Data processing: financial – business practice – management – or co – Business processing using cryptography – Usage protection of distributed data files
Reexamination Certificate
1999-10-08
2004-02-03
Trammell, James P. (Department: 3621)
Data processing: financial, business practice, management, or co
Business processing using cryptography
Usage protection of distributed data files
C705S050000, C713S150000, C380S255000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06687683
ABSTRACT:
This application is based on application Nos. 10-295829 and 11-092557 filed in Japan, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system for technically realizing copyright protection of digital production, and especially relates to copyright protection technologies in replaying and recording contents that are digital production.
(2) Description of the Prior Art
Due to the recent development of Internet-related technologies, it is possible to distribute contents such as music through the Internet and to receive charges from the users who have downloaded distributed contents.
On the other hand, digital production that have been downloaded on personal computers through the Internet can be easily duplicated. In order to prevent unauthorized duplication, for instance, encryption technologies are used.
When a content for sale is provided through the Internet, the sample of the content with a lower quality may be also provided for sales promotion. For instance, users are supposed to purchase a content after trying the free sample of the content.
In this case, since the provider wants the sample to be tried by as many as users and clients, it is desirable that the sample can be replayed by personal computers connected to the Internet as the hardware. Note that in some cases, the provider may want to control the distribution and replay of the sample to some extent, so that the content of the sample is assumed to be encrypted.
However, if the content for sale and the content of the sample are encrypted in the same encryption system and provided through the Internet in response to the request, the content for sale is equally vulnerable to fraudulent acts such as analysis of the encryption algorithm as the content of the sample.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is accordingly an object of the present invention to provide a production protection system that enables less important contents to be replayed by general personal computers and more important contents to be highly protected against fraudulent attacks when the combination of two kinds of content with different degrees of importance such as contents for sale and trial is distributed.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a production protection system that enables contents to be recorded on a recording medium loaded on a player for replaying contents and the like in order to more intensively protect contents for sale, and enables one of encryption algorithms for distributing contents via the Internet and for recording contents on the recording medium not to be influenced by the decryption of the other one.
A further object of the present invention is to provide a production protection system that enables to reduce cost when encryption algorithms for distribution and recording are realized by software and hardware by using encryption algorithms that share parts with each other.
In order to achieve the above-mentioned first object, the production protection system according to the present invention is a production protection system dealing with contents that are digital production that may include: an obtaining unit for obtaining data including at least one of a first content, on which first encryption has been performed and a second content, on which second encryption has been performed, the second encryption is more difficult to break than the first encryption; a first content decryption unit for decrypting the first content using a first decryption method that corresponds to the first encryption when the data that has been obtained by the obtaining unit includes the first content; and a second content decryption unit for decrypting the second content using a second decryption method that corresponds to the second encryption and is more difficult than the first decryption method when the data that has been obtained by the obtaining unit includes the second content.
By means of the production protection system, when the first and second contents are obtained, on each of which a different degree of encryption has been performed on due to the different two degrees of importance, each of the first and second contents is separately decrypted. As a result, the second content, which is more important, may be intensively protected against fraudulent acts with encryption that is difficult to break. Note that the difficulty of breaking encryption can be ensured logically by using a more complicated encryption algorithm and at implementation level by using tamperproof hardware, for instance.
Note that the apparatuses that realize the first and second content decryption units, which decrypt different contents, may be different ones. For instance, less important contents may be widely used by being decrypted and replayed by a personal computer, and more important contents may be highly protected against fraudulent acts by being decrypted, replayed, and recorded by a special-purpose apparatus.
As a result, for instance, less important contents for trial and more important contents for sale may be distributed using networks and recording media with security.
By means of the production protection system, wherein the obtaining unit and the first content decryption unit are realized by a personal computer that executes software for decrypting contents, and the second content decryption unit is realized by one of tamperproof hardware and an apparatus that executes tamperproof software, the first content is decrypted and, for instance, may be replayed by the personal computer for wide, general use. On the other hand, the second content, which is more important, is decrypted and, for instance, may be replayed and recorded by special-purpose hardware to be highly protected against fraudulent acts.
By means of the production protection system, wherein the obtaining unit obtains the data by receiving the data from an outside network, the production protection system that may further include: a replay unit for audio-visually replaying the first content that has been decrypted by the first content decryption unit; an encryption unit for performing third encryption, which is different from the second encryption, on the second content that has been decrypted by the second content decryption unit; and a recording unit for recording at least part of the second content on which the third encryption has been performed by the encryption unit on a recording medium, less important contents for trial and more important contents for sale may be distributed via networks with security. For instance, when digital production such as video, music, and still pictures, is created, contents for trial such as a music content sampled at a lower sampling rate with a lower quality and a digest edition of a video may be widely distributed through the network for the purpose of sales promotion with security. Meanwhile, contents for trial may be decrypted by the personal computer, so that wide, general user may try the contents, and contents for sale may be recorded on a recording medium such as a memory card only by special-purpose hardware, so that high security may be ensured and unauthorized recording may be prevented. In addition, the contents recorded on a recording medium such as a memory card are encrypted, so that the contents may be protected against peeping.
Furthermore, different encryption is used for the distribution and the recording of second contents, so that even if an encryption algorithm is decrypted, another one is not influenced. As a result, the above-mentioned second object is realized.
By means of the production protection system, wherein the encryption unit and a data communication channel between the second content decryption unit and the encryption unit are realized by one of tamperproof hardware and an apparatus that executes tamperproof software, it is necessary to encrypt second contents for sale after decryption according to a standard for recording on a recording medium. It is possible to ensure security that peeping of second content
Harada Shunji
Kozuka Masayuki
Minami Masataka
Tatebayashi Makoto
Matsushita Electric - Industrial Co., Ltd.
Trammell James P.
Worjloh Jalatee
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