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AssigneeBritish Telecommunications public limited company
InventorsIan Duncan Bramhill, Matthew Robert Charles Sims
Estimating the term…
A copyright protection scheme is provided in which data is downloaded from a server 1, typically over the World Wide Web 2 to a client 3, for presentation to a user. The downloaded data is cryptographically protected, by encryption and hashing. When displayed by the client, storing and copying functions are selectively disabled in respect of the data, in order to to prevent unauthorised copying.
A method of copy protecting data sent from a server to a client for presentation to a user, comprising:
A method according to any preceding claim including authenticating that the client is permitted to receive the data.
A method according to any preceding claim including identifying the client to the server before the data is sent to the client.
A method according to any preceding claim including:
A method according to any preceding claim wherein the data is sent to the client from the server through a network.
A method according to any preceding claim wherein the server and the client each hold data corresponding to a cryptographic key and a machine identifier for uniquely identifying the client, the method including:
A method according to any preceding claim wherein the data is steganographically marked.
A method according to any preceding claim including registering the client with the server.
A method according to any preceding claim including;
A server configured to perform a method as claimed in any preceding claim.
Initiation by the client, of the downloading of copy protected data by a method according to any preceding claim.
A copy protected data stored on the client by a method according to any preceding claim.
A method of downloading encrypted data from a server to a client, including:
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.
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Implementing security features at a particular protocol layer: above the transport layer
Security arrangements for protecting computers, components thereof, programs or data against unauthorised activity: protecting distributed…
Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising: price estimation or determination
Including means for verifying the identity or authority of a user of the system or for message authentication, e.g. authorization, entity…: using…
Term end not estimated
This invention relates to protecting data against copying and has particular application to protecting data transmitted through a network, such as hypermedia transmitted over a web-based network.
It is known that data in the form of hypermedia such as hypertext, is often written in the hypertext language HTML and arranged in webpages that are provided by a server connected through a network to a client. The client may comprise a personal computer or other processing device capable of presenting the data retrieved from the server to a user. The network may comprise a local area network (LAN), a wide area network (WAN) or may comprise the Internet. For example, the World Wide Web comprises many servers connected over the Internet in a web, which have addresses in the form of universal resource locators (URL).
The hypertext information is arranged in webpages which include hotspots to allow the user to establish a link to another webpage, which may be located on the same or a different server, the routing to the document being achieved by use of a URL in the webpage at the hotspot.
In order that the invention may be more fully understood an example will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:
FIG. 1 is a schematic illustration of a conventional client and server connected through the World Wide Web;
FIG. 2 is a schematic illustration of a conventional display provided by a web browser on the client 3;
An example of the invention will now be described in relation to the World Wide Web (WWW). As is well known, a page of information on a web server is identified on the web by means of an individual URL so that it can be accessed by a browser running on a client computer. Referring to FIG. 1, a web server 1 is connected through the World Wide Web 2, to a client computer in the form of a PC 3. HTML webpages can be downloaded to the client computer 3 from the web server 1, to be displayed to the user of the client computer 3. The HTML document may include links to other HTML pages on the same or a different web server, in a manner well known per se. The HTML webpages may also include embedded objects such as graphics, images and the like.
The client 3 runs a browser which receives the HTML documents from the web server 1 and displays them on the display of the computer. In this example, the browser is Java aware i.e. can interpret Java bytecodes received from the server. More particularly, as known in the art, when the HTML document includes a so-called Java applet tag, the server downloads a corresponding applet, consisting of Java bytecodes, which are interpreted and run by the browser. Typically, the downloaded Java applet allows interactivity between the user of the computer 3 and the displayed image. For further information, reference is directed to “HTML 3.2 and CGI Unleashed”, supra, Chapter 18.
An example of the screen display of an HTML webpage is shown in FIG. 2. The display is provided within a window 4 presented by the browser. Examples of a suitable browser are the Microsoft Internet Explorer 3.1 and the Netscape Navigator. The browser includes a number of conventional controls which are operated by clicking on a mouse, in the usual way. For example, the browser includes a print button 5 which allows a screen print to be produced of the entire page shown within the browser window 4. Also, the browser includes a control, shown schematically at 6, with a drop-down menu option “view source”, which allows a display to be provided of the actual HTML code which is being run.