Digital right management systems versus users´ privacy

At the time of their introduction, Digital Rights Management systems were
often triumphantly presented as the decisive technological response to
digital piracy. However, shortly after their introduction it became clear
that this technological protection presents a rather small, but costly
speed bump on the digital highway leading to the protected content, and
not a panacea for this undesirable phenomenon. As a result, Digital Rights
Management systems have undergone crucial transformation. With their
further development, the Digital Rights Management systems ceased to
focus solely on combating piracy and started to collect vast amounts of
information about the users and content usage for various purposes. This
book describes the crucial stages of this process, evaluates the extent of
the threat to the privacy of users' using protected content and assesses both
- legality and legitimacy of the current use of Digital Rights Management
systems. Although this book emphasizes privacy and data protection
legislation in the European Union and Digital Rights Management systems
usage interrelation, it also offers non-legal insight by adding social and
economical views on the development in the field.