METHOD, SYSTEM AND PROGRAM PRODUCT FOR THE INSERTION AND RETRIEVAL OF IDENTIFYING ARTIFACTS IN TRANSMITTED LOSSY AND LOSSLESS DATA

• US 20080084949A1
• Filed: 09/20/2006
• Published: 04/10/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 09/20/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Gula Consulting Limited Liability Company (Intellectual Ventures LLC)
• Original Assignee: CELO Data Incorporated
• Inventors: Putnam, Jon S.
• Granted Patent: US 7,668,205 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 375/346
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 19/018 Audio watermarking, i.e. embedding inaudible data in the audio signal
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 20/31 using in-band signals, e.g. subsonic or cue signal
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/37 for identifying segments of broadcast information, e.g. scenes or extracting programme ID
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 60/58 of audio determination or detection of speech characteristics in general G10L25/00; speech recognition in general G10L15/00

Abstract

Identifying artifacts are inserting in radio frequency broadcast data at the transmitter and retrieved at a receiver, allowing verification of the receipt of the transmitted data, authentication of transactions that use the transmitted data, or activation of processes dependent on receipt of the carrier data. A content system receives content data to serve as carrier data, and an identifying artifact insertion system inserts artifact data into the carrier data based on predetermined characteristics of the carrier data without requiring human intervention, and then generates a composite data sequence. A data transmit system connected to the identifying artifact insertion system and the content system transmits the composite data sequence. A receiver system performs real-time, automated extraction of identifying artifacts within lossy carrier data and verifies the reception of the data artifacts in the carrier data.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

identifying one or more insertion areas within carrier data for the insertion of identifying data, wherein the identifying data identifies an association with the carrier data, based on one or more characteristics of the carrier data within a given insertion area indicating that variations of the carrier data at one or more samples within the given insertion area may be inaudible by a human auditory system;

inserting the identifying data in one or more locations of the carrier data based on the identified one or more insertion areas, resulting in modified carrier data containing the identifying data; and

transmitting the modified carrier data.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein inserting includes modulating amplitude of the carrier data at the one or more locations of the carrier data as a function of amplitude of the identifying data, thereby resulting in the modified carrier data.

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein the identifying data includes date and time stamp data.

4. The method according to claim 1, wherein at least one of the one or more insertion areas within carrier data is identified based on a change in value between two sequential samples of the carrier data exceeding a pre-determined amount.

5. The method according to claim 1, further comprising:

sampling the carrier data over a length at least as long as the identifying data to define an insertion area.

6. The method according to claim 5, further comprising:

calculating a slope of the insertion area of the carrier data based on a change of amplitude of the carrier samples over a length of the identifying data.

7. The method according to claim 6, further comprising:

inserting the identifying data into the carrier data within the identified insertion area based on the slope.

8. The method according to claim 6, wherein the one or more characteristics of the carrier data within the given insertion area include the slope.

9. The method according to claim 1, further wherein the identifying data includes a flag and a payload.

10. The method according to claim 1, further comprising:

transmitting the modified carrier data in the radio frequency spectrum.

11. The method according to claim 1, wherein inserting includes replacing the carrier data within the identified insertion area with modulated identifying data samples.

12. The method according to claim 1, wherein inserting includes:

sampling the carrier data;

sampling the identifying data; and

modulating the identifying data by incrementing each sample of the identifying data with a value based on a slope of a carrier data sample over a length of the identifying data within the identified one or more insertion areas for each sample of the identifying data.

13. The method according to claim 1, wherein the carrier data is audio carrier data.

34. A program product comprising a machine-readable medium including program logic embedded therein for causing an apparatus to perform the steps of claim 1.

14. A method comprising:

receiving modulated carrier data containing identifying data;

sampling the received modulated carrier data;

determining the amplitude slope of the modulated carrier data corresponding to the one or more samples of the received modulated carrier data; and

demodulating the identifying data from the modulated carrier data based on the slope of the modulated carrier data within a predetermined length of the carrier data corresponding to the length of the identifying data.

15. The method according to claim 14, wherein a location of the identifying data within the modulated carrier data is determined based upon detecting a flag within the carrier data.

16. The method according to claim 14, further comprising verifying the receipt of digital content contained within the carrier data based on the demodulated identifying artifact.

17. The method according to claim 14, wherein the identifying data includes source identifying data referencing the source of the modulated carrier data.

18. The method according to claim 14, further comprising:

receiving the modulated carrier data in the radio frequency spectrum.

19. The method according to claim 14, wherein demodulating includes:

decrementing each sample of the carrier data within the predetermined length of the carrier data corresponding to the length of the identifying data with a value based on the slope.

20. The method according to claim 14, wherein the modulated carrier data is audio carrier data.

35. A program product comprising a machine-readable medium including program logic embedded therein for causing an apparatus to perform the steps of claim 14.

21. A system comprising:

an identifying data insertion system configured to perform;

identifying one or more insertion areas within carrier data for the insertion of identifying data, wherein the identifying data identifies an association with the carrier data, based on one or more characteristics of the carrier data within a given insertion area indicating that variations of the carrier data at one or more samples within the given insertion area may be inaudible by a human auditory system;

inserting the identifying data in one or more locations of the carrier data based on the identified one or more insertion areas, resulting in modified carrier data containing the identifying data; and

transmitting the modified carrier data.

22. The system according to claim 21, further comprising:

a transmitter transmitting the modified carrier data in the radio frequency spectrum.

23. The system according to claim 21, further comprising:

a receiver system configured to perform;

receiving modified carrier data containing identifying data;

sampling the received modified carrier data;

determining the amplitude slope of the modified carrier data corresponding to the one or more samples of the received modified carrier data; and

demodulating the identifying data from the modulated carrier data based on the slope of the modulated carrier data within a predetermined length of the carrier data corresponding to the length of the identifying data.

24. The system according to claim 21, wherein the carrier data comprises audio data.

25. The system according to claim 21, wherein inserting includes modulating amplitude of the carrier data at the one or more locations of the carrier data as a function of amplitude of the identifying data, thereby resulting in the modified carrier data.

26. The system according to claim 21, wherein the identifying data includes date and time stamp data.

27. The system according to claim 21, wherein at least one of the one or more insertion areas within carrier data is identified based on a change in value between two sequential samples of the carrier data exceeding a pre-determined amount.

28. The system according to claim 21, wherein the identifying data insertion system further being configured to perform:

sampling the carrier data over a length at least as long as the identifying data to define an insertion area.

29. The system according to claim 28, further being configured to perform:

calculating a slope of the insertion area of the carrier data based on a change of amplitude of the carrier samples over a length of the identifying data.

30. The system according to claim 29, further being configured to perform:

inserting the identifying data into the carrier data within the identified insertion area based on the slope.

31. The system according to claim 29, wherein the one or more characteristics of the carrier data within the given insertion area include the slope.

32. The system according to claim 24, wherein inserting includes replacing the carrier data within the identified insertion area with modulated identifying data samples.

33. The system according to claim 24, wherein inserting includes:

sampling the carrier data;

sampling the identifying data; and

modulating the identifying data by incrementing each sample of the identifying data with a value based on a slope of a carrier data sample over a length of the identifying data within the identified one or more insertion areas for each sample of the identifying data.