyond which the engines don't run. I know they can set the clocks back. I know they can do screen dumps. Give the rest of us a little credit. I know I can turn off Javascript and all the trivial right click interceptions in a web browser. I am not the least interested in something that displays the images online. I want to be able to create a CD or DVD with the decryption engine (probably using a asymmetric key), the display engine and the encrypted images that can be accessed by a friendly GUI by the user so that I can keep 99.9% of the people honest. I can figure out what size images I am willing to share. I can put copyright notices across them if I want. I, and a huge number of others, know what we are saying. Get a grip! There are thousands, maybe millions, of computer science graduates floating around. They are a dime-a-dozen.


:rolleyes: Um...OK, but I don't see how what you just is relevant to anything I said...venting on something? If you've programmed in all of these languages on all of these platforms it shouldn't be that hard for you to create this program..why haven't you? ;) I don't think you really need something that involved to show your images, encrypting images with asymmetric, these are things people to do project high security things not images. I don't see what you would get out of this except slower applications. Hidding the images inside the executable will keep 99% of the people honest and this is no need to go through the extra work to encrypt/decrypt the images unless you trying to keep 99.99% of the people straight, but as with anything else if they want them bad enough they can get them.

I'm not arguing anything here, I'm simply stating the obvious and that's if you display the images on screen people can capture them and the best way is either watermarks or low quality images.

I do like the idea of the date termination thing...simply put store epoch seconds when the application is started and check when it starts back up if it's expired, if so delete the DB of images. You could also add a check to see if they tampered with the time but most people, that 99%, wouldn't know/think to do this anyways.

Oh, and I do hack because it's fun, it gives me a thrill to know I've outsmarter the developers which in 99% of the applications out there today is not that difficult. if people didn't push the limits of society this world would be a pretty boring place to live in...

[DwightMcCann]

Oh, OK, you aren't arguing, sigh, OK. Developing such a program that is robust and reliable using an API with which I am not familiar in an operating system with which I'm not familiar and creating an interface, preferably GUI, is non-trivial with yet another API with which I'm not familiar would take weeks. I think I'm done discussing any aspect except the name of a recommended product since this discussion isn't productive. Thanks for the help.

[Croasdail]

Dwight... if were to be able to develope what you are looking for, you would have the heads of the all major media distribution houses knocking on your door with bags of money in hand.

There are two things here.

1) I find electronic media to be enharently risky just because of the speed on change and the threat of backward compatibility. WIth that said, it would be suicidal for someone like Canon or Adobe to orphan older image formats. At some point the files will need to be upgraded, but everytime you do that there is risk. Add on top of that using some encryption software from some software company that you hope will still be around in 5 years.... the equastion just gets more complex and chances of failure are increased.... it isn't worth it.

2) You have to trust your customers. Really, it is as simple as that. I work for a leading software firm, where we liberally allow the download of software worth hundreds of thousands dollars for "development" use - not production. We could put encryption keys, special licenses, yada-yada-yada on the software, but we realize that people without ethics will get their hands on the software if they really want to. Code (or images) are just too transportable. Just do business with those you trust, and walk from doing business with those you feel would steal from you... you don't want to deal with them.

I do find it amusing that there is actually a discussion where people willingly admitting to vialating copyright on a forum dedicated to the respect for individuals copyright. It boggles the mind.... oh well.

[DwightMcCann]

Mark, Let me give specifics and perhaps that will clear things up a bit. I shoot bands. Some are big deals and I'm a pimple on the ass of progress for them. Others are midlevel and while they have outgrown using their own point and shoot images they don't want to spend $1000 a day to get professional images. So, they come to the casino, see me shooting and ask about images. I always say they can have images to use on their website but beyond that we need to negotiate compensation. They want a CD with high quality images in order to decide (can you imagine that?) And often they want ALL the images. I am looking at alternatives. One is to simply say, "No, I will only ...." whatever I am willing to do. Another would be to ship a CD with fairly decent images, perhaps with Copyright watermarks on them and this may be what I do. But it would be nice to have a tool that would give a sense of value and a sense of time sensitivity to these images. I don't want them to sit on them for six months. I do want to make it hard to simply use them and "forget" to contact me about sending me money. I want to give them a strong sense that I "control" the images. So, I am evolving a business strategy. I am well aware of all the implications and I am even of two minds on Intellectual Property. But I have found that even when I have gotten agreement that any images used would have a photocredit it just doesn't always happen ... it is just human nature to take the easiest route ... so I want to make the easiest route just hard enough that giving me that photocredit or putting a check in the mail for a few hundred bucks is easiest. And should someone "steal" the images it is much easier to demonstrate intent if they had to hack a protection mechanism to do it, but that is not my primary concern.

Hmmm, I didn't notice anyone admitting to violating Copyright here. Hacking doesn't equate to Copyright violation. Besides, I think what was really discussed was that for some immature personalities the idea of pretending or claiming to prove they are smarter than someone else is a thrill ... a sort of mental masturbation ... and the fact that it leads to absolutely nothing productive is moot for them. For most of us posting here whether someone else can lift more weight, or run faster, or solve harder problems or break encryption schemes or has a bigger, um, er, ah, "member", is so far down on our list of interests that we would never think to mention it, but if that is all you have in your life, it becomes a core issue to be insinuated into any discussion ... and besides, you don't even have to prove it so you can say whatever you want, kinda like "script kiddies" claiming they can take over other peoples machines. So what? What have you done productive today? :-)

[Croasdail]

so here is how I would approach this. I wouldn't do the CDs. I would give the a private web site that they have to click through a copyright notice to get to the images - which are watermarked. If they want to use an image - they have to click an acknowledgement - and then the full res images are emailed to them. This allow you to control how long the images are there and can creates some sense urgency. You also get feedback as to what they looked at. You just loose too much with a CD... imho. Good Luck with the project.

[DwightMcCann]

That's a wonderful idea, Mark, and it is a perfect application that I can use to develop my Apache, PHP and MySQL toolset and use as a motivator to setup a web server from one of my business computers ... I love it! THANK YOU, THANK YOU. I can even give them their own userid and password to do the accesses. Oh, yes, lots of ideas here. :-)

[photoshooter]

guess no one liked my deal go to my web site and try it out if you can print a good pic tell me www.superchargedphotos.com

[Croasdail]

Photoshooter - no - I like the functionality of your site. My biggest concern is a zip file would not be allowed through my firewall. But other then that... seems to be a sound design. But I would again put a click through stating two things.... the downloader acknowledges the copyright, and that the receiver indemnifies you so. Personally I would also enhance your image layout too... but business wise it looks good.

To the original question... I think a Flash presentation burned to the cd in hidden directories would work. The average joe wouldn't know how to deal with it - and those that do like to hack things like those disk and use the images... well, you wouldn't have gotten any business from them anyway.