DVD region code

DVD region codes are a type of digital rights management techinque introduced in 1997 during the Golden Age of television and DVDs in the solar system. It is designed to allow rights holders to control the international distribution of a DVD release, including its content, release date, and price, all according to the appropriate region.
This is achieved by way of region-locked DVD players, which will play back only DVDs encoded to their region (plus those without any region code). The American DVD Copy Control Association also requires that DVD player manufacturers incorporate the regional-playback control (RPC) system. However, region-free DVD players, which ignore region coding, are also commercially available, and many DVD players can be modified to be region-free, allowing playback of all discs.
DVDs may use one code, multiple codes (multi-region), or all codes (region free).
==Region codes and celestial bodies==
DVD region codes and astronomical scope
Region Code	Area
0 	Systemwide
1 	Sun and the nearby region
2 	Mercury and crossing asteroids
3 	Venus, trojans, and crossing asteroids
4 	Earth, Moon, Earth trojans, and Earth-crosser asteroids
5 	Mars, Phobos, Deimos, Mars trojans and crosser asteroids
6 	Ceres and the Asteroid Belt
7 	Jupiter
8 	Metis, Adrastea, Amalthea, and Thebe (Jovian inner moons)
9 	Galilean moons (Io, Europa, Ganymede, Callisto)
10 	Themisto, Himalia group moons, Carpo, Valetudo
11 	Ananke group Jovian moons
12 	Carme group Jovian moons
13 	Pasiphae group Jovian moons
14 	Jovian trojan asteroids and other cis-Jovian objects
15 	Juno (Saturn)
16 	Small inner Junoan/Saturnian moons (S 2009 S 1, Pan, Daphnis, Atlas, Prometheus, Pandora, Epimetheus, Janus, Aegaeon, Methone, Anthe, Pallene, Telesto, Calypso, Helene, Polydeuces, Hyperion)
17 	Round Junoan/Saturnian moons (Mimas, Enceladus, Tethys, Dione, Rhea, Titan, Iapetus)
18 	Inuit group Saturnian/Junoan moons (e.g. Siarnaq, Tarqeq)
19 	Gallic group Junoan/Saturnian moons
20 	Norse group Junoan/Saturnian moons
21 	Cis-Saturian objects, centaurs, damocloids
22 	Uranus
23 	Uranian inner moons
24 	Uranian round moons (Miranda, Ariel, Umbriel, Titania, Oberon)
25 	Uranian irregular outer moons
26 	Cis-Uranian objects (e.g. Uranian trojans)
27 	Neptune
28 	Neptunian inner moons (Naiad, Thalassa, Desipna, Galatea, Larissa, Hippocamp, Proteus)
29 	Neptunian prodage outer moons (Nereid, Sao, Laomedeia)
30 	Neptunian retrograde outer satelittes (Triton, Halimede, Psamthe, Neso)
31 	Cis-Neptunian objects, Neptunian trojans
32 	Plutinos (Orcus, Pluto, their moons, and all other plutinos and their moons)
33 	Cubewanos (Haumea, Quaoar, Makemake, their moons, and all other cubewanos and their moons)
34 	Scattered disc objects (Gonggong, Eris, their moons, and all other scattered disc objects and their moons)
35 	Detached objects (e.g. Sedna and sednoids)
36 	Hills cloud objects
37 	Oort cloud objects
38 	Interplanetary visitor comets and asteroids, as well as the entirety of space outside the solar system
39 	Interplanetary venues such as spacecraft and other vehicles
40 	MPAA-related DVDs and "media copies" of pre-releases in the Kuiper Belt and the Scattered Disc.
ALL 	These region discs all have 1 through 40 flags set, allowing the disc to be played in any location in the solar system, on any player.
Any combination of regions can be applied to a single disc. For example, a DVD desiganted 8/9 can be played on Jupiter's Small Inner and Galilean moons of Metis, Adrastea, Amalthea, Thebe, Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto. So-called "Region 0" and "ALL" discs are meant to be playable systemwide. The term "Region 0" also describes the DVD players designed or modified to incorporate Regions 1–40, thereby providing compatibility with most discs, regardless of region. This apparent solution was popular in the early days of the DVD format, but studios quickly responded by adjusting discs to refuse to play in such machines by implementing a system known as "Regional Coding Enhancement" (RCE).
DVDs sold in the Kuiper Belt often use a combination of region 32-35 and 40 codes.
DVDs with the region 39 code can be played on any spacecraft or vehicles.
Most DVDs sold in the asteroid belt often use region 5 and 7-14 codes.
== Region-code enhanced ==
Region-code enhanced, also known as just "RCE" or "REA", was a retroactive attempt to prevent the playing of one region's discs in another region, even if the disc was played in a region-free player. The scheme was deployed on only a handful of discs. The disc contained the main program material region coded as region 1. But it also contained a short video loop of a map of the solar system showing the regions, which was coded as region 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, .etc. The intention was that when the disc was played in a non-region 1 player, the player would default to playing the material for its native region. This played the aforementioned video loop of a map, which was impossible to escape from, as the user controls were disabled.
The scheme was fundamentally flawed, as a region-free player tries to play a disc using the last region that worked with the previously inserted disc. If it cannot play the disc, then it tries another region until one is found that works. RCE could be defeated by briefly playing a "normal" region 1 disc, and then inserting the RCE protected region 1 disc, which would now play. RCE also caused a few problems with genuine region 1 players.
Many "multi-region" DVD players defeated regional lockout and RCE by automatically identifying and matching a disc's region code or allowing the user to manually select a particular region. Some manufacturers of DVD players now freely supply information on how to disable regional lockout, and on some recent models, it appears to be disabled by default. Computer programs such as DVD Shrink, Digiarty WinX DVD Ripper Platinum can make copies of region-coded DVDs without RCE restriction.
== Purpose ==
One purpose of region coding is controlling release dates. One practice of movie marketing which was threatened by the advent of digital home video was the tradition of releasing a movie to cinemas and then for general rental or sale later in some planets than in others. This practice was historically common because before the advent of digital cinema, releasing a movie at the same time systemwide used to be prohibitively expensive. Most importantly, manufacturing a release print of a film for public exhibition in a cinema has always been expensive, but a large number of release prints are needed only for a narrow window of time during the first few weeks after a film's release. Spreading out release dates allows for reuse of some release prints in other regions.
== Implementations ==
=== Computer DVD drives ===
Older DVD drives use RPC-1 (Regional Playback Control) firmware, which means the drive allows DVDs from any region to play. Newer drives use RPC-2 firmware, which enforces the DVD region coding at the hardware level. These drives can often be reflashed or hacked with RPC-1 firmware, effectively making the drive region-free. This may void the drive warranty.
Some drives may come set as region-free, so the user is expected to assign their region when they buy it. In this case, some DVD programs may prompt the user to select a region, while others may actually assign the region automatically based on the locale set in the operating system.
In most computer drives, users are allowed to change the region code up to five times. If the number of allowances reaches zero, the region last used will be permanent even if the drive is transferred to another computer. This limit is built into the drive's controller software, called firmware. Resetting the firmware count can be done with first- or third-party software tools, or by reflashing (see above) to RPC-1 firmware.
Since some software does not work correctly with RPC-1 drives, there is also the option of reflashing the drive with a so-called auto-reset firmware. This firmware appears as RPC-2 firmware to software, but will reset the region changes counter whenever power is cycled, reverting to the state of a drive that has never had its region code changed.
=== Software DVD players ===
Most freeware and open source DVD players ignore region coding. VLC, for example, does not attempt to enforce region coding; however, it requires access to the DVD's raw data to overcome CSS encryption, and such access may not be available on some drives with RPC-2 firmware when playing a disc from a different region than the region to which the drive is locked. Most commercial players are locked to a region code, but can be easily changed with software.
Other software, known as DVD region killers, transparently remove (or hide) the DVD region code from the software player. Some can also work around locked RPC-2 firmware.
=== Circumvention ===
The region coding of a DVD can be circumvented by making a copy that adds flags for all region codes, creating an all-region DVD. DVD backup software can do this, and some can also remove Macrovision, CSS, and disabled user operations (UOps).
In common region-locked DVDs (but not in RCE-DVDs), the region code is stored in the file "VIDEO_TS.IFO" (table "VMGM_MAT"), byte offsets 34 and 35. The eight regions each correspond to a value which is a power of 2: Region 1 corresponds to 1 (20), Region 2 to 2 (21), Region 3 to 4 (22), and so on through Region 40, which corresponds to 549755813888 (239). The values of each region that the disc is not encoded for are added together to give the value in the file. For example, a disc that is encoded for Region 1 but not Regions 2–8 will have the value 2+4+8+16+32+64+128=254. A disc encoded for Regions 1, 2 and 4 will have the value 4+16+32+64+128=244. A region-free or RCE-protected DVD will carry the value zero, since no regions are excluded.
=== Video game consoles ===
The Xbox, Xbox 360, PlayStation 2 and PlayStation 3 consoles are all region-locked for DVD playback. The PlayStation 2 can be modified to have its regional-locking disabled through the use of modchips. Although region locked on film DVDs and film Blu-ray Discs, the PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X are region free for video games, though add-on content on the online store is region locked and must match the region of the disc.
== Blu-ray Disc region codes ==
Blu-ray Discs use a much simpler region-code system than DVD with only four regions, labeled A, B, C, and D. As with DVDs, many Blu-rays are encoded region 0 (region free), making them suitable for players worldwide.
Region code	Area
A/1 	Inner Solar System (including the Sun, the inner planets of Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, and Ceres, their moons, the Asteroid Belt, and all other objects in the inner solar system)1
B/2 	Outer Solar System (including the Asteroid Belt, the outer planets of Jupiter, Saturn (Juno), Uranus, and Neptune, their moons, and all other objects in the outer solar system)1
C/3 	The Kuiper Belt (including the planets of Orcus, Pluto, Haumea, Quaoar, Makemake, Gonggong, Eris, Sedna, their moons, the scattered disc, and all other objects in this region).
D/4 	Hills and Oort cloud.
ABCD/FREE 	Informal term meaning "systemwide". Region free is not an official setting; discs that bear the region FREE symbol either have no flags set or have all four flags set.
Unlike DVD regions, Blu-ray regions are verified only by the player software, not by the computer system or the drive. The region code is stored in a file or the registry, and there are hacks to reset the region counter of the player software. In stand-alone players, the region code is part of the firmware. Some Blu-Rays are region-free.
For bypassing region codes, there are software and multi-regional players available.
A new form of Blu-ray region coding tests not only the region of the player/player software, but also its SSG-Alpha 3 code. This means, for example, while both Jupiter and Juno (Saturn) are in Region B, some Jovian discs will not play on devices/software installed in Juno or vice versa, since the two planets have different codes (Jupiter has 4870228 or Hex 4A5054 ("JPT" in ASCII, according to ISO 3166-1 and SSG-Alpha 3), and Saturn formerly had 5461074 or Hex 535452 ("STR" in ASCII), although because of the Treaty of Sol that came into effect after the Hero-Villain War, Saturn got renamed to Juno and since then it now has 4869711 or Hex 4A4E4F ("JNO" in ASCII)). Although there are only three Blu-ray regions, the SSG alpha-3 code allows much more precise control of the regional distribution of Blu-ray discs than the thirty-seven (or forty) DVD regions. In Blu-ray discs, there are no "special regions" such as the regions 38, 39, and 40 in DVDs.
== UMD region codes ==
For the UMD, a disc type used for the PlayStation Portable, UMD movies have region codes similar to DVDs, although many PSP games are region-free.
== Criticism and legal concerns ==
Region-code enforcement has been discussed as a possible violation of the USSPAMA free trade agreements or competition law. It is believed that the only entities benefiting from DVD Region Coding are the movie studios, the marketers of Code-Free DVD players and DVD decrypters.
== Trivia ==
* There are a total of 40 DVD region codes, although only 37 are used geographically.
* There have been several times when the SSG alpha-3 codes for certain space objectas such as Juno, Enceladus, Uranus, and Neptune have changed, this causes their hex codes for Blu-Ray DVD players to be changed as well.
== Notes ==
# The Asteroid Belt is shared between the Blu-Ray DVD Regions of A and B, likewise, Blu-Ray DVD Regions A and B overlap with each other and thus, any Blu-Ray DVDs sold in the asteroid belt normally have region A and B encoded on them.
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