Collusion-resistant watermarking and fingerprinting

• US 7,558,959 B2
• Filed: 10/28/2004
• Issued: 07/07/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 04/23/2001
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Kirovski, Darko, Yacobi, Yacov, Malvar, Henrique
• Primary Examiner(s): Lanier; Benjamin E
• Application Number:
  US10/975,735
• Publication Number:
  US 20050086486A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,713 Days
• Field of Search: 713/176
• US Class Current: 713/176
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 1/005 Robust watermarking, e.g. average attack or collusion attack resistant
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2201/0063 in relation to collusion attacks, e.g. collusion attack resistant
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2201/0065 Extraction of an embedded watermark; Reliable detection
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/32144 embedded in the image data, i.e. enclosed or integrated in the image, e.g. watermark, super-imposed logo or stamp
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3205 of identification information, e.g. name or ID code H04N2201/3209 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3233 of authentication information, e.g. digital signature, watermark
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 2201/3236 Details of authentication information generation

Abstract

An implementation of a technology is described herein that facilitates rights enforcement of digital goods using watermarks. More particularly, it is a fingerprinting technology for protecting digital goods by detecting collusion as a malicious attack and identifying the participating colluders. If a digital pirate breaks one client and enables this client to avoid watermark detection, all content (both marked/protected an unmarked/free) can be played as unmarked only on that particular client. However, to enable other clients to play content as unmarked, the digital pirate needs to collude the extracted detection keys from many clients in order to create content that can evade watermark detection on all clients. The described implementation significantly improves collusion resistance through a fingerprinting mechanism that can identify the members of a malicious coalition even when their numbers are several orders of magnitude greater than what conventional collusion-protection schemes can accomplish. However, in this scenario each member of the malicious coalition leaves a fingerprint in every digital good from which the estimated watermark is subtracted. Thus, like a burglar without gloves, the digital pirate leaves her fingerprints only when she commits a crime. This abstract itself is not intended to limit the scope of this patent. The scope of the present invention is pointed out in the appending claims.

Claims

1. A method facilitating protection of digital goods, wherein the method is implemented by one or more computers executing computer-executable instructions stored in one or more computer-readable media, the method comprising:

segmenting a digital good into multiple segments;

for each of a plurality of individual segments of the multiple segments, performing acts comprising;

obtaining a pseudorandom watermarking key;

combining the watermarking key with the digital good to embed a watermark in the digital good and associate the watermark with a particular individual segment;

producing a pseudorandom watermark carrier that is independent of the segment-associated watermark and the watermarking key;

generating an individualized detection key from the watermark carrier and the watermarking key, whereby the individualized detection key is associated with the segment-associated watermark for the particular individual segment, the individualized detection key being used for detecting the segment-associated watermark in the digital good;

associating the individualized detection key with a unique detection entity by associating the watermark carrier to the unique detection entity, wherein the unique detection entity uses the individualized detection key for detecting the segment-associated watermark in the digital good; and

identifying, by one or more of the computers, the watermark carrier used to generate the individualized detection key following an attempt to modify or remove the segment-associated watermark from the digital good.

2. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein associating the individualized detection key with a unique detection entity comprises assigning the individualized detection key to a particular client that uses the individualized detection key for detecting the segment-associated watermark in the digital good.

3. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein each segment of the multiple segments has a different segment-associated watermark associated therewith, and each different segment-associated watermark has a different individualized detection key associated therewith.

4. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the segment-associated watermark is embedded into the particular individual segment of the digital good without embedding the individualized detection key in the digital good.

5. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the combining produces a marked digital good, the method further comprising:

distributing identical copies of the marked digital good to multiple detection entities, each detection entity having a different individualized detection key for accessing a different segment-associated watermark in a different segment of the marked digital good.

6. A method as recited in claim 1,

wherein the detection entity associated with the individualized detection key is identified via the watermark carrier when the individualized detection key is used in a collusion attack on the digital good having the watermark embedded therein.

7. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the identifying the watermark carrier used to generate the individualized detection key following an attempt to modify or remove the segment-associated watermark from the digital good further comprises:

recovering an attack vector from an examination of the digital good; and

identifying the watermark carrier from correlation with the attack vector.

8. A method as recited in claim 1, further comprising generating a short key estimation of the individualized detection key, which is approximately equivalent to the individualized detection key associated with the segment-associated watermark and is substantially smaller in scale than the individualized detection key.

9. One or more computer-readable storage media having computer-executable instructions stored thereon that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to carry out steps for facilitating protection of digital goods, the steps comprising:

segmenting a digital good into multiple segments;

for each of a plurality of individual segments of the multiple segments, performing acts comprising;

obtaining a pseudorandom watermarking key;

combining the watermarking key with the digital good to embed a watermark in the digital good and associate the watermark with a particular individual segment;

producing a pseudorandom watermark carrier that is independent of the segment-associated watermark and the watermarking key;

generating an individualized detection key from the watermark carrier and the watermarking key, whereby the individualized detection key is associated with the segment-associated watermark for the particular individual segment, the individualized detection key being used for detecting the segment-associated watermark in the digital good;

associating the individualized detection key with a unique detection entity by correlating the watermark carrier to the unique detection entity, wherein the unique detection entity uses the individualized detection key for detecting the segment-associated watermark in the digital good; and

identifying the detection entity associated with the individualized detection key via the watermark carrier when the individualized detection key is used in a collusion attack on the digital good having the watermark embedded therein.

10. One or more media as recited in claim 9, wherein associating the individualized detection key with a unique detection entity comprises assigning the individualized detection key to a particular client that uses the individualized detection key for detecting the segment-associated watermark in the digital good.

11. One or more media as recited in claim 9, wherein each segment of the multiple segments has a different segment-associated watermark associated therewith, and each different segment-associated watermark has a different individualized detection key associated therewith.

12. One or more media as recited in claim 9, wherein the segment-associated watermark is embedded into the particular individual segment of the digital good without embedding the individualized detection key in the digital good.

13. One or more media as recited in claim 9, wherein the combining produces a marked digital good, the method further comprising:

distributing identical copies of the marked digital good to multiple detection entities, each detection entity having a different individualized detection key for accessing a different segment-associated watermark in a different segment of the marked digital good.

14. One or more media as recited in claim 9,

wherein the identifying the detection entity associated with the individualized detection key via the watermark carrier when the individualized detection key is used in a collusion attack on the digital good having the watermark embedded therein further comprises:

recovering an attack vector from an examination of the digital good;

identifying the watermark carrier from correlation with the attack vector; and

identifying the detection entity via the identified watermark carrier.

15. One or more media as recited in claim 9, further comprising identifying the watermark carrier used to generate the individualized detection key following an attempt to modify or remove the segment-associated watermark from the digital good.

16. One or more media as recited in claim 9, further comprising generating a short key estimation of the individualized detection key, which is approximately equivalent to the individualized detection key associated with the segment-associated watermark and is substantially smaller in scale than the individualized detection key.

17. A method facilitating protection of digital goods, wherein the method is implemented by one or more computers executing computer-executable instructions stored in one or more computer-readable media, the method comprising:

obtaining a pseudorandom watermarking key;

producing a pseudorandom watermark carrier that is independent of the watermarking key, the watermark carrier being associated with a unique detection entity used for detecting a watermark in a digital good;

generating an individualized detection key from the watermark carrier and the watermarking key, said individualized detection key being used by the detection entity for detecting the watermark when the watermark is embedded in the digital good;

marking the digital good by combining the watermarking key with the digital good for embedding the watermark in the digital good;

associating the individualized detection key with the unique detection entity by the association of the watermark carrier to the detection entity; and

identifying, by one of the computers, the watermark carrier used to generate the individualized detection key following an attempt to modify or remove the watermark from the digital good.

18. A method as recited in claim 17 further comprising:

embedding the watermark into a digital good without embedding the individualized detection key in the digital good.

19. A method as recited in claim 17, further comprising:

segmenting the digital good into multiple individual segments;

producing a different pseudorandom watermark carrier and a different watermarking key for each different individual segment; and

generating a different individual detection key able to detect a corresponding different watermark for each individual segment.

20. A method as recited in claim 17, further comprising:

producing a plurality of the watermark carriers, each said watermark carrier being different from the others, for generating a plurality of the individualized detection keys, each detection key being correlated to a different detection entity via the corresponding watermark carrier.

21. A method as recited in claim 17, wherein the generating further comprises combining the watermark carrier with the watermarking key to generate the individualized detection key, whereby knowledge of the individual detection key does not imply knowledge of the watermarking key.

22. A method as recited in claim 17 further comprising embedding the watermark into a digital good without embedding the watermark carrier or the individualized detection key into the digital good.

23. A method as recited in claim 17, wherein the embedding produces a marked digital good, the method further comprising:

distributing identical copies of the marked digital good to multiple detection entities, each detection entity having a different individualized detection key for accessing the watermark in the marked digital good.

24. A method as recited in claim 17,

wherein the detection entity associated with the individualized detection key is identified via the watermark carrier when the individualized detection key is used in a collusion attack on the digital good having the watermark embedded therein.

25. A method as recited in claim 17, wherein the identifying the watermark carrier used to generate the individualized detection key following an attempt to modify or remove the watermark from the digital good further comprises:

recovering an attack vector from an examination of the digital good; and

identifying the watermark carrier from correlation with the attack vector.

26. A method as recited in claim 17, further comprising generating a short key estimation of the individualized detection key, which is approximately equivalent to the individualized detection key and which is substantially smaller in scale than the individualized detection key.

27. One or more computer-readable storage media having computer-executable instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to carry out steps comprising:

producing a pseudorandom secret watermarking key using a pseudorandom key generator;

marking a digital good by combining the secret watermarking key with the digital good to produce a marked digital good having a watermark embedded therein;

producing a plurality of pseudorandom watermark carriers that are independent of the secret watermarking key, the watermark carriers being stored in a memory;

associating each watermark carrier to a unique watermark detection device out of a plurality of unique watermark detection devices;

generating an individualized detection key from each of the watermark carriers and the secret watermarking key, whereby each individualized detection key is associated with the watermark for detecting the watermark;

assigning one of each individualized detection key to the unique watermark detection device to which the corresponding watermark carrier was assigned for use in detecting the watermark in the marked digital good, wherein the marked digital good having the watermark embedded therein does not have any of the individualized detection keys or watermark carriers embedded therein; and

associating each of the individualized detection keys with the corresponding unique watermark detection device by correlation of the corresponding watermark carrier to the unique detection device; and

identifying one or more detection devices associated with one or more of the individualized detection keys via the corresponding watermark carrier when the one or more individualized detection keys are used in a collusion attack on the digital good having the watermark embedded therein.

28. One or more media as recited in claim 27 further comprising:

segmenting the digital good into multiple individual segments;

producing a different pseudorandom secret watermarking key for each different individual segment; and

generating at least one different individual detection key for detecting the corresponding watermark for each individual segment.

29. One or more media as recited in claim 27 further comprising:

identifying a particular watermark carrier used to generate a particular one of the individualized detection keys following an attempt to modify or remove the watermark from the digital good.

30. One or more media as recited in claim 27, wherein the generating further comprises combining the watermark carriers with the secret watermarking key to generate the individualized detection key, whereby knowledge of one of the individual detection keys does not imply knowledge of the secret watermarking key.

31. One or more media as recited in claim 27, wherein the embedding produces a marked digital good, and further comprising:

distributing identical copies of the marked digital good to multiple detection devices, each detection device having a different individualized detection key for accessing the watermark in the marked digital good.

32. One or more media as recited in claim 27,

wherein the identifying the one or more detection devices associated with one or more of the individualized detection keys via the watermark carrier when the one or more individualized detection keys are used in a collusion attack on the digital good having the watermark embedded therein further comprises:

recovering an attack vector from an examination of the digital good;

identifying the watermark carrier from correlation with the attack vector; and

identifying the detection entity via the identified watermark carrier.

33. One or more media as recited in claim 27, further comprising identifying a plurality of the watermark carriers used to generate a plurality of the individualized detection keys following an attempt to modify or remove the watermark from the digital good.

34. One or more media as recited in claim 27 further comprising generating a short key estimation of each of the individualized detection key, which is approximately equivalent to the individualized detection key and which is substantially smaller in scale than the individualized detection key.

35. A system comprising:

a key generator including a processor and a memory for producing a pseudorandom watermark carrier that is independent of a pseudorandom watermark and corresponding watermarking key, the watermark carrier being stored in the memory and related-associated with a unique detection entity, wherein the key generator is configured to generate an individualized detection key from the watermark carrier and the watermarking key, wherein the individualized detection key is associated with the uniaue detection entity by the associating the watermark carrier with the detection entity;

a marker for combining the watermarking key with a digital good for embedding a watermark into a digital good to produce a marked digital good; and

a watermark detector associated with the detection entity and configured to use the individualized detection key to detect the watermark in the marked digital and

a fingerprint detector for identifying the detection entity associated with the individualized detection key via the watermark carrier when the individualized detection key is used in a collusion attack on the marked digital good.

36. A system as recited in claim 35,

wherein the marker is configured to embed the watermark into the digital good without embedding the individualized detection key in the digital good.

37. A system as recited in claim 35,

wherein the digital good includes multiple individual segments;

wherein the key generator is configured to produce a different pseudorandom watermark carrier and a different watermarking key for each different individual segment, and generate a corresponding different individual detection key able to detect the watermark for each individual segment.

38. A system as recited in claim 35, wherein the key generator is configured to produce a plurality of the watermark carriers, each said watermark carrier being different from the others, for generating a plurality of individualized detection keys, each detection key being correlated to a different detection entity via the corresponding watermark carrier.

39. A system as recited in claim 35, wherein the individualized detection key is associated with the watermark detector and the detection entity via the correlation with the watermark carrier stored in the memory.

40. A system as recited in claim 35, wherein the fingerprint detector identifies the detection entity associated with the individualized detection key via the watermark carrier when the individualized detection key is used in a collusion attack on the marked digital good by;

recovering an attack vector from an examination of the digital good;

identifying the watermark carrier from correlation with the attack vector; and

identifying the detection entity via the identified watermark carrier.

41. A system as recited in claim 35 further comprising a short-key generation means for generating a short key estimation of the individualized detection key, which is approximately equivalent to the individualized detection key and which is substantially smaller in scale than the individualized detection key.