Using YouTube For File Storage

First time accepted submitter anonymous writes "Ever thought it might be a good idea to store encrypted data in a QRCode video? Using this technique one could easily store 10GB of data to be available anywhere in the world, and completely free."

Re:a bit too blatant

[Anonymous Coward]

Which can be avoided if you follow their documentation. [google.com]

Encodings which match their specifications won't be re-encoded (only the down-scaled versions will).

Re:10GB Free, Wow!

[ag0ny]

Have you been hiding under a rock for the last few months? Mega [mega.co.nz] gives you 50GB for free.

Re:Lolzers.

[tverbeek]

Yeah, this is a textbook example* of how relying on an outside "cloud" service – especially one that you have no contractual control over – to store your data is a really dumb idea.

*OK, maybe it's just in the teacher's edition.

Re:right...

[Psyborgue]

QR codes error correction [wikipedia.org] is quite resilient. Even with heavy spatial/temporal compression, the data should still be recoverable. There are far better ways of hiding data than this, however.

Re:Ever thought it might be a good idea?

[omnichad]

Who would be responsible for this copyright infringement? YouTube for having encrypted video data? It could be argued that YouTube is only carrying gibberish video data. The forum?

The student who posted it. If you want to get technical, the QR code video on Youtube is not gibberish video data. It's a copy of the movie. It's just a different carrier. Unless you think turning on SSL in bittorrent means you're transmitting gibberish data.

Re:right...

[CrashandDie]

Have you ever used a QRCode? Ever noticed that most algorithms don't recognise the QRCode when it's sharpest and level with your screen? Usually, you don't have the time to have the code be level, or in focus, before the algorithm picks it up.

That's because QRCode are nigh indestructible. They could add a watermark [wikipedia.org] and the code would most probably still be readable (depending on the level of error correction you apply when encoding).

For example, I took one of the Wikimedia QRCode examples [wikimedia.org], and drew on it [postimg.org]. It still worked. Then I skewed the image [postimg.org] using MS Paint. It still worked. Then I decided to go from 172 pixels to 86 pixels [postimg.org] (using MS Paint's resize function). It still worked (zoomed to either 100% or 200%). Then I decided to "reduce its resolution", so to speak, by resizing that reduced image to 200%, then back to 50%, then back to 200%, etc for 4 or 5 times, until I ended up with this [postimg.org]. It still worked.

Now, I'm sure that I *wanted* this to work. There will be dozens of cases where even the most stupid tear of paper or poor lighting will prevent that QRCode from being decoded. But somehow, I don't think that YouTube's HD video encoding will be much of an issue for QRCodes.

Tested with QR Droid on a Wiko Cink King, scanning off a 23" 1080p screen.