INTRODUCTION

The digital age has brought with it numerous challenges in terms of technology, its use and its
abuse. Traditionally, the thought of violation was restricted to physical imitation of proprietary
work, and copy or repetition of the work accompanied with unauthorised sale/distribution of
copyrighted material. the amount of physical copies produced determined the extent of piracy.
with the upsurge of technology, piracy has become a lot feasible With the rapid development of
the Internet and computer technology, digital content, including digital images, video and music
can be distributed instantaneously. However, digital content in the digital world differs from
objects in real world. The main difference is the dissemination - it can be easily copied, altered,
and distributed to a large number of recipients seamlessly. This almost certainly causes copyright
infringement and revenue losses to content owners In control how digital content is used.
Technologists and information scientists consider DRM as a tool which address the issues
pertaining to –

1. Digital Rights Enforcement (DRE) environment

2. Digital Rights, and

3. Standardization for interoperability

However Many public interest organizations, fear that DRM technologies will be used by
copyright owners to erode capabilities that had previously been permitted to the public by
copyright law under the “fair use” doctrine DRM technologies can be used for more nefarious
purposes such as infringing on privacy, personal profiling, price discrimination based on
personally dentifiable information and stymieing the development of open source software.
Digital rights management does not equate to a single technology or a simple philosophy, but
extends to a wide range of technologies and standards which are at the evolving stage. Digital
rights management is a system of solutions designed as a means to control the unauthorised
duplication and illegal distribution of copyrighted digital media. DRM a misnomer or not The
rights conferred the copyright owner in digital media are called on digital rights. But as these
rights are in danger of being violated, so digital management of such rights are called digital
rights management. As DRM manages all right and not only the rights applicable to digital
content, so the term DRM to be taken as management of digital rights will be wrong. So, one can
say that DRM is a general term used to prevent unauthorised access or redistribution of copyright
work available on digital media.

Therefore digital rights management is a complex technology involving a number of controlling

features to provide control on access and on use of such work rather than copying of the same.
By this method they are trying to curb the illegitimate actions of distributing the copyrighted
work on digital media through the peer-to-peer file sharing network leading to the traditional
copyright law obsolete and also regain control over distribution of such matter. So, people think
that the term digital rights management is misleading and suggest using the term digital
restriction management. But the counter-arguments given in favour of DRM is that the main
purpose of DRM is not to prevent rather to enable usage of content through active enforcement
of rights of copyright owner’s.
 DIGITAL RIGHTS MANAGEMENT AND IT’S LEGAL DEVELOPMENT

Laws on DRM Digital rights management systems received international legal backing by
implementation of the WIPO Copyright Treaty, 1996. Article 11 of the Treaty contains the
provisions requiring the contracting parties of the Treaty to enact laws against DRM
circumvention. The WCT has been implemented in most member States of the WIPO. USA
implemented it in the form of the Act named as Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA),
while in Europe the Treaty has been implemented by the 2001 European Directive on Copyright,
which on its part requires member States of the European Union to implement basic legal
protections for technological prevention measures (other name for DRM circumvention). The
Digital Millennium Copyright Act is an amendment to the United States copyright law which
was passed unanimously on 14-5-19985. It contains provisions, which criminalise the production
and dissemination of technology that allows users to circumvent the laws made for prevention of
copyright infringement. Under this Act, circumvention of a technological measure whose
purpose is to control access of a work is made illegal, if such act is done with the primary intent
of violating the rights of copyright holders. Thus it criminalises the act of circumventing an
access control, whether or not there is actual infringement of copyright. India does not have any
special or particular anti-circumvention laws to protect DRM technologies as the Indian
legislature has not implemented the WCT and WPPT in India through any means. India is a
country filled with piracy and the reason behind this is that the copyright law is not strictly
enforced here. Hardly any authors in India really bother for getting their works registered with
the copyright office or enforcing their copyrights. However, DRM is sought to be introduced in
India via the Copyright (Amendment) Bill, 2010 through Sections , 65- A and 65-B. The Indian
Copyright (Amendment) Bill, 2010 was firstly introduced in the Rajya Sabha on 19-4-2010. The
Bill was referred for consideration to the Department related Standing Committee on Human
Resource Development eventually in 2012 they were added through amendment to copyright
act1957
Digital rights management and the legal framework Digital rights management consists of two
kinds of technical protection i.e. technical protection measures and rights management
information. Technological protection measures refers to technologies and systems which permit
copyright owners to control the access to their works, or kinds of permissible uses, terms of such
uses and distribution of the works. Rights management information refers to mechanisms which
identify digital works and they are used to manage materials to customers. Internationally, the
anti circumvention legislations have been enacted not only to protect digital rights management
but also to ban the act of circumvention. It prohibits the manufacture, sale, and distribution of
devices which can be used to break the production provided by digital rights management
systems.

Digital rights management and stakeholders The entertainment industry consisting of six major
industries viz. the film industry, the music industry, the print media, television, animation and
computer games are most affected by violation of copyright of their digital content. The rampant
copying has severely affected these industries and hence they are in favour of digital rights
management to protect their interests and profits. The content creators and copyright owners in
all fields of activities, the network providers, manufacturers of consumer electronics, computer
hardware, digital rights management developers and vendors, consumers and general public are
the stakeholders in this arena. The Bollywood industry in India whose significant presence is felt
from 1998 when it was granted the status of an industry is an important stakeholder. Another
important stakeholder is IT companies, both Indian and foreign sector in India, who would be
affected by incorporating law relating to digital rights management. The digital rights
management technologies are owned by US and European companies in which Sony, Panasonic,
Phillips and Microsoft are a few and have a considerable market presence in India. The digital
rights management is inhibitory against the IT companies, which engage in software research.
The proposed provisions prevent anti circumvention activities, but provide exception to research
in case encryption technologies.

DRM ARCHITECTURE: DIFFERENT METHOD

Digital rights management provide different method to protect copyright on digital platforms
Following are the DRM architecture widely used and accepted as the standards at present
situation. This extracts are the high-level usage scenarios according to content consumers,
producers and publishers.

 Fingerprinting - Fingerprinting technologies can be used to identify content by

the process depicted in the diagram below. Fingerprinting or “content-based
identification technologies” function by extracting the characteristics of a file and
storing them in database. When the technology is presented with an unknown
file, the characteristics of that file are calculated and matched against those stored
in the database, in an attempt to find a match. If a match is found, the system will
return the appropriate metadata from the fingerprint d Fingerprints are highly
effective with certain content types, but less equipped to aid the unique
identification and greatly depends on the “detail” they provide. Hence fingerprints
are suitable for audio, video and audio-visual content as well as photographs but
less for computer graphics and text.

 Watermarking - Watermarking is also often cited when discussing copyright

protection technologies. A watermark is “embedded information.” This
information (often a file or IP identifier) can be extracted by special software.
This “watermarking detector” when applied to content that is suspected to be
pirated, check if the content bears the watermark and thereby prove or disprove
the suspicion. Typically, all files that are to be distributed are watermarked before
they are allowed into the content chain. A functional flow diagram of this is
shown in the diagram below.

 Digital signature - Digital Signatures akin to hand written signature scan be used
to regulate the access to digital content It is important to see that information
associated with content (e.g., IDs and rights expressions) can be trusted. Such
functionality can be achieved when the party adding the metadata digitally signs
the metadata, and is known to be authorized to add the metadata. a digital
signature provides information about the origin of a piece of information and
knowledge about whether the information has been altered or not. However,
 although this kind of architecture solves the rights management problems, a
customized image viewer is not convenient for users. Later several commercial
DRM

POSITION IN INDIA

In India, the Copyright Act deals with the infringement of copyright. The Copyright Act does not
provide for the liability of the ISPs as such. Section 51, which deals with the infringement of
copyright, provides that copyright is deemed to be infringed when any person, without a licence
granted by the owner of the copyright or the Registrar of Copyrights. The issue whether the
liability of ISPs can be fixed for the infringement of copyright under the aforesaid provision is
debatable even though the provision may interpreted in such a way as to fix their liabilities. It is
also noteworthy that it might not be the intention of the legislature to apply the aforesaid
provision to fix the liabilities for the ISPs. The issue to fix the liability of the ISPs has been
redressed under the Information Technology Act 2000. Section 79 of the Information
Technology Act 2000 exempts the network service providers from liability in certain cases. It
provides that any person providing any service as a network service provider is no to be made
liable for any third party information or data made available by him if he proves that the offence
or contravention was committed without his knowledge or that he had exercised all due diligence
to prevent the commission of such offence or contravention. The problem with the Information
Technology Act is that it was enacted to provide legal recognition for e-commerce and does not
deal with the infringement of copyright as such.The Indian courts have held in Garware Plastic
and Polyester Ltd. v. Telelink in a case pertaining to the showing of video films over a cable
network, that such an action amounts to broadcasting or communicating it to a section of the
public. The Hon’ble Supreme Court also held that such broadcasting of the programme directly
affected the earnings of the author and violated his intellectual property rights. The case also held
that assisting in infringement would amount to the infringement of copyright .On the basis of this
case, it may be possible for some to argue that Napster facilitates unauthorised copying and
hence, should be liable for contributory and vicarious infringement of copyright. However, the
Garware case may be distinguished from the Napster, as Napster is not ‘broadcasting’ the music
to any of its subscribers. It is merely providing software that may be used to locate songs for
copying over the Net. The legal position in India is as yet unclear and much would depend on the
facts and interpretation of these facts by the court.

CONCLUSION

The domain of DRM is currently lacking a generic architecture that supports

interoperability and reuse of specific DRM technologies. This architectural lack is a
serious drawback in light of the rapid evolution of a complex domain like DRM. It is
unlikely that a single DRM technology or standard will be able to support the
diversity of devices, users, platforms, and media; or the wide variety of system
requirements concerning security, flexibility, and efficiency But, even today, in
Indian legal system western thought is readily acceptable. The Indian position is
unique among Asian and developing nations. Litigation and enforcement tools and
concepts have found ready acceptance. For example, Anton Piller Orders and Mareva
injunctions have been employed with success in India. Nonetheless, the following
points should be kept in mind. There is no common law duty of care parallel to the
duty imposed by the statute not to infringe copyright. In addition, there is no distinct
tort of procuring or inciting the infringement of copyright. Anyone who sanctions,
approves or countenances an infringement may be liable. Even indirect permission or
countenancing of infringement would be sufficient to constitute authorising. (Section
48(4) and 48(6) of the UK Act of 1956) There is no parallel section in the Indian
Copyright Act 1957,despite the fact that DRMs will undoubtedly be susceptible to
counter measures, the scheme for automation of copyright enforcement is unsettling.
The policy makers and technology experts should work together to bridge the gap in
the existing law and also for the improvement of the technology, so as to reduce the
number of copyright infringement disputes. While the normative frameworks may be
indeterminate, they can still guide policy makers in making prudent choices that will
reward creative labour and stimulate creativity while avoiding further erosion of the
intellectual commons