The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - false piracy alert

Sony Pictures have designed their DVD to look like a pirated copy, much to the dismay of DVD renters. This design was to portray and emphasize the hacker theme of the video

Many renters of the DVD version of "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" were horrified when they got the DVD home and saw that it had what looked like hand-writing on the DVD itself. They immediately thought that the shop had rented them a pirated video. The DVD itself can be viewed here. The disk was delivered to shops looking just like a blank, home-burned DVD - the title carelessly hand-written in a black permanent marker. Sony says that this was to emphasize the theme of the movie. They wished to highlight the growing problem of pirate copying. The movie is about a journalist hired to investigate the disappearance of a rich industrialist's niece 40 years ago. He is helped in the movie by a female hacker, and between them they uncover a secret history of sexual abuse and murder. It is a remake of the 2009 Swedish film based on the novel of Stieg Larsson, and stars Daniel Craig and Rooney Mara. Daily Telegraph advised that on the film forum, MidWest Tape this week, one commenter posted: "I almost had a fit and returned this to Redbox", referring to the American rental service. Now Redbox have posted a warning message to renters, to stop any confusion. On their web page for the DVD they state: "NOTE TO RENTERS: The handwritten look on the disc of this movie is legitimate and is intended to look like a burned DVD."