Cable television system with two-way telephone communication pat

Cryptography – Key management – Having particular key generator

Patent

Rate now

  [ 0.00 ] – not rated yet Voters 0   Comments 0

Details

235382, 2353825, 358 84, 379 91, 379 92, 379209, 380 20, 455 2, H04N 7167, H04N 710, H04M 1100

Patent

active

047109556

ABSTRACT:
A method and apparatus to enable billing of subscribers of pay-per-view television systems or the like on a non-real-time basis. A scrambled television signal is received at a subscriber terminal from a headend. The received signal is selectively descrambled in response to subscriber action indicating acceptance for viewing of a program contained in the signal. A record is maintained at the subscriber terminal of the billable programs accepted for viewing by the subscriber. The signal received from the headend is monitored by the subscriber terminal for a call-in command which instructs the subscriber terminal to forward the record of billable programs to the headend. A telephone communication path is established between the subscriber terminal and the headend in response to the call-in command. The record of billable programs is transmitted to the headend over the telephone communication path, and the subscriber is billed in accordance therewith. A plurality of transaction credits can be downloaded from the headend to the subscriber terminal, stored therein, and debited in response to the acceptance by a subscriber of a billable program for viewing. The descrambling of a program is prevented if there are not sufficient stored transaction credits available to pay for the program. A time-out count can be maintained in the subscriber terminal and reinitialized in response to a signal received from the headend. Descrambling of billable programs is prevented at the subscriber terminal if the time-out count expires.

REFERENCES:
patent: 3390234 (1968-06-01), Glidden
patent: 3684823 (1972-08-01), McVoy
patent: 3769579 (1973-10-01), Harney
patent: 3890461 (1975-06-01), Vogelman et al.
patent: 4104486 (1978-08-01), Martin et al.
patent: 4126762 (1978-11-01), Martin et al.
patent: 4163254 (1979-07-01), Block et al.
patent: 4225884 (1980-09-01), Block et al.
patent: 4439670 (1984-03-01), Basset et al.
patent: 4484217 (1984-11-01), Block et al.
patent: 4486625 (1984-12-01), Reinauer et al.
patent: 4546382 (1985-10-01), McKenna et al.

LandOfFree

Say what you really think

Search LandOfFree.com for the USA inventors and patents. Rate them and share your experience with other people.

Rating

Cable television system with two-way telephone communication pat does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this patent.

If you have personal experience with Cable television system with two-way telephone communication pat, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Cable television system with two-way telephone communication pat will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

     

Profile ID: LFUS-PAI-O-1935980

  Search
All data on this website is collected from public sources. Our data reflects the most accurate information available at the time of publication.