Emulation is legal but emulators that circumvent the DMCA in order to function are not. Yuzu and Ryujinx both decrypt encrypted Switch content using prod keys and title keys in order to execute it. The act of decrypting switch games in real-time using those keys is a violation of DMCA and is illegal (in countries that care about the DMCA anyhow). Having code in your emulator that CAN decrypt the Switch content can be viewed as a DMCA violation as well, even if it also supports unencrypted content.
Based on that, it seems like all we need is for Ryujinx/Yuzu/some other switch emulator that hasn’t yet been sued by Nintendo to be built in a way that it requires decrypted copies of the software and they could then argue that the person who violated the DMCA was the person who released the decryption tool or the teams that release decrypted versions of switch software.
Seems like if the developers remove the need for the emulator to use prod keys or title keys and they can remove the primary DMCA violation that is being weaponized against these emulators.
So, I have the prod keys from my own v1 Switch, and plugged those into the emulator, to play games I bought on physical carts.
I’ve never understood how that is illegal when everything (if you’re doing it legitimately of course) is done legitimately? They could’ve taken out the generic prod keys and be okay? Or does it not matter either way because Nintendo said so?
I’m genuinely curious because that seems like it’s well within my rights to do, but I’m not sure as legalese gives me a headache. :/
The problem is that the DMCA is a flawed piece of legislature that hamstrings fair use in a couple of really key ways.
Obligatory IANAL, but my read on the (admittedly very legalese) section 1201 (https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/1201) is that it lists a very few exemptions for what is allowable under the DMCA with regard to bypassing copyright protection mechanisms, and archival copies of personal media are not in that list of exemptions. Archival use of computer programs is covered under section 117 (https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/117) and it allows you to make a bit-by-bit copy of your media for archiving it. It doesn’t allow you to bypass copyright protection mechanisms on that exist that content.
So, you’d be protected if you were making a 1:1 exact cloned (and therefore, encrypted) copy of your switch game. Any action to decrypt that switch game (because the encryption is explicitly a copyright protection mechanism) would be a violation, whether it be you doing it manually with a tool, or an emulator doing it on your behalf. If you move that violation outside of the emulator, I would think that based on how the law is written they’d have to find some other way you were violating the DMCA with the emulator specifically in order to target it.
Ultimately, I think the reason it’s illegal is because the DMCA is corpo crap that has been bastardized several times over to reduce consumer rights, but the lawyers seem to wield section 1201 as the silver bullet.
Emulation is legal but emulators that circumvent the DMCA in order to function are not. Yuzu and Ryujinx both decrypt encrypted Switch content using prod keys and title keys in order to execute it. The act of decrypting switch games in real-time using those keys is a violation of DMCA and is illegal (in countries that care about the DMCA anyhow). Having code in your emulator that CAN decrypt the Switch content can be viewed as a DMCA violation as well, even if it also supports unencrypted content.
Based on that, it seems like all we need is for Ryujinx/Yuzu/some other switch emulator that hasn’t yet been sued by Nintendo to be built in a way that it requires decrypted copies of the software and they could then argue that the person who violated the DMCA was the person who released the decryption tool or the teams that release decrypted versions of switch software.
Seems like if the developers remove the need for the emulator to use prod keys or title keys and they can remove the primary DMCA violation that is being weaponized against these emulators.
So, I have the prod keys from my own v1 Switch, and plugged those into the emulator, to play games I bought on physical carts.
I’ve never understood how that is illegal when everything (if you’re doing it legitimately of course) is done legitimately? They could’ve taken out the generic prod keys and be okay? Or does it not matter either way because Nintendo said so?
I’m genuinely curious because that seems like it’s well within my rights to do, but I’m not sure as legalese gives me a headache. :/
The problem is that the DMCA is a flawed piece of legislature that hamstrings fair use in a couple of really key ways.
Obligatory IANAL, but my read on the (admittedly very legalese) section 1201 (https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/1201) is that it lists a very few exemptions for what is allowable under the DMCA with regard to bypassing copyright protection mechanisms, and archival copies of personal media are not in that list of exemptions. Archival use of computer programs is covered under section 117 (https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/117) and it allows you to make a bit-by-bit copy of your media for archiving it. It doesn’t allow you to bypass copyright protection mechanisms on that exist that content.
So, you’d be protected if you were making a 1:1 exact cloned (and therefore, encrypted) copy of your switch game. Any action to decrypt that switch game (because the encryption is explicitly a copyright protection mechanism) would be a violation, whether it be you doing it manually with a tool, or an emulator doing it on your behalf. If you move that violation outside of the emulator, I would think that based on how the law is written they’d have to find some other way you were violating the DMCA with the emulator specifically in order to target it.
Ultimately, I think the reason it’s illegal is because the DMCA is corpo crap that has been bastardized several times over to reduce consumer rights, but the lawyers seem to wield section 1201 as the silver bullet.