EMI Music Canada lock down new releases after the Hail to the Thief leak

EMI Music Canada is moving its new recordings onto a secure delivery system from Musicrypt, a Toronto company, to stop music reaching listeners before its release date. Liz Clayton reports for ITBusiness.ca that the Hail to the Thief leak, which put the album online more than two months early, made EMI one of the labels hit hardest by leaks.

Musicrypt's Digital Media Distribution System carries a finished mix from the studio to the label and on to radio and the press without a physical copy ever leaving anyone's hands. Rob Brooks, EMI Music Canada's vice-president of marketing, blames no one in particular.

Leaks have been found at virtually every one of those points somewhere.

Rob Brooks¹

Every recipient gets a personal password, tied to them by the rhythm of their typing, which Musicrypt's Peter Diemer compares to a fingerprint or retina scanner. Radio stations can download broadcast-quality audio through a web page and audition songs that stay on the server until they are added to a playlist. A downloaded file can still leak, but each one carries a watermark with the downloader's ID.

Brooks says any saving on posting advance copies is beside the point, because it's totally anti-piracy¹.