Dr Who’s leaked

Bad week for the BBC.   Last week, scripts of five episodes of next season of Dr Who leaked online.  The scripts were accessed from a Miami-based BBC worldwide server.  It seems that that they were publicly available (with a lot of material) and was indexed by Google.   A typical Google request provided access to this confidential material.

Unfortunately, other material was available.  A black & white unfinished watermark version of the first episode has also been put online.  The copy is visibly watermarked for a given recipient.   Drei Marc is a Brazilian company that provides subtitling and dubbing services.  Nevertheless, it seems that it comes from the same server.  It is not sure that other episodes may not surface in the coming days.  Broadcast of the first episode is planed on 23 August.

dr-who

BBC asked its fans not to spoil the release.

We would like to make a plea to anyone who might have any of this material and spoilers associated with it not to share it with a wider audience so that everyone can enjoy the show as it should be seen when it launches.

"We know only too well that Doctor Who fans are the best in the world and we thank them for their help with this and their continued loyalty

Several lessons:

  • Secure your servers and be aware of the indexing robots.   No server should be put online without prior pen testing.
  • Encryption at rest should be mandatory for early content.  If ever the attacker access the video server, he will access an encrypted video without the decryption key.  Useless.
  • Forensic marking should only occur at delivery time.  If prepared and stored before release, it is useless.  It will not hold in front of a Court with good security expert.
  • TV series are the new Eldorado of the movie industry

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