Electrical computers and digital processing systems: support – Multiple computer communication using cryptography – Particular communication authentication technique
Reexamination Certificate
2000-01-06
2003-07-08
Barron, Jr., Gilberto (Department: 2132)
Electrical computers and digital processing systems: support
Multiple computer communication using cryptography
Particular communication authentication technique
C380S269000, C380S054000, C382S232000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06591365
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The art of music compression is based on psychoacoustic phenomena, e.g., the human hearing system and the human brain can not process certain acoustic information of lesser amplitudes in the presence of other information of higher amplitudes. It is well known that the recent rise in music piracy had its impetus on college campuses when students with fast Internet connections discovered that a sound compression technology called MP3 could pack copies of music that could be reproduced almost perfectly into a file small enough to distribute rapidly on line. These students, ripping songs from CDs, compressing them (typically, into approximately one-tenth their original size), and posting the files on the Web, proved that MP3 and other compression technologies could transform an industry and establish an entirely new way to distribute music whether acquired legitimately or not.
Downloading music is the process of copying a file from a site on the Internet to the user's hard drive. The commonly used term “streaming audio” refers to music that can be listened to as it arrives without necessarily being stored. (Presently, the most popular streaming format is RealAudio ®.) Downloaded music and streaming music are different—streaming music provides instant gratification but sometimes poor playback quality, and it does not necessarily capture the content. Downloading, which involves moving an entire file before any part of it is accessible, offers the potential for better quality over limited bandwidth networks and, fueling piracy and copyright concerns, deposits the content on a hard drive. However, as used herein, the term downloading refers to both. Already there is a new breed of “solid-state personal stereo,” such as the Rio ® of Diamond Multimedia ® and the Nomad ® of Creative Labs ®, in which downloaded music is stored on RAM.
Artists and music companies would of course like to protect their music. That is extremely difficult. For example, once music is in analog form, which it must be if conventional speakers are used, it is very difficult to prevent unauthorized copying. And there is no practical way to prevent compressed music files from being distributed over the Internet, for example, by way of E-mail.
There is clearly a need for some kind of protection scheme for electronic music distribution (commonly referred to as EMD) that will protect artists and the music companies, at least partially, yet be accepted by the record-buying public and the consumer electronics companies. From a practical standpoint, the goal is not to prevent unauthorized music distribution in any form. The goal of the present invention is to prevent play or processing of pirated music (so that distribution of pirated copies over the Internet, which from a practical standpoint just cannot be prevented, achieves nothing of value). The present invention is also applicable to the distribution of audio/video files. In the appended claims, the term “music” is to be taken as embracing video and other forms of entertainment programming material as well.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
In the long run, any protection scheme must have the cooperation of the consumer electronics manufacturers and it must be based on the rule of law. Thus, if the consumer electronics industry and the personal computer manufacturers agree that their music players and PCs will conform to standards that implement a copy-protection scheme such as that of the present invention, and there are laws—such as those that exist in the United States—that make it a crime to foil a player designed to protect against play of pirated music, then a copy-protection scheme can be effective. The present invention is designed to work with a player for downloaded (or other) music that operates in accordance with certain rules, the assumption being that the player operation will not be illegally modified under penalty of law.
Before considering the invention itself, it will be helpful to understand several different scenarios that can arise in electronic music distribution:
(1) The medium (CD, broadcast, etc,) over which a compressed file is received should not be ignored. If a compressed file is received over a secure channel, i.e., one whose very nature is an assurance that the file was most likely sent with authorization of the music rights holder, it is not unreasonable to assume that the file should be played. An example is that of a record company that sells music in compressed form over the Internet, from a Web site that encrypts the music file. The file can be used only if the recipient has the decryption key, and that usually happens only if a payment has been made for it. Thus there is little need to prevent play of a compressed file that arrives over a secure channel.
(2) Consider next music that is received via a communications medium such as the Internet, over a channel that is not secure, and is received in compressed form. One possibility is that the music was originally released on a CD or DVD and it was the rights holder's intent that the music not be copied. If it is now being received in compressed form over an insecure channel, it is certainly possible that the music is being received from an unauthorized source which compressed it and is now distributing it, perhaps for a fee and perhaps for free.
(3) On the other hand, there are many artists who freely distribute their music from Web sites in compressed form. Very often this is the only way for a group to make a name for itself. This legitimate compressed file must be distinguishable from the pirated compressed file of the previous case. There must be a way to prevent play in one case and allow it in the other, even when both files are received over an insecure channel.
(4) When music is released on a CD or DVD, it is in the form of linear PCM (pulse code modulation) or, in the case of DVD, it may have been losslessly compressed to pack the data more efficiently. We are assuming that the music is to be played on a player that operates on a bit stream, compressed or linear PCM. Music files, in analog or any digital form, can be compressed into an MP3, AC3 or some other standard lossy compressed format. If the test used by a player to accept or reject a file always approves of a file that has not been subjected to lossy compression, be it analog or digital, then to foil the system it would only be necessary to expand the file after it is first received in compressed form from an illegitimate source. So to be effective, a protection scheme must not approve a file for play or other processing simply because it is not compressed at the point in the chain at which the “piracy” test is applied.
In accordance with the principles of my invention, in one embodiment thereof, two watermarks or tags are inserted into the music by the music publisher. One watermark is robust. By this is meant that it will not be destroyed by compression. (Hereinafter, the term “compression” excludes compression that is lossless; as used hereinafter, “compression” results in some information loss.) The other watermark is weak—it is designed to be destroyed by compression. The robust mark tells the player that the music is protected (“this music is not authorized to be delivered in compressed form over an insecure channel”), i.e., if the music is found to have been compressed and it was delivered over an insecure channel, then it should not be played or otherwise processed.
The player includes circuitry (or works in conjunction with circuitry or a data processor) that may not only check the kind of channel over which the music file was received, but also can tell if the music was compressed by checking whether the second watermark, the weak one, is missing. If the weak watermark is missing in the presence of the strong watermark, it is an indication that at some time in the history of the received music file, the music was compressed.
The basic theory is that music that is derived from a compressed source over an insecure channel, and which the rights holder has explicitly marked as un
Barron Jr. Gilberto
Gottlieb Rackman & Reisman P.C.
Time Warner Entertainment Co. LP
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