Users of CAD (computer-aided design) get upset when software vendors encrypt data in their file formats. Examples include file formats from PTC and Autodesk. Customers create the designs that are stored in the files, and want to be able to access them, even if the CAD vendor goes under.
Now the camera world is rocked by the news that Nikon has encrypted a portion of the RAW files generated by its high-end D2 series of digital cameras. Adobe found that the white balance settings are encrypted.
(RAW is the generic name given to any digital camera's files made from captured images with no in-camera processing. In contrast, JPG files are heavily processed, with compression, sharpening, saturation, and other enhancements. RAW images are considered "pure.")
The idea behind encryption is to force customers to buy photograph processing software from Nikon or from a vendor approved by Nikon (to whom the encryption has been revealed). It is common for third-party vendors in the CAD and camera worlds to reverse-engineer the encrypted formats, often using subcontractors in Russia or India who specialize in this work -- and who are outside the jurisdiction of the USA's legislation that makes such acts illegal.
The problem is the same for the CAD drafter and the photographer: the customer owns the design and the image -- not the vendor who provides the tool with which the customer makes his living. For the professional photographer, this could mean avoiding the purchase of Nikon products.
Update
Nikone makes a leaded response to the controversy, saying, "Nikon’s preservation of its unique technology in the NEF file is employed as an action that protects the uniqueness of the file."
I wonder how many public relations flaks worked that sentance over until it eventually came to mean close to nothing.
The encrypted files can only be accessed by using Nikon's SDK, and Nikon only gives the SDK to select programmers. In the end, the person who owns the camera does not matter to Nikon.: "Nikon continues to welcome dialogue with bona fide software developers." The pictures you take are not your own.
You can read the full statement at Imaging Resource.
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