Hacking the Spectrum

Architecture and Background

Wendy Seltzer and Seth Schoen, Hacking the Spectrum: Open Source Software vs. the Broadcast Flag The FCC, at Hollywood's request, has mandated a broadcast flag for high-definition digital television (HDTV). By July 2005, it will be unlawful to sell devices that don"t respond to a "do not copy" flag or that provide unencumbered high-definition digital outputs. The flag's "robustness" requirement will make it impossible to build an open-source HDTV version of the TiVo.

Vulnerability Analysis

This talk will demonstrate how these rules thwart user innovation, showing an open-source HDTV PVR (MythTV on Linux) you soon won"t be able to build. We"ll discuss the law and challenges to receiver regulation, and encourage people to get HDTV cards while they still can. Wendy Seltzer, Electronic Frontier Foundation Staff Attorney Wendy Seltzer is a Staff Attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, specializing in intellectual property and free speech issues. As a Fellow with Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet and Society, Wendy founded and leads the Chilling Effects Clearinghouse, helping Internet users to understand their rights in response to cease-and-desist threats.

Exploitation and Demonstrations

Prior to joining EFF, Wendy taught Internet Law as an Adjunct Professor at St. John's University School of Law and practiced intellectual property and technology litigation with Kramer Levin Naftalis and Frankel in New York. Wendy speaks frequently on copyright, trademark, open source, and the public interest online. She has an A.B.

Remediation and Defensive Strategies

from Harvard College and J.D. from Harvard Law School, and occasionally takes a break from legal code to program (Perl). Seth Schoen, Electronic Frontier Foundation Staff Technologist Seth Schoen created the position of EFF Staff Technologist, helping other technologists understand the civil liberties implications of their work, EFF staff better understand the underlying technology related to EFF's legal work, and the public understand what the technology products they use really do. Schoen comes to EFF from Linuxcare, where he worked for two years as a senior consultant. While at Linuxcare, Schoen helped create the Linuxcare Bootable Business Card CD-ROM. Prior to Linuxcare, Schoen worked at AtreNet, the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and Toronto Dominion Bank. Schoen attended the University of California at Berkeley with a Chancellor's Scholarship.