French security player Inside Secure, known as much for transaction security as its downloadable DRM, says it has a tie up with the Cryptography Research Inc. subsidiary of Rambus over using Vidity technology.
Vidity is a brand stamp that came out of an international standard for securing premium content on renewable storage like Flash memory or a disk drive, without it being copy-able. It relies on an encrypted key in a safe area of the storage device which is not readable by the operating system of the device or by anything else for that matter.
We assume this is both a patent license plus the know how to link a given DRM, in this case DRM Fusion Agent, to the Vidity qualified storage.
Vidity came out of the Secure Content Storage Association (SCSA) and the specification is built around a secure key placed inside either flash memory or on a disk drive, outside of the reach of the operating system, at the time it is constructed. That key forms the basis of the decryption for premium content – which will increasingly be UHD content. The protection of that key from the operating system which runs the hardware, and the protection of automated negotiations between a service and that secure area of storage is defined in the SCSA specification. We understand that the system will also rely on the service and this secure area authenticating one another, to avoid any spoofing.
The initial SCSA joint venture was started by 20th Century Fox, Warner, SanDisk and Western Digital, but now includes Samsung, Qualcomm, LG, Chinese phone company Xiaomi, Comcast, Intel, Sky, Cisco, Sprint, Broadcom, ARM, TP Vision, Seagate, Akamai, Marvell, DTS and Dolby, Pace, MStar, DivX, ST Micro, MediaTek, Realtek Walmart and Cryptography Research (CRI) as a special security advisor. Apple is the only significant name missing from the pack, along with those from the rival SeeQVault technology pushed in Japan by Panasonic, Samsung, Sony and Toshiba.
Interestingly it has all gone quiet on the Vidity front since the last IBC, with just one or two announcements such as a Samsung Blu-Ray player the UBD-K8500, which allows copies to be mode from the disc to a hard disk on a PC.
Cryptography Research did announce in January its own CryptoMedia security platform to protect 4K UHD and High Dynamic Range (HDR) programming, including a secure key derivation core, a player agent for secure acquisition and playback and trusted key provisioning services but this was released to all SCSA members, and Inside Secure is a member.
We suppose the media had to come first which allows copying and then the storage has to be in place in products, which adhere to Vidity, before anyone can bind their DRM to the service to allow it to push content in and out of Vidity storage.
Essentially this means that online services can now emerge which can copy DRM protected content onto perhaps a memory stick or a hard drive of a laptop or the flash memory of a tablet, and the content is safe from all but the most sophisticated piracy, since the copied version cannot itself be copied, except in its encrypted form, which is unreadable on a device which does not have the key.
It is perhaps no coincidence that Simon Blake-Wilson, who now works at Cryptography Research, was previously the chief sales officer at Inside Secure. Our take is that Cryptography Research needs a DRM supplier to step up and show what an advantage Vidity is, and needs to seed the market, so perhaps reached out to Inside Secure.
Whatever the reason may be the event that triggers the market, with consumers ready to “store” content on devices other than an official DVR, especially on portable devices which they can carry around with them.
The system is hoped to provide the technology replacement for DVDs and stimulate Electronic Sell Through globally, something that content providers are exceptionally keen on, but only if it doesn’t lead to piracy.
Vidity is built around a secure key placed inside either flash memory or a disk drive, outside of the reach of the operating system when it is constructed. That key forms the basis of the decryption for premium content – which will increasingly be UHD content. Back in 2012 Faultline said the SCSA specification was bound to be a slam dunk, starting as it did with the two largest disk drive makers and the largest manufacturer of flash memory controllers and two major US studios.
CRI previously designed the BD+ protection in Blu-ray; discovered differential power analysis and designed defenses against it for all credit card and smart card manufacturers, and has already signed most of the major set top chip suppliers to its independent cryptographic firewall, to replace conditional access smart cards.
Vidity will not require a connection to the Internet for playback. Compliant products will offer consumers the ability to store, copy, play and share downloaded digital files on a wide range of devices, including laptops, mobile phones and tablets. And the technology is said to be compatible with UltraViolet.
“This collaboration between Rambus and Inside Secure means that consumer electronics manufacturers can easily comply with the new specs set by Hollywood to securely distribute 4K and Ultra HD premium content,” said Andrew McLennan, executive vice-president of the Mobile Security Division of Inside Secure. “With the launch of a new agent for SCSA, Inside Secure also advances its goal of offering a multi-DRM platform, a platform already being used by 100 major deployments – including HBO, BBC, Sky, Orange, Canal+, and Bell Canada – and more than 120 million consumers every day.”
Inside Secure has been in the Vidity ecosystem from early on in SCSA and already supports Microsoft PlayReady, Google Widevine and Verimatrix ViewRight, all Hollywood approved DRMs.