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You wouldn't be able to open and read e-mail from anyone who turns on DRM in the new version of Microsoft Office unless you also have Microsoft's proprietary e-mail software AND have been pre-approved to read the message.
  technofile
Al Fasoldt's reviews and commentaries, continuously available online since 1983

T e c h n o f i l e
Microsoft's new Office software could trace document recipients


March 23, 2003


By Al Fasoldt
Copyright © 2003, Al Fasoldt
Copyright © 2003, The Post-Standard

   Microsoft's monopoly in the PC market has an ominous new twist.
   A future version of Microsoft Office will be able to track the identities of Office users who open documents and e-mail, and can even block access to people who haven't been pre-approved by Microsoft.
   This attempt to control users and documents is so far-reaching that it seems to have come straight from the "Big Brother" mind-control force in George Orwell's classic novel "1984." But it is not fantasy. Microsoft is already testing the software, as shown by a beta version that leaked out of the company's notoriously insecure private Web servers this month.
   The new version of Office, referred to as Office 11 in Microsoft's internal notes, is likely to hit the market later this year.
   Millions of Americans use portions of Microsoft Office every day. It is a suite of productivity programs that provides word processing, e-mail, database management, financial calculations and many other functions. Office 95, Office 97, Office 2000 and Office XP are the Windows versions in current use.
   Versions for the two Macintosh operating systems are popular also, but Microsoft hasn't indicated whether the Macintosh software will be fitted with the access-blocking software.
   The new technology is part of Microsoft's so-called "Digital Rights Management" (DRM), designed to block unauthorized users from opening documents, listening to music, opening unauthorized e-mail messages and attachments or viewing sections of Web pages.
   One possible commercial use for Digital Rights Management seems obvious. Music companies could try to reduce the theft of copyrighted material by using DRM to prevent those who haven't paid for a song from playing it, even if they've downloaded it.
   A user who tried to play such a downloaded song on Microsoft's proprietary media player would have to wait while the software contacted the recording company to find out if the music had been paid for. If no record of payment was found or if the user was not approved in some other way, the software would refuse to play the song.
   This alone is enough to make us sit up. Protecting copyrights is important. But who should control your listening habits? Who should decide whether you are "approved" to listen to a certain piece of music? I find this disturbing in many ways.
   But Microsoft's DRM could do something far outside the bounds of copyright protection.
   Microsoft will try very hard to make its own version of Digital Rights Management the de facto standard for Windows PCs. This is the way Microsoft does things.
   But it will attempt to make its proprietary DRM the standard for the rest of the computing world, too. If Microsoft succeeds, offices, schools and many personal users throughout the country will find that they're unable to read and respond to DRM-encoded e-mail without buying DRM-enabled software -- from Microsoft, of course.
   The same restriction would apply to all other office documents that use Microsoft's Digital Rights Management. You would not be able to deal with any documents created with DRM encoding unless you bought the latest version of Microsoft Office.
   Let me be very plain. Many of you have struggled countless times with documents that can't be opened or viewed unless you have Microsoft Office. This is not a Mac vs. Windows problem, either; countless Windows users have trouble every day handling Microsoft documents created by versions of Microsoft Office they don't have. And if you don't have Microsoft Office at all, you can face major annoyances if the correspondents you work with insist on using Word, Excel, Access or PowerPoint, the four mainstays of the Office suite.
   Imagine the problems you could face if Microsoft's Digital Rights Management system takes hold. You wouldn't be able to open and read e-mail from anyone who turns on DRM in the new version of Microsoft Office unless you also have Microsoft's proprietary e-mail software AND have been pre-approved to read the message or download the attachment.
   When you install that software, it will "phone home" (by contacting Microsoft over the Internet) to establish your credentials. If the same copy of Microsoft Office has already been used on another PC, even on one owned by you, Microsoft will tell your software that it is not allowed to run.
   If for any reason Microsoft doesn't want to approve you or your computer, you're out of luck. (Did you say you got your PC at a garage sale? Does Microsoft know that, or is your PC actually listed as stolen property? Or maybe your kids were downloading music from non-approved file sites, and the traces of those files are on your hard drive. Would you get approved for DRM when Microsoft finds traces of those music files?)
   You might think I'm overreacting. But let me explain.
   Your Windows PC would become, in this scenario, an agency of Microsoft and perhaps of the government. I'm not exaggerating. Your privacy could, in the most literal sense, be diluted every time you handled a document that used Digital Rights Management.
   Is this something to worry about? You bet. We should understand that some of what DRM can do is good and necessary, but Microsoft, in its inimitable way, is about to make a mess of what could be a very important safeguard for those who create art for a living. By turning DRM into something that can track what you do, what you read and even what you reject, Microsoft is reminding us that our democracy requires its own kind of "rights management."
   I'm more worried about DRM than about any other technological change facing us. Initially I was less concerned, but something almost trivial changed my mind.
   I discovered that Microsoft's Digital Rights Management even prevents Windows users from making screen shots of DRM-encoded messages that they are authorized to read.
   I'm not trying to be funny. If you finally get approval from Big Brother as someone Microsoft can trust, you're not trusted enough to press your Print Screen key. If you do try to copy the screen to the clipboard, nothing happens if a DRM document is on the screen.
   Big deal? Do you think it's merely silly? After all, you can take all the screen snapshots you want with your digital camera.
   Ah, here's where I became convinced that there is something sinister about DRM. Microsoft knows about digital cameras. It's not that stupid. So of course it's got another plan. I feel this in my bones.
   If you take a picture of your PC screen when it's showing a document covered by Digital Rights Management, I'm convinced that Microsoft will do its best, or perhaps its worst, to find a way to make you a thief. It will declare picture-taking illegal when any part of the photo shows a DRM document on the screen -- even if you're taking a picture of your own computer screen.
   This is scary. What else is under the surface? Will it be a crime to draw a picture of your screen? If your 5-year-old points the camcorder at the DRM messages on your Windows PC, are you responsible for corrupting the morals and ethics of a child?
   I don't like this at all.
   Am I just plain crazy or am I seeing through the cloak of Digital Rights Management? Tell me what you think. Send me your comments. Put "Technofile DRM" somewhere in the subject so we can sort it out and send your e-mail to afasoldt@twcny.rr.com. I'll quote the best responses in a few weeks.