Spotify Dirty Little DRM Secret Crucial On Mobile Platforms

The roaring success of Spotify, the online music service, is owed partly to the fact that it is a free service - that's as far as consumers are concerned and it appears that the record and independent music labels have been pretty receptive to the arguments of the Swedish outfit.

What makes Spotify unique, in a sense, is that it managed to convince the guys who matters that it can convince music listeners to move from a scenario where they own music to one where they pay to actually listen to music online, essentially a subscription service.

And to do that, rather than relying on wireless connections, it came up with a cunning system of caching which allows it to store encrypted music files on any devices.

The system is actually protected by a proprietary Digital Rights Management solution which almost everyone seems to be embracing without complaining a lot. 

It is quite puzzling that no one actually managed to crack  the DRM system and advertise it, not that it is particularly to break into Spotify. 

The issue though is that unlike say DVD CSS (Content Scramble System), there is no real incentive to crack a free system, however pervert it is.