CONTENT SUPPLIER’S PERSPECTIVE: HOME NETWORKS AND RIGHTS MANAGEMENT Robert M. Zitter, Craig D. Cuttner Home Box Office Abstract subsequent distribution windows such as home video, pay-per-view, etc. – each Copyright Protection, Digital Rights window and its attendant revenue stream is Management, Home Networks and other critical to the total revenue stream that buzzwords are all swirling around in a makes theatrical movie production a viable frenzy that has seemingly pitted content ongoing business. providers against operators and all seem to make consumers appear to be felons. If video programs are available on the Internet at no charge, once the Internet is This paper defines the scope of the issue connected to a digital home network, and discusses the pro- and con-attributes of consumers will be less likely to pay for the a Home Network. services MVPDs offer. Beginning in the first-steps of initial Distribution Security implementation of “simple” Copy Control Information (CCI) and how that may Over time, cable distribution technology evolve into sophisticated Digital Rights has evolved to thwart the capabilities of the Management (DRM) systems. “consuming public” to circumvent the collection of fees and protect revenues. BACKGROUND Non-standard channel (“mid-band” placement for pay channel security in the Content Value and Cable Value ‘70s) was succeeded by block converter devices and, later, by the cable-ready TV, The ‘sale’ of access to video content has which necessitated trapping. Higher value been a hallmark of the cable television premium TV led to channel scrambling and industry since its inception. Technology fixed (programmed) descrambling STB’s. used in the distribution, securing the Pay per view required addressability – and distribution and the content itself has the consumer’s ability to record high-value evolved over time as has the value of the content led to analog copy control (a/k/a content being distributed. Cable, and other Macrovision). forms of multichannel distribution (MVPDs), are actually the ‘tip of the Each of these steps was necessitated by iceberg’ related to a multi-faceted time- an evolutionary requirement to continue to value food-chain that impacts all aspects of collect revenue to keep growing the cable content. and content industries. Time-value of content and distribution Likewise, the “robustness” of systems are not new concepts. Hard cover books was driven to sophistication requirements by become mass-market paperbacks and later the day’s environment. Security evolved motion pictures. Theatrical movies have from virtually-none (since early TVs did not generally tune RF non-standard channels), Consumers increasingly want all of their compromised by simple “orange wires” in home electronics products to integrate and set-top-boxes, to sync-suppression provide a ‘greater good’ by using common scrambling – and, in fact, it was not always control systems and making content clear that the consumer electronics products available in different rooms, on different were designed to respect the necessity of devices – including computers, portable cable security – early versions of digital- devices, and, perhaps, vehicles. chassis analog television receivers were able to defeat very sophisticated sync- This need for integration means a suppression scrambling. network – and the “Home Network” connectivity promise soon available to Although there were limited cases of consumers is both a potential revenue source “redistribution” of video programming (e.g. for enhanced services, provisioning, an apartment building with ‘channel-3 management, and maintenance – and a sharing’),. the physical audit capabilities of threat to the distribution-revenue just as has the cable operator, and simple physical occurred in decades past. limitations of single-premium-channel distribution, were adequate limits on the The stakes today, unfortunately, are spreading of content redistribution. much higher. TODAY’S LANDSCAPE While a crude ‘channel-3 network’ might have provided a few like-minded apartment Building on the premise that the “on/off” dwellers a single-channel of HBO in the nature of conditional access (traps, 1970’s – one copy of a motion picture on the addressability, or other forms of access Internet has devastating impact on the denial) was appropriate to the consumer’s revenue stream before, during and after the then-current abilities to circumvent those cable window. The impact will be more systems. Further building on the ability to devastating now that the value of cable use simple analog Macrovision as an content has significantly increased – and appropriate means to prevent analog VCR more of that content is original-to- cable, as copies in the PPV window – where does that its first exhibition window. leave us today? First Steps in Security – Basic Conditional Digital cable-ready receivers will soon be Access able to be directly-attached to cable systems; digital VCR and DVD burning devices are The FCC and industry economics have growing in popularity, and the fastest- dictated the first steps to continue the growing segment of the (IT) computer evolution of cable security – the one-way industry, the ‘Media Center PC’ – promotes digital cable ready television is a reality. a video program guide, Digital Video Recording and DVD-burning. Using contemporary industry-standard digital encryption techniques, the Clearly, the next evolution in conditional CableCARD™ can take the best-of-breed access, content security – and potential new conditional access systems deployed today revenue streams are upon us. and integrate it into a consumer-purchased host device. As required by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), no used to ensure that the host device properly consumer-accessible ‘in-the-clear’ streams adheres to the PHILA principles. are available courtesy of DFAST encryption. 2. Compressed Firewire (1394) – the It is important to note that the current ‘5C’ (DTCP) copy protection regime is implication in the nature of consumer specifically tailored for high-speed behavior is that “in the clear” is a direct tie compressed applications. to “distributed on the Internet” without recourse. It is the need to encrypt content 3. Uncompressed DVI (also HDMI) – securely to both maintain its value and retain the ‘HDCP’ copy protection regime is legal protections under DMCA. specifically tailored for uncompressed digital signals such as might be transported CableCARD, however, is only the first- between a host device and display device. step evolution of an integrated TV / set top – and it alone does not provide functionality These copyright protection systems for the Home Network as consumers would protect, generally, a source-to-sink deploy it. relationship and convey only ‘basic’ copy control states. (Generally, signals in this In a consumer environment, more context, originate in a “source” device and connections than cable-to-host / display are are consumed in a “sink” device. A set top envisioned. Modular components (set top to is an example of a source, a TV display is a plasma display; recorder to display; media sink.) storage to display) begin to form the basis of a series of output to input links – all digital – The ability to separately enable and hence all needing some form of copyright disable items 2 and 3 (above), is referred to protection to prevent ‘unprotected copying as “selectable output control” which was a and redistribution.’ Each type of interface point of considerable discussion during the has a defined and approved copy protection Plug and Play negotiation. system and is a overall part of the ‘Plug-and Play Agreement’ tied to a set of principles Second Step – (Unprotected Interfaces) and rules that govern access to and use of cryptographic keys that control system Analog video, in many contemporary behavior. consumer devices today, is routinely converted from analog to digital in a very Second Step – (Protected Interfaces) high-quality manner. Once that conversion has occurred, all of the concerns about As secure digital interfaces require copyright protection, Internet redistribution, copyright protection regimes, there are etc. equally apply to the converted signal. systems appropriate to the major interfaces: This is the so-called “Analog Hole.” 1. The CableCARD itself – although NTSC composite analog video is not intended for consumer access, the pins “protected” only to the extent that of the card interface could be intercepted Macrovision may be applied as a part of the during their transport of high-value content ‘copy never’ state. CGMS-A may also be – thus, the DFAST encryption system is present to signal other copy control states, but may be removed by some consumer devices, thus it is not, by itself, sufficient for authoritative signaling. Further, the “low- Home Network Topology quality” nature of NTSC limits the quality of Secure copies that may be made from either the Video original analog or digital copies thereof. Home TV Display Network Component analog video interfaces are higher quality than NTSC, and can support DVR very-high quality signals up to high- “The Internet” definition. Considering the weaknesses of CGMS-A noted above, and the fact that only certain resolutions and formats of component analog support a vertical There are two other “competitors” that blanking interval for carriage of copyright currently are working to be the key control information, there are concerns providers of that home network: about very high-quality analog to digital conversions