Apple iBooks Copy Protection Cracked for First Time - MacRumorsOpen MenuShow RoundupsShow Forums menuVisit ForumsOpen Sidebar
Skip to Content

Apple iBooks Copy Protection Cracked for First Time

709193 large2The Digital Reader points to reports that Apple's iBooks Digital Rights Management (DRM) copy protection has been cracked for the first time:

Reports are coming in today that the latest version of Requiem, an app that removes Fairplay DRM from music and videos sold via iTunes, will now also remove the DRM from iBooks ebooks.

The news is notable in that it's the first time that iBooks DRM has been circumvented. This would allow iBooks downloaded from iTunes to be used on other platforms besides Apple's iBooks reader.

Apple's DRM for music and movies have been circumvented in the past, and resulted in a cat and mouse game of updates to iTunes to disable these hacks. Apple will likely respond in a similar fashion to this hack.

Popular Stories

imac video apple feature

Apple Released Yet Another New Product Today

Friday March 20, 2026 2:39 pm PDT by
Apple has unveiled a whopping nine new products so far this March, including an iPhone 17e, iPad Air models with the M4 chip, MacBook Air models with the M5 chip, MacBook Pro models with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips, the all-new MacBook Neo, an updated Studio Display, a higher-end Studio Display XDR, AirPods Max 2, and now the Nike Powerbeats Pro 2. iPhone 17e features the same overall design as...
iPhone 18 Pro Deep Red Feature

iPhone 18 Pro Launching Later This Year With These 12 New Features

Wednesday March 18, 2026 7:39 am PDT by
While the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max are not expected to launch for another six months or so, there are already plenty of rumors about the devices. It was initially reported that the iPhone 18 Pro models would have fully under-screen Face ID, with only a front camera visible in the top-left corner of the screen. However, the latest rumors indicate that only one Face ID component...
ios 26 4 pastel

iOS 26.4: Top 10 New Features Coming to Your iPhone

Friday March 20, 2026 2:44 pm PDT by
iOS 26.4 isn't the major update with new Siri features that we hoped for, but there are some useful quality of life improvements, and a little bit of fun with an AI playlist generator and new emoji characters. Playlist Playground - Apple Music has a Playlist Playground option that lets you generate playlists from text-based descriptions. You can include moods, feelings, activities, or...

Top Rated Comments

184 months ago
You can't read iBook on your desktop. Not even Mac OS X can read iBooks. This is the main reason I stopped buying ebooks from iBooks.

Now I can. Thanks "stupid pirates"
Score: 72 Votes (Like | Disagree)
184 months ago
I've never understood DRM, it's premise seems to be to penalise those who purchase content legally, whilst pirates still get their more flexible content for free.
Score: 45 Votes (Like | Disagree)
184 months ago
<wishfull thinking>
Maybe this is a reason for Apple to drop the drm on the ibook ebooks altogether (like what happened with the AAC's)
</wishfull thinking>
Score: 33 Votes (Like | Disagree)
cambookpro Avatar
184 months ago
What for?
I understand that its a kind of sport for hackers, but for end-user...



Pirates? I dont see anything related to pirating. Its just hacking formats.

Oh I dunno...

* Reading on a Mac
* Reading on Kindle
* Able to copy and paste from iBooks
* Reading on any other ereader
* etc...


:D
Score: 29 Votes (Like | Disagree)
arn Avatar
184 months ago
You are welcome to discuss the merits of DRM and circumventing it, but please no links to such software, etc...
Score: 21 Votes (Like | Disagree)
AppleMark Avatar
184 months ago
It was always going to happen at some stage.
Score: 19 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Related Apple News: Ipad | Sport | Entertainment | Iphone | Reviews