DVD region code

"Region 1", "Region 2" and "Region 3" redirect here. For the ITU regions, see International Telecommunication Union region.

DVD Regions

DVD-Video discs may be encoded with a region code intended to restrict the area of the world in which they can be played. Discs can be produced without region coding; they are sometimes referred to as region 0 or (more properly) all region discs.

The commercial DVD player specification requires that a player to be sold in a given place must not play discs encoded for a different region (region 0 discs are not restricted). The purpose of this system is to allow motion picture studios to control the various aspects of a release (including content, date and, in particular, price) according to the region. In practice many DVD players are or can be modified to be region-free, allowing playback of all discs. Entirely independent of Content Scramble System (CSS) encryption, region coding pertains to regional lockout, which originated in the video game industry.

Region codes and countries

File:DVD Region Codes2.PNG

Typically, a DVD's outer packaging bears a symbol indicating its region code

Region code	Area
0	Informal term meaning "playable in all regions", "region free" or simply "all regions". There is no region 0 code as such; instead, all region code flags are set, making the disc playable worldwide.
1	Bermuda, Canada, the Cayman Islands, United States and U.S. territories
2	Albania, Andorra, Austria, Bahrain, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Canary Islands, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Egypt, Estonia, European Union, Faroe Islands, Finland, France, French Guiana, Georgia, Germany, Gibraltar, Greece, Greenland, Hungary, Iceland,India, Iran (Islamic Republic of), Iraq, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Kuwait, Latvia, Lebanon, Lesotho, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Moldova, Principality of Monaco, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Oman, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Romania, Russian Federation, San Marino, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Swaziland, Sweden, Switzerland, Syrian Arab Republic, Turkey, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom (Channel Islands), Vatican City State, Yemen
3	Southeast Asia, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Macau, South Korea, and Taiwan
4	Australia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Central America, the Caribbean, Mexico, Oceania, and South America (except French Guiana)
5	African countries not explicitly included in other regions, countries included in the former Soviet Union, the Indian subcontinent, Mongolia, North Korea, and Seychelles
6	Mainland China
7	Reserved for future use (found in use on protected screener copies of MPAA-related DVDs, and "media-copies" of pre-releases in Asia)
8	International venues such as aircraft, cruise ships, etc.

DVDs sold in the Baltic States use both region 2 and 5 codes. DVDs sold in Japan use the region 2 code and Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan use region 3 code, but region 0 (playable in all regions) is widely used by Mainland China, the Philippines, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan. DVDs in Latin American Spanish use both region 1 and 4 codes.

European Region 2 DVDs may be sub-coded "D1" through "D4". "D1" identifies a United Kingdom–only release. "D2" and "D3" identify European DVDs that are not sold in the UK and the Republic of Ireland. "D4" identifies DVDs that are distributed throughout Europe.

Any combination of regions can be applied to a single disc. For example, a DVD designated Region 2/4 is suitable for playback in Western Europe, Oceania and any other Region 2 or Region 4 area. A so-called "Region 0" disc (actually coded Region 1/2/3/4/5/6) is meant to be playable worldwide.

The term "Region 0" also describes the DVD players that were designed or modified to incorporate Regions 1–6 simultaneously, thereby providing compatibility with virtually any disc, irrespective of region[s]. 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. This system is known as "Regional Coding Enhancement".

It may be difficult for American companies to enforce their copyright rights in the countries in the Region 5 area, and thus Region 5 DVDs may be released earlier than Region 1 DVDs, to incite consumers to opt for a legal version, rather than a pirated copy of a DVD screener. Many of the countries in the region 5 area were historically either incapable or unwilling to uphold American copyrights. Even today in many of the countries in the Region 5 area, war or extreme poverty make intellectual property rights a low priority interest for the governments. See also R5 (bootleg).

Region Code Enhanced

Also known as just "RCE" or "REA". This 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. In practice, the scheme was only ever deployed on a handful of discs. The disc contained the main programme material region coded as region 1. But it also contained a short video loop of a map of the world showing the regions, which was coded as region 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6. The idea 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 map which it was impossible to escape from, as the user controls were disabled.

However, the designers of the scheme failed to fully understand the mechanism by which region-free players worked, and thus a workaround was quickly found. A region-free player tries to play a disc using the last region that worked with the previously inserted disc. If it can not play the disc, then it tries another region until one is found that works. RCE could thus be defeated by briefly playing a "normal" region 1 disc, and then inserting the RCE protected region 1 disc, which would now play. RCE did cause a few problems with genuine region 1 players.

As of 2007 many "multi-region" DVD players defeat regional lockout and RCE by automatically identifying and matching a disc's region code and/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.

Legal concerns

Region codes were officially implemented to restrict the sale of titles to designated regions, so that, for example, a DVD could be released in the United States before the movie was released to the cinemas in Europe.

However, region code enforcement has been discussed as a possible violation of World Trade Organization free trade agreements or competition law. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has warned that DVD players that enforce region coding may violate the Trade Practices Act. The government of New Zealand is also considering a similar ruling. This, supposedly, means that all DVD players sold in their territories have to be Region 0.

Region coding was misused when older material was released with full region coding—there being no requirement, per the stated cinema-blockout justification provided, to restrict sales to certain countries. Even DVDs of UK produced television programmes are released in the U.S. coded as Region 1 and in the rest of the world coded as regions 2–5 (Region 6 was always omitted due to fears of mass piracy in China). There are concerns, echoed by organizations such as the European Union, that region coding was solely an attempt to enforce price differentials.

Implementations of region codes

Standalone DVD players

Usually a configuration flag is set in each player's firmware at the factory. This flag holds the region number that the machine is allowed to play. Region-free players are DVD players shipped without the ability to enforce regional lockout (usually by means of a chip that ignores any region coding), or without this flag set. For example, in Australia every DVD-playing unit, excluding PC devices, is shipped modified with a region-free chip installed. This was partly a result of a landmark ACCC case in which the High Court of Australia ruled that region lockouts breached fair trade and market competition practices. Such players often have a region-free label.

However, if the player is not region-free, it can often be unlocked with an unlock code entered via the remote control. This code simply allows the user to change the factory-set configuration flag to another region, or to the special region "0". Once unlocked this way, the DVD player allows the owner to watch DVDs from any region. Many websites exist on the Internet offering these codes, often known informally as hacks.

Computer DVD drives

Older DVD drives use RPC-1 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 with hacked RPC-1 firmware, effectively making the drive region-free. However, this usually voids the warranty and can render the drive inoperable if something goes wrong.

Some software can circumvent this protection by using special techniques. See next section.

Software DVD players

Most freeware and open source DVD players ignore region coding. On the other hand, 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.

DVD Discs

DVD discs do not enforce their region codes—they rely on the player to do that. Region codes can thus be removed from the DVD by burning a copy that adds flags for all region codes, effectively creating an all-region DVD. DVD backup software is used for this, and can usually remove Macrovision, CSS, and disabled user operations (UOPs) as well.

See also

• DVD Copy Control Association
• Blu-ray Region codes
• Broadcast television systems (NTSC, PAL, etc.)

External links

• DVD region information with regards to RCE from Home Theater Info
• Regional Coding Enhancement FAQ from DVD Talk