METHOD ANS SYSTEM FOR CONTROLLING MEDIA CONVEYANCE BY A DEVICE TO A USER BASED ON CURRENT LOCATION OF THE DEVICE

• US 20120131611A1
• Filed: 07/31/2009
• Published: 05/24/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 07/31/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: BCE Incorporated
• Original Assignee: BCE Incorporated
• Inventors: Yeap, Tet Hin, Neilly, Patrick
• Granted Patent: US 9,641,889 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 725/35
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/1013 to locations
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00086 Circuits for prevention of unauthorised reproduction or copying, e.g. piracy indicating unauthorised use of record carriers in general G11B23/28; scrambling for television signal recording H04N5/913; network architectures or network protocols for network security H04L63/00; cryptographic mechanisms or cryptographic arrangements for secret or secure communication H04L9/00
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00739 wherein the usage restriction is associated with a specific geographical region
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00818 wherein the usage restriction limits the signal quality, e.g. by low-pass filtering of audio signals or by reducing the resolution of video signals
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 20/00884 involving a watermark, i.e. a barely perceptible transformation of the original data which can nevertheless be recognised by an algorithm
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/0872 using geo-location information, e.g. location data, time, relative position or proximity to other entities
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/0877 using additional device, e.g. trusted platform module [TPM], smartcard, USB or hardware security module [HSM]
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2005/91335 the copy protection signal being a watermark
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2347 involving video stream encryption
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/23892 involving embedding information at multiplex stream level, e.g. embedding a watermark at packet level
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4181 for conditional access
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42202 environmental sensors, e.g. for detecting temperature, luminosity, pressure, earthquakes
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4318 by altering the content in the rendering process, e.g. blanking, blurring or masking an image region image enhancement or restoration in general G06T5/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4405 involving video stream decryption
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4524 involving the geographical location of the client retrieval from the Internet by querying based on geographical locations G06F16/9537; systems specially adapted for using geographical information in broadcast systems H04H60/70; protocols in which the network application is adapted for the location of the user terminal in communication control or processing H04L67/52; services making use of the location of users or terminals in wireless networks H04W4/02; locating users or terminals in wireless networks H04W64/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4627 Rights management associated to the content security in data switching network management H04L41/28; security management or policies for network security H04L63/20; access security in wireless networks H04W12/08
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6143 involving transmission via a satellite
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6547 comprising parameters, e.g. for client setup
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8358 involving watermark protecting executable software by watermarking G06F21/16; image watermarking in general G06T1/0021; watermarks inserted in still images for transmission purposes H04N1/32144; inserting watermarks during video coding H04N19/467
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/913 for scrambling ; for copy protection

Abstract

A method for execution by a customer premises receiver, comprising: receiving a signal that carries an original media stream; determining a location of the receiver; obtaining an identifier of an authorized region for the receiver; determining whether said location is contained within said authorized region; if said location is determined to be contained within said authorized region, outputting the original media stream for conveyance to a user; if said location is determined to not be contained within said authorized region, outputting a second media stream that is sufficiently corrupted relative to the original media stream as to degrade the user'"'"'s viewing experience while being demonstrative of non-malfunctioning of the receiver. Also, a method, comprising a service provider releasing towards a plurality of customer premises receivers information regarding a respective geographic region within which each receiver is authorized to operate, wherein different geographic regions define coverage areas of different sizes.

Claims

1. A method for execution by a customer premises receiver, comprising:

the customer premises receiver receiving a received signal that carries an original media stream;

the customer premises receiver determining a current location of the customer premises receiver;

the customer premises receiver obtaining an identifier of an authorized geographic region for the customer premises receiver;

the customer premises receiver determining whether said current location is contained within said authorized geographic region;

if said current location is determined to be contained within said authorized geographic region, the customer premises receiver outputting the original media stream for conveyance to a user;

if said current location is determined to not be contained within said authorized geographic region, the customer premises receiver outputting a second media stream that is sufficiently corrupted relative to the original media stream as to degrade the user'"'"'s viewing experience while being demonstrative of non-malfunctioning of the customer premises receiver.

2. The method defined in claim 1, wherein to degrade the user'"'"'s viewing experience while being demonstrative of non-malfunctioning of the customer premises receiver, the second media stream conveys the original media stream contaminated by an artifact that reduces a perceived quality of the original media stream.

3. The method defined in claim 1, wherein to degrade the user'"'"'s viewing experience while being demonstrative of non-malfunctioning of the customer premises receiver, the second media stream conveys information warning the user that the customer premises receiver is not located in the authorized geographic region.

4. The method defined in claim 1, further comprising, prior to outputting the original media stream if said current location is determined to be contained within said authorized geographic region, deriving the original media stream from the received signal.

5. The method defined in claim 4, wherein deriving the original media stream from the received signal comprises processing the received signal to obtain a corrupted media stream and correcting the corrupted media stream to obtain the original media stream.

6. The method defined in claim 5, wherein the second media stream is the corrupted media stream.

7. The method defined in claim 4, wherein deriving the original media stream from the received signal comprises removing at least one analog artifact from the received signal and processing the received signal with the at least one analog artifact removed to obtain the original media stream.

8. The method defined in claim 7, further comprising processing the received signal without removing the at least one analog artifact to obtain the second media stream.

9. The method defined in claim 1, further comprising processing the received signal to obtain a corrupted media stream, correcting the corrupted media stream to obtain the original media stream and corrupting the original media stream to obtain the second media stream.

10. The method defined in claim 1, the received signal containing a first artifact added prior to receipt of the received signal, wherein the method further comprises removing the first artifact from the received signal, adding a second artifact to the received signal with the first artifact removed and deriving the second media stream from the received signal with the first artifact removed and the second artifact added.

11. The method defined in claim 1, further comprising deriving the original media stream from the received signal.

12. The method defined in claim 11, wherein deriving the original media stream from the received signal comprises carrying out at least one down-conversion or demodulation operation.

13. The method defined in claim 12, further comprising, prior to outputting the second media stream if said current location is determined not to be contained within said authorized geographic region, corrupting the received signal.

14. The method defined in claim 13, wherein corrupting the received signal comprises adding an artifact to the received signal or to a down-converted version of the received signal.

15. The method defined in claim 13, wherein corrupting the original media stream comprises adding an artifact to the original media stream.

16. The method defined in claim 13, wherein corrupting the original media stream comprises replacing the original media stream with a media stream conveying a message for the user.

20. The method defined in claim 1, wherein the identifier of the authorized geographic region comprises a central point and a set of distances in corresponding directions branching from the interior point.

21. The method defined in claim 1, wherein the identifier of the authorized geographic region comprises a set of geographical coordinates defining an outer boundary of the authorized geographic region.

22. The method defined in claim 1, wherein the identifier of the authorized geographic region comprises a set of geographical coordinates defining the authorized geographic region.

23. The method defined in claim 1, wherein the identifier of the authorized geographic region comprises at least one of a zip code and a postal code.

24. The method defined in claim 1, wherein the identifier of the authorized geographic region is carried within the received signal.

25. The method defined in claim 1, wherein the identifier of the authorized geographic region is stored in a memory element in the customer premises receiver, and wherein the identifier of the authorized geographic region is obtained by consulting said memory element.

33. The method defined in claim 1, wherein determining the current location of the customer premises receiver comprises receiving information from a plurality of wireless transponders and triangulating the current location from the received information.

34. The method defined in claim 1, wherein determining whether said current location is contained within said authorized geographic region comprises (i) determining a set of geographic coordinates defining the authorized geographic region and (ii) determining whether said location is encompassed by said set of geographic coordinates.

35. The method defined in claim 34, wherein determining the set of geographic coordinates defining the authorized geographic region comprises consulting a mapping based on the indication of the authorized geographic region.

36. The method defined in claim 1, wherein determining whether said current location is contained within said authorized geographic region comprises (i) identifying a geographic region encompassing the current location of the customer premises receiver;

and (ii) determining whether the geographic region encompassing the current location of the customer premises receiver matches the authorized geographic region.

17. (canceled)

18. (canceled)

19. (canceled)

26. (canceled)

27. (canceled)

28. (canceled)

29. (canceled)

30. (canceled)

31. (canceled)

32. (canceled)

37. (canceled)

38. (canceled)

39. (canceled)

40. (canceled)

41. A customer premises receiver, comprising:

an input configured to receive a received signal carrying an original media stream;

a location determining entity configured to determine a current location of the customer premises receiver;

a location comparing entity operatively coupled to the location determining entity and configured to obtain an indication of an authorized geographic region for the customer premises receiver and to determine whether said current location is contained within said authorized geographic region;

an output configured to (i) output the customer premises receiver outputting the original media stream for conveyance to a user, if said current location is determined to be contained within said authorized geographic region and (ii) a second media stream that is sufficiently corrupted relative to the original media stream as to degrade the user'"'"'s viewing experience while being demonstrative of non-malfunctioning of the customer premises receiver, if said current location is determined to not be contained within said authorized geographic region.

42. (canceled)

43. An apparatus, comprising:

a memory storing a plurality of customer premises receiver identifiers in association with respective authorized geographic region identifiers, the customer premises receiver identifiers identifying individual customer premises receivers, the authorized geographic region identifiers defining respective coverage areas of different sizes in which the respective customer premises receivers are authorized to operate;

a processing entity configured to consult said memory based on a particular one of the customer premises receiver identifiers in order to identify a particular one of said authorized geographic region identifiers that is associated with said particular one of the customer premises receiver identifiers;

an output configured to cause said particular one of said authorized geographic region identifiers to be released towards the individual customer premises receiver identified by said particular one of the customer premises identifier receivers.

45. The apparatus defined in claim 43, wherein said coverage areas are inhabited, and wherein the coverage area defined by a first of said geographic region identifiers is related to the coverage area defined by a second of said geographic region identifiers inversely to the manner in which a population density of the first of said coverage areas is related to a population density of the second of said coverage areas.

46. The apparatus defined in claim 43, wherein the each geographic region identifier comprises at least one of a zip code and a postal code associated with the coverage area defined by said geographic region identifier.

44. (canceled)

47-61. -61. (canceled)