New paradigms for effective multicasting and fingerprinting of entertainment media

The large-scale adoption of network-centric entertainment systems rests on the ability to provide reliable, low-cost, and secure services for all parties in the entertainment distribution system. The use of modern data networks such as the Internet to communicate digital entertainment media is motivated, in part, by advancements in communication networking, signal processing, and storage technologies that facilitate more flexible and granular business models. This same technological progress can also be shown to equip potential "attackers" with the means to more easily violate system security. A broad class of system security issues for entertainment applications is addressed by the growing field of digital rights management. This article focuses on an aspect of DRM that involves multicast entertainment media distribution using digital encryption and digital fingerprinting technologies to prevent widespread piracy. The goal of DRM is to provide protection and facilitate equitable compensation for all parties in the entertainment distribution chain including content creators, aggregators, distributors, and consumers. Previous security proposals to protect entertainment media have sacrificed broadcast efficiency for security. This article collectively addresses security and broadcast efficiency for network-centric entertainment systems, an area of research seldom explored. We present the challenges, technological solutions, and future trends of this emerging field.