The Quick Start scheme was, in the early days at least, a bonus for Sky. It convinced people to subscribe on the spot and almost without reflection. It is similar in some respects to an impulse purchase with a credit card.
Of course problems with the scheme quickly surfaced. Far from being a storm in a teacup, a typhoon developed. The Quick Start cards were being obtained with false names and addresses and being resold in Mainland Europe.
With the advent of the Phoenix Program, the Quick Start became a major liability to Sky. Judging from the over the air traffic of September, October and November 1994, they lost more cards to pirated QuickStarts than to lost subscribers.
The figures shown are those for kills between the May 1994 and December 1994. The sheer magnitude of the kills in some months indicates that the number of cards going missing each month was a massive drain on Sky's reserve of smart cards.
All Chs No Sports Sports only New Kills
May 94 39512 6230 10462 519507
Jun 94 28043 4177 3941 543015
Jul 94 25845 4014 3515 294300
Aug 94 35079 3664 6343 225244
Sep 94 45192 4703 7483 569430
Oct 94 57264 4821 5220 220073
Nov 94 52503 5560 5628 139118
Dec 94 61498 7111 6422 97217
The changeover to 09 occurred on 18th May 1994. In June, the number of missing QuickStart cards rose dramatically. The months of July and August were typically lower due since television viewing figures fall in the Summer. By August, the Phoenix Program was beginning to hit Sky. The highest kill figure is directly attributed to this factor. The fall off in the Kill figure from November is due to the increasing availability and reliability of the pirate 09 smart cards.
The killing of approximately 2.6 Million cards, most of which were probably QuickStarts, would have used up a major part of Sky's reserve of smart cards. The 09 card was probably intended to last a lot longer, except it has been totally hacked. This is one thing that News Datacom did not seem to expect.
Some people considered that the 09 was intended to last until September 1994 at least. With the addition of MTV to the Multichannels fold, this projection was expected to change.
MTV had always protested at being included in the Sky Multichannels package by Sky's publicity department. Recently they had concluded a deal to join and announced that they would scramble as of July 1st 1995. Naturally there were questions about the vulnerability of the VideoCrypt system. Did Sky offer MTV the prospect of a new 0A card launch? It is an interesting theory. But it would have been dangerous for Sky to launch the 0A just now.
The present 09 smart card has been reverse engineered. While the reverse engineering operation may have taken some time, it was aided by the rather stupid mistake of News Datacom. They put a backdoor into the software. Well it was not exactly a backdoor in their eyes. It was an over the air reprogramming scheme.
The 09 Sky card is based on a Motorola 6805 type smart card. While it is fast in terms of multiplication operations, it is not fast enough to carry out RSA calculations of the type necessary to protect Pay TV signals. Indeed the whole of News Datacom's seed generation algorithms for the last few card issues appear to be based on a hashing function.
To carry out the calculations necessary for secure RSA, a smart card chip with better arithmetic processing power would be required. This chip will not apparently be available from Motorola until at least late July. This would mean that it would be close to November before Sky would have upgraded its subscriber base to the new 0A cards.
Of course there is another side to the withdrawal of the QuickStarts. In the past, the launch of a new card was always preceded by a diminished supply of QuickStart cards. However the pattern this time is very different. What would normally be the precursor to the launch of the new Sky 0A card may well signal an underlying confusion.
Sky is in a very bad situation regarding the security of the 09 card. The card is totally hacked at this stage and so it needs to be replaced. However it would appear that Sky did not plan to replace the 09 card just yet. It was, more than likely, meant to be the transition card between the analogue VideoCrypt and the digital VideoCrypt system.
This transition plan, had it succeeded, would have called for the 09 card to last for at least 18 months and for the digital video system to be in place by September 1995 at the latest. The reality is that they would be extremely lucky to have the digital video system ready to ship by the first quarter of 1996.
The US Digital Satellite System developed by News Datacom and Thomson - RCA needs some modification for use here in Europe. Tests were carried out in the last few months but few details are available. News Datacom are not in the habit of willingly releasing such details.
The other factor that will play a part is the absence of Stephen Barden. Barden resigned as head of News Datacom. Therefore the overseeing of the transition will be left to those who worked with him. Barden's replacement has not been named yet.
It is likely that his replacement will have little grasp of the realities of Counter Piracy. Such a transitional state in the company supplying the new card does not look good. Therefore it would be a good thing for News Datacom if the 0A was scheduled for release in the fourth quarter of 1995. It would give things some time to settle down.
However other pressures such as Pay Per View are lurking in the background. The advent of Pay Per View has been planned for with all the fervor of an expected Second Coming. In either case nobody is sure exactly when this event is meant to take place.
The new subscriber management centre at Dumfermline in Scotland is a key player in the Sky plan. This may not be completed until August. With Pay Per View, the capability to take the pre-booking orders via telephone are important. The present subscriber centre, while being able to handle the current subscription management is not equipped to handle PPV.