Digital rights management license delivery system and method

• US 7,310,729 B2
• Filed: 03/12/2003
• Issued: 12/18/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 03/12/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Limelight Networks, Inc.
• Sponsoring Entity: Limelight Networks, Inc.
• Inventors: Gordon, Michael, Raciborski, Nathan
• Primary Examiner(s): Zand; Kambiz
• Assistant Examiner(s): Nalven; Andrew L
• APPLICATION: US 20040181490A1
• Time in patent office: 1742 Days
• Field of Search: 713/161, 713/164, 713/189, 726/30
• US Class Current: 713/161
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/10 Protecting distributed programs or content, e.g. vending or licensing of copyrighted material

Abstract

A system for Digital Rights Management (DRM) license delivery is presented in which the license and encrypted content is accessed from a unique download URL address for each unit of encrypted content for each subscriber. The license is delivered only a limited number of times from each URL (typically once, but optionally more than once) and is delivered to the client system that first accesses the URL (or if more than one license delivery is authorized by the content owner or distributor) to the same or different client system that accesses the URL up to the maximum number of license delivery events authorized.. When the subscriber is ready to view the content, the subscriber clicks on the download URL to cause the browser for the subscriber client system to request the web page located at the unique URL location. In response to the request, the host system delivers a license and the encrypted content to the subscriber client system that accessed the URL. If the unique download URL is accessed subsequent times, the host system delivers the encrypted content, but does not re-deliver the license. Since the subscriber client system has already stored the license, if the subscriber client system re-accesses the site, it will be able to download and play the media content for so long as the terms of the license permit. However, if another client system accesses the unique URL address, for example if the subscriber e-mails the URL address to another user, the content can be downloaded but will not be played by the subsequent client system because the license is not re-delivered.

Claims

1. A system for digital rights management comprising:

a client computer having software for receiving and playing encrypted media content, said client computer further having software for transmitting a request to a server to obtain said encrypted media content;

a host computer system, said host computer system including a server having software for mapping a plurality of unique unencrypted logical addresses to a single logical address, said single logical address pointing to a unit of encrypted media, said host computer system further having software for determining the number of times delivery of said unit of encrypted media is requested from each of said plurality of unique logical addresses and for determining whether the number of requests for said unit of encrypted media from each of said plurality of unique logical addresses exceeds a predetermined license delivery event limit and, if the number of requests for said unit of encrypted media from one of said plurality of unique logical addresses does not exceed said predetermined license delivery event limit, authorizing the transmittal of a digital rights management license to decrypt said unit of encrypted media to said client computer.

2. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

software associated with said host computer system for encrypting said encrypted media content with a public key infrastructure (PKI) key pair.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein:

the host computer system software further comprises instructions for determining a hardware profile of the client computer, wherein the encrypting instruction encrypts the encryption key with the hardware profile of the client computer.

4. A method of providing encrypted media and licenses to decrypt said encrypted media to a plurality of users, comprising the steps of:

providing a unit of encrypted media content to a host computer, said unit of encrypted media content being encrypted with an encryption key;

mapping said unit of encrypted media to a plurality of unique logical addresses;

providing one of said plurality of unique logical addresses to a client computer;

transmitting a first request from said client computer to retrieve said unit of encrypted media from said one of said plurality of unique logical addresses;

in response to said first request for said unit of encrypted media, transmitting said encrypted media content to said client computer; and

in response to said first request to retrieve said unit of encrypted media, determining whether the number of licenses transmitted to decrypt said unit of encrypted media content from said one of said plurality of unique logical addresses exceeds a predetermined license delivery event limit and, if the number of licenses transmitted to decrypt said media content associated with said one of said plurality of unique logical address does not exceed said predetermined license delivery event limit, transmitting a license to decrypt said encrypted media content to said client computer.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein

said plurality of unique logical addresses comprise a plurality of unencrypted URLs.

6. The method of claim 4, wherein:

the step of mapping said encrypted media to a plurality of unique logical addresses comprises generating a unique URL for each of a group of individuals of said plurality of users and mapping said encrypted media to each of said unique URLs.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein:

the step of providing one of said plurality of unique logical addresses to a client computer comprises transmitting each of said unique URLs to a corresponding one of said plurality of users.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein:

The step of transmitting each of said unique URLs to a corresponding one of said plurality of users comprises transmitting said unique URLs to plural of said plurality of users via e-mail.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein:

The step of transmitting each of said unique URLs to a corresponding one of said plurality of users comprises transmitting said unique URLs to plural of said plurality of users via a web site.

10. The method of claim 4, wherein:

said predetermined license event limit is between one and two license events per unique logical addresses.

11. The method of claim 4, wherein:

the step of transmitting a license to decrypt said encrypted media content to said client computer is effected without requesting a username, password, or payment information from said client computer.

12. The method of claim 4, further comprising the step of:

determining a hardware profile of the client computer and, wherein the encrypting step encrypts the decryption key with the hardware profile of the client computer to create a decryption key personalized to the client computer.

13. The method of claim 4, further comprising the step of:

transmitting a second request from a client computer to retrieve said unit of encrypted media from said one of said plurality of unique logical addresses; and

in response to said second request to retrieve said unit of encrypted media, determining whether the number of licenses transmitted to decrypt said unit of encrypted media content from said one of said plurality of unique logical addresses exceeds a predetermined license delivery event limit and, if the number of licenses transmitted to decrypt said media content associated with said one of said plurality of unique logical address exceeds said predetermined license delivery event limit, transmitting said unit of encrypted media without a license to decrypt said encrypted media content to said client computer.