-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- L. Detweiler's tentacle Vlad Nuri writes:

[...] the rep told me something interesting: he said that every Bell phone book is actually "seeded" with dummy names so they can detect copyright infringers. if you come out with a business directory, these Bells will just scan for the fake names that they have inserted into their own listings. if they find them, supposedly they can show them to a copyright judge and he will immediately close down your operation and fine you, almost no questions asked. I didn't know how much of this really happens (the legal stuff sounded questionable to me) but it is an interesting "real world" instance of copyright terrorism prevention that the "information liberation front" would have to contend with.

While he's correct that publishers of data compilations do use dummy entries to track [mis]use of their data, he's incorrect when he asserts that it's possible to get a copyright on an ordinary white-pages style directory. (_Feist v. Rural Telephone_, 499 US 340 (1991), http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/classics/499_340v.htm ). This practice occurs when mailing lists are sold, and in the drafting of maps (non-existent streets or sections of streets may be added, or changed in an unremarkable way). It's also possible (and getting easier with laser printers, etc) to generate apparently indentical but distinguishable documents for use where disclosure of the documents is controlled; the distinguishing parts (perhaps a misspelled word or other apparent typo, or a change in line spacing between paragraphs, or altered line breaks) can then be used to trace a recovered "leaked" document to the person who received it originally. Where the documents are digital (or digitizable), two or recipients could collude to 'diff' their copies, and find the barium data; but a savvy document-distributor could generate copies with multiple ID-bits, such that any two copies might have differences between the two, but barium data that's the same yet different from the other participants. So those two colluders round up a third recipient [...] It's basically a form of very-low-bandwidth text-only steganography. Of course, we're wandering into FAQ territory; isn't there something in the Cyphernomicon about digital signatures for physical items being used as proof of source? (e.g., you'll know that the expensive motorcycle part you just bought really *is* from Harley-Davidson, not a cheaper part placed in a knockoff Harley box) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBMFIOtX3YhjZY3fMNAQGlwAP+KhhBK1MGDvsNizH5Pu7XsqQg6rPxnCp2 q5YRZrQyVktit8hK+TbHcodAvG7IWK2vFuI1y80dFx5sKfAqjLU81rth7Pad7nRm USUYUIxlvnaO7dOWUPMsEaaad2uZpLn/ALoTwXsYqzT2YjPyl1/YYLTHkmK/PHUI 5C6yJNKtpAY= =CwZF -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----