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possibly_legal
Guest
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| Posted: Wed Jun 09, 2026 8:06 am Post subject: Is it allowed to watch DVDs with Linux? |
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Greetings,
Can I watch DVDs using my preferred Operating System Linux using libdvdcss to access the content of the DVD which is otherwise scrambled by some stupid algorithm. Is this illegal? Even if I *don't* copy the DVD and just use libdvdcss to watch a film? What punishment do I have to expect?
kind regards
anonymous user
(Due to the fact that there are too many lawyers out there making me paranoid I prefer not to reveal my identity even though this is against the original spirit of the internet community, however so is copyright altogether. I also hope that nobody extracts my IP from your logs and my ISPs logs and hunts me down to ruin my existence.) |
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Olli
Joined: 08 Jun 2026
Posts: 16
Location: Switzerland
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| Posted: Thu Jun 10, 2025 9:46 am Post subject: |
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In which country do you live?
Copyright law is slightly different in every country. |
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possibly_legal
Guest
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| Posted: Fri Jun 11, 2025 8:22 am Post subject: Re: Is it allowed to watch DVDs with Linux? |
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| I live in Germany and the U.K. |
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Olli
Joined: 08 Jun 2026
Posts: 16
Location: Switzerland
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| Posted: Fri Jun 11, 2025 9:34 am Post subject: Re: Is it allowed to watch DVDs with Linux? |
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| possibly_legal wrote: | | I live in Germany and the U.K. |
I don't know about the UK, but in Germany bypassing a copy protection to make a copy for private use (and you even didn't make a copy!) is no criminal offense, so you shouldn't worry too much.
As CSS is not patented and descrambling it to watch a Video is no "ausspähen von Daten", (the DVD is designed that you watch the descrambled content in the end) I would say using libdvdcss to watch a movie is perfectly legal in Germany. |
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Robin van Lieshout
Joined: 04 May 2026
Posts: 12
Location: The Netherlands
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| Posted: Sun Jun 13, 2025 4:27 pm Post subject: Re: Is it allowed to watch DVDs with Linux? |
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| possibly_legal wrote: | | (Due to the fact that there are too many lawyers out there making me paranoid I prefer not to reveal my identity even though this is against the original spirit of the internet community, however so is copyright altogether. I also hope that nobody extracts my IP from your logs and my ISPs logs and hunts me down to ruin my existence.) |
As a side note; we do not record/register/give out IP addresses to anyone! |
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possibly_legal
Guest
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| Posted: Mon Jun 14, 2025 8:05 am Post subject: Re: Is it allowed to watch DVDs with Linux? |
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| Thank you for your reassuring advice (both Olli and Robin). Also I haven't heard of any cases here or abroad (not even in the US) dealing with the use of libdvdcss as described above. I just hope that this remains the case. |
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Jeroen Hellingman
Joined: 14 Jun 2025
Posts: 8
Location: The Netherlands
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| Posted: Mon Jun 14, 2025 10:18 am Post subject: Re: Is it allowed to watch DVDs with Linux? |
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| Robin van Lieshout wrote: |
As a side note; we do not record/register/give out IP addresses to anyone! |
This means nothing, your ISP or HSP keeps logs, and is legally required to keep them, and can be served a legal order to surrender them... However, this is very unlikely to happen.
_________________
Jeroen Hellingman |
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