DVB-CPCM

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

DVB Content Protection & Copy Management often abbreviated to DVB-CPCM or CPCM is a digital rights management standard being developed by the DVB Project. Its main application is interoperable rights management of European digital television, though other countries may also adopt the standard.

CPCM specifies a way of adding information to digital content, such as television programs, to describe how and if content may be used and shared among other CPCM-enabled devices.

Content providers can use a range of flags stored with the content to describe how it may be used. All CPCM-enabled devices should obey these flags. These flags can allow or deny content to be either moved or copied to other CPCM devices. Content may also be provided for a set time limit, or forbid content to be played concurrently on separate devices.

CPCM can distinguish between devices inside and outside an "authorized domain" of devices. The authorized domain can include devices both in the home or in remote locations such as cars or vacation homes. It also specifies whether content should remain inside the home (the "local environment") or inside a physical region, such a a country (the "geographic area").

CPCM can be compared to the failed U.S. broadcast flag where regulation was relatively narrow, the redistribution control flag could only be present or absent (recording of broadcast is allowed or not). DVB-CPCM, by contrast, is specifying remarkably fine-grained means by which broadcasters can control the detailed functionality of receiving devices. CPCM contains a "robustness requirement" that demands that manufacturers design their technologies to resist end-user modification, which makes it impossible to implement CPCM in free and open source software like Linux.