BD+ Titles Coming Soon

In response to the attacks on AACS (the encryption system used to protect against piracy of Blu-ray and HD DVD discs) the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) has accelerated the time table for implementing BD-Plus. Earlier this year, a flaw was found in PC-based Blu-ray and HD DVD player software, allowing users to obtain the title keys necessary to freely copy content of the disc onto a hard drive. Since then, HD titles have appeared on Torrent sites and other underground networks. BD-Plus (BD+) is an encryption system completely separate from AACS, which helps prevent Blu-ray discs from being copied to a user's computer far beyond what AACS was designed to do. BD+ allows the disc to install a small piece of encryption software on a player, meaning that each disc can have its own key instead of each disc of a particular movie having the same key. This allows a single disc to be rejected, effectively punishing the person stealing the content, instead of everyone who owns that movie. Sources indicate that player compatibility testing has ended, and that studios have had test discs for the last few months. Once BD+ is available - which Sony Pictures is planning to use by the end of the year - it will add from seven to 28 days to production time, per title. 20th Century Fox, who introduced BD+ and has slowed disc production since the attacks on AACS, is expected to be one of the firsts to implement this new technology. BD+ is only available to members of the BDA for use on Blu-ray discs.