Method and apparatus for preventing illegal copy or illegal installation of information of optical recording medium

An information reproducing system comprising means (17) for rotationally driving a disc-like optical recording medium (2) wherein information is recorded in the form of pits, an optical head (6) for reading out the recorded information from said optical recording medium, head-moving means (23) for making said optical head movable radially on said optical recording medium, and signal processing means for processing the information read out through said optical head, which system is characterized by including:

• first physical information detecting means (743, 38, 665) for detecting, on the basis of information read out through one of said optical head and a magnetic head, first physical feature information (532) which is representative of a physical feature including at least one of a two-dimensional pit arrangement and a pit configuration on said optical recording medium and which is enciphered and recorded at manufacturing of said optical recording medium;
• decryption means (534) for deciphering the first physical feature information;
• means (17a, 6, 38, 703a) for measuring a physical feature of said optical recording medium to detect second physical feature information;
• check means (535) for checking said second physical feature information with said first physical feature information to make a decision as to whether or not both are in a specific relation to each other;
• and
• control means (717, 665) for, when the check means decides that said second physical feature information is not in the specific relation to said first physical feature information, stopping one of an operation of a specific program read out from said optical recording medium, the subsequent reading-out of information from said optical recording medium, and a given process of information, read out from the optical recording medium, the given process being practiced by said signal processing means, characterized in that said second physical feature information detecting means is equipped with pit depth detecting means (555) for detecting a pit depth of a specific recording signal to detect said second physical feature information.

An information reproducing system comprising means (17) for rotationally driving a disc-like optical recording medium (2) wherein information is recorded in the form of pits, an optical head (6) for reading out the recorded information from said optical recording medium, head-moving means (23) for making said optical head movable radially on said optical recording medium, and signal processing means for processing the information read out through said optical head, which system is characterized by including:

• first physical information detecting means (743, 38, 665) for detecting, on the basis of information read out through one of said optical head and a magnetic head, first physical feature information (532) which is representative of a physical feature including at least one of a two-dimensional pit arrangement and a pit configuration on said optical recording medium and which is enciphered and recorded at manufacturing of said optical recording medium;
• decryption means (534) for deciphering the first physical feature information;
• means (17a, 6, 38, 703a) for measuring a physical feature of said optical recording medium to detect second physical feature information;
• check means (535) for checking said second physical feature information with said first physical feature information to make a decision as to whether or not both are in a specific relation to each other;
• and
• control means (717, 665) for, when the check means decides that said second physical feature information is not in the specific relation to said first physical feature information, stopping one of an operation of a specific program read out from said optical recording medium, the subsequent reading-out of information from said optical recording medium, and a given process of information, read out from the optical recording medium, the given process being practiced by said signal processing means, characterized in that said second physical feature information detecting means (635) detects said second physical feature information with error signal detecting means (633) being used as physical feature information detecting means to detect the presence or absence of an error signal (632) of a specific recording signal in a specific address.

An information reproducing system comprising means (17) for rotationally driving a disc-like optical recording medium (2) wherein information is recorded in the form of pits, an optical head (6) for reading out the recorded information from said optical recording medium, head-moving means (23) for making said optical head movable radially on said optical recording medium, and signal processing means for processing the information read out through said optical head, which system is characterized by including:

• first physical information detecting means (743, 38, 665) for detecting, on the basis of information read out through one of said optical head and a magnetic head, first physical feature information (532) which is representative of a physical feature including at least one of a two-dimensional pit arrangement and a pit configuration on said optical recording medium and which is enciphered and recorded at manufacturing of said optical recording medium;
• decryption means (534) for deciphering the first physical feature information;
• means (17a, 6, 38, 703a) for measuring a physical feature of said optical recording medium to detect second physical feature information;
• check means (535) for checking said second physical feature information with said first physical feature information to make a decision as to whether or not both are in a specific relation to each other;
• and
• control means (717, 665) for, when the check means decides that said second physical feature information is not in the specific relation to said first physical feature information, stopping one of an operation of a specific program read out from said optical recording medium, the subsequent reading-out of information from said optical recording medium, and a given process of information, read out from the optical recording medium, the given process being practiced by said signal processing means, characterized in that said second physical feature information detecting means uses a special sign detecting means (640) as physical feature information detecting means and detects said second physical feature information by detecting that a special sign (639) which is not present in a first legal sign decode table in sign decode means exists in a specific recording signal area.

An information reproducing system comprising means (17) for rotationally driving a disc-like optical recording medium (2) wherein information is recorded in the form of pits, an optical head (6) for reading out the recorded information from said optical recording medium, head-moving means (23) for making said optical head movable radially on said optical recording medium, and signal processing means for processing the information read out through said optical head, which system is characterized by including:

• first physical information detecting means (743, 38, 665) for detecting, on the basis of information read out through one of said optical head and a magnetic head, first physical feature information (532) which is representative of a physical feature including at least one of a two-dimensional pit arrangement and a pit configuration on said optical recording medium and which is enciphered and recorded at manufacturing of said optical recording medium;
• decryption means (534) for deciphering the first physical feature information;
• means (17a, 6, 38, 703a) for measuring a physical feature of said optical recording medium to detect second physical feature information;
• check means (535) for checking said second physical feature information with said first physical feature information to make a decision as to whether or not both are in a specific relation to each other;
• and
• control means (717, 665) for, when the check means decides that said second physical feature information is not in the specific relation to said first physical feature information, stopping one of an operation of a specific program read out from said optical recording medium, the subsequent reading-out of information from said optical recording medium, and a given process of information, read out from the optical recording medium, the given process being practiced by said signal processing means, characterized in that said second physical feature information detecting means has pit arrangement detecting means (747) for detecting pit arrangements on two or more tracks, adjacent to each other, in a specific area indicated by said first physical feature information of said recording medium.

An information reproducing system comprising means (17) for rotationally driving a disc-like optical recording medium (2) wherein information is recorded in the form of pits, an optical head (6) for reading out the recorded information from said optical recording medium, head-moving means (23) for making said optical head movable radially on said optical recording medium, and signal processing means for processing the information read out through said optical head, which system is characterized by including:

• first physical information detecting means (743, 38, 665) for detecting, on the basis of information read out through one of said optical head and a magnetic head, first physical feature information (532) which is representative of a physical feature including at least one of a two-dimensional pit arrangement and a pit configuration on said optical recording medium and which is enciphered and recorded at manufacturing of said optical recording medium;
• decryption means (534) for deciphering the first physical feature information;
• means (17a, 6, 38, 703a) for measuring a physical feature of said optical recording medium to detect second physical feature information;
• check means (535) for checking said second physical feature information with said first Physical feature information to make a decision as to whether or not both are in a specific relation to each other;
• and
• control means (717, 665) for, when the check means decides that said second physical feature information is not in the specific relation to said first physical feature information, stopping one of an operation of a specific program read out from said optical recording medium, the subsequent reading-out of information from said optical recording medium, and a given process of information, read out from the optical recording medium, the given process being practiced by said signal processing means, characterized by further comprising reproducing means for detecting a low-reflection section (740) producing a small reflected light quantity due to the presence of pits and a high-reflection section (741) having a higher reflectance than that of said low-reflection section due to the absence of pits, second low-reflection section detecting means (586) for detecting a second low-reflection section placed in an optical recording signal area (742) and having a lower reflectance than that of said first low-reflection section to produce a second reflected light quantity, and demodulating means (621) for demodulating a second low-reflection section detection signal of said second low-reflection section detecting means into a first digital signal.

An information reproducing system comprising means (17) for rotationally driving a disc-like optical recording medium (2) wherein information is recorded in the form of pits, an optical head (6) for reading out the recorded information from said optical recording medium, head-moving means (23) for making said optical head movable radially on said optical recording medium, and signal processing means for processing the information read out through said optical head, which system is characterized by including:

• first physical information detecting means (743, 38, 665) for detecting, on the basis of information read out through one of said optical head and a magnetic head, first physical feature information (532) which is representative of a physical feature including at least one of a two-dimensional pit arrangement and a pit configuration on said optical recording medium and which is enciphered and recorded at manufacturing of said optical recording medium;
• decryption means (534) for deciphering the first physical feature information;
• means (17a, 6, 38, 703a) for measuring a physical feature of said optical recording medium to detect second physical feature information;
• check means (535) for checking said second physical feature information with said first physical feature information to make a decision as to whether or not both are in a specific relation to each other;
• and
• control means (717, 665) for, when the check means decides that said second physical feature information is not in the specific relation to said first physical feature information, stopping one of an operation of a specific program read out from said optical recording medium, the subsequent reading-out of information from said optical recording medium, and a given process of information, read out from the optical recording medium, the given process being practiced by said signal processing means, characterized in that said decryption means (534) converts a first cipher, encrypted with a disclosed key cipher system function, into a plain text including said first physical feature information.

A method of preventing an illegal copy of a disc-like optical recording medium or of preventing an illegal install of information on the disc-like optical recording medium, which comprises the steps of:

• detecting on the basis of information read out from the optical recording medium first physical feature information (532) which is representative of a physical feature including at least one of a two-dimensional pit arrangement and pit configuration on said optical recording medium and which is encrypted and recorded by using a one direction function at manufacturing of said optical recording medium;
• decrypting said first physical feature information;
• measuring a physical feature of said optical recording medium to obtain second physical feature information;
• checking said second physical feature information with said first physical feature information to make a decision as to whether or not both are in a specific relation to each other;
• and
• when the check step decides that the second physical feature information is not in the specific relation to the first physical feature information, stopping the operation of a specific program read out from the optical recording medium, stopping at least one of the subsequent reading-out of information from the optical recording medium, and a given process of information read out from said optical recording medium, the given process being practiced by signal processing means.

A method of preventing an illegal copy of a disc-like optical recording medium or of preventing an illegal install of information on the disc-like optical recording medium, which comprises the steps of:

• detecting first physical feature information (532) from said optical recording medium, said first physical feature information being indicative of a physical feature at least including a two-dimensional pit arrangement or a pit configuration on the optical recording medium, encrypted using a one direction function and recorded on said optical recording medium or an original record therefor so as to be distinguishable from main information to be recorded on said optical recording medium;
• decrypting said first physical feature information;
• measuring a physical feature of said optical recording medium to obtain a second physical feature information;
• checking said second physical feature information with said first physical feature information to make a decision as to whether or not both are in a specific relation to each other;
• and
• when the check step decides that said second physical feature information is not in the specific relation to said first physical feature information, stopping at least one of the operation of a specific program read out from said optical recording medium, the subsequent reading-out of information from the optical recording medium, and a given process of information, read out from the optical recording medium, said given process being practiced by signal processing means.