Delivery of multiple third-party services to networked devices

• US 9,009,808 B2
• Filed: 01/27/2014
• Issued: 04/14/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 10/28/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Dell Products LP (Dell Technologies Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Dell Products LP (Dell Technologies Inc.)
• Inventors: Ross, Mark Andrew, Bucher, Timothy
• Primary Examiner(s): Chai, Longbit
• Application Number:
  US14/164,768
• Publication Number:
  US 20140143848A1
• Time in Patent Office: 442 Days
• Field of Search: 726/9
• US Class Current: 726/9
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2209/60 Digital content management, e.g. content distribution
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0876 based on the identity of the terminal or configuration, e.g. MAC address, hardware or software configuration or device fingerprint
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/3213 using tickets or tokens, e.g. Kerberos network architectures or network communication protocols for entities authentication using tickets in a packet data network H04L63/0807

Abstract

Systems and methods for authenticating a media device or other information handling system so as to be able to receive content from one or more media content providers. Authenticating the device includes determining what authentication information the media content providers require for access and then to generating and providing to the media device an authentication token that includes the required information. In some embodiments this may be accomplished by a service center, which removes the need for additional authentication steps to be performed by the media device or the media content providers. In addition, the service center may also determine when changes are made to the authentication information and may then ensure that the authentication token is changed or updated to reflect these changes. This ensures that the media device is at least partially immune to changes to authentication.

Claims

1. In a system including a media device that receives content or services from one or more media content providers, a method performed by a service center for providing authentication information to the media device, without the media device having first communicated with a media content provider, to enable the media device to authenticate with the media content provider to receive content or services from the media content provider, the method comprising:

receiving, at a service center, a request from a media device, the request requesting authentication information for enabling the media device to authenticate with a media content provider that is separate from the service center, the request from the media device being sent from the media device to the service center before the media device has communicated any request to the media content provider;

generating, at the service center, authentication information and providing the authentication information to the media device for allowing the media device to authenticate to the media content provider without having communicated previously any request to the media content provider; and

wherein the authentication information is configured to allow the media device to authenticate directly to the media content provider without having previously communicated any request to the media content provider and without further communication with the service center and by sending the authentication information to the media content provider to authenticate the media device to receive media content or services directly from the media content provider.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the service center comprises one or more servers that are configured to communicate with a plurality of media devices.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the media content provider comprises a source of one or more of digital music, talk audio data, television data, movie data, podcasts, sports data, weather data, news data, or internet data.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the authentication information comprises user identification information for a user of the media device.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the authentication information comprises device configuration information for the media device.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the authentication information comprises payment information for a user of the media device.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the authentication information is generated based on information received by the service center from the media content provider.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the authentication information is generated based on information stored at the service center.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the authentication information is contained within an authentication token.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the authentication token includes instructions for configuring the media device for communicating with the media content provider.

11. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

updating the authentication information; and

providing the updated authentication information to the media device.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the authentication information is configured to allow the media device to authenticate directly to a plurality of media content providers.

13. In a system including a plurality of media devices that receive content or services from a media content provider, a method performed by a service center for providing authentication information to each of the plurality of media devices, without the media devices having first communicated with the media content provider, to enable the media devices to authenticate with the media content provider to receive content or services from the media content provider, the method comprising:

receiving, at a service center, a request from each of a plurality of media devices, each request requesting authentication information for enabling the corresponding media device to authenticate with a media content provider that is separate from the service center, each request being sent from the corresponding media device to the service center before the corresponding media device has communicated any request to the media content provider;

in response to each request at the service center, generating authentication information and providing the authentication information to each of the media devices for allowing the corresponding media device to authenticate to the media content provider without having communicated previously any request to the media content provider and providing the authentication information to the corresponding media device;

wherein the authentication information generated for each media device is configured to allow the media device to authenticate directly to the media content provider without having previously communicated any request to the media content provider and without further communication with the service center and by sending the authentication information to the media content provider to authenticate the media device to receive media content or services directly from the media content provider.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the media content provider comprises a source of one or more of digital music, talk audio data, television data, movie data, podcasts, sports data, weather data, news data, or internet data.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein the authentication information generated for each media device comprises one or more of:

user identification information for a user of the corresponding media device;

device configuration information for the corresponding media device;

or

payment information for a user of the corresponding media device.

16. The method of claim 13, wherein the authentication information for each media device is generated from one or more of:

information received by the service center from the media content provider;

or

information stored at the service center.

17. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

for at least one of the media devices, updating the authentication information; and

providing the updated authentication information to the corresponding media device.

18. A service center configured to provide authentication information to a media device, without the media device having first communicated with a media content provider, to enable the media device to authenticate with the media content provider to receive content or services from the media content provider, the service center comprising:

one or more hardware processors; and

memory storing computer executable instructions which when executed by the one or more processors perform the following;

receiving, from a media device, a request to generate authentication information for enabling the media device to authenticate with a media content provider that is separate from the service center, the request from the media device being sent from the media device to the service center before the media device has communicated any request to the media content provider;

generating authentication information for allowing the media device to authenticate to the media content provider without having communicated previously any request to the media content provider; and

sending the authentication information to the media device to enable the media device to authenticate directly to the media content provider without having previously communicated any request of the media device to the media content provider and without further communication from the media device to the service center by submitting the authentication information to the media content provider so as to receive media content or services directly from the media content provider.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the authentication information is configured to allow the media device to authenticate to any of a plurality of media content providers by submitting the authentication information to any of the plurality of media content providers.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the authentication information comprises user identification information.