they know who are you. They know where you are. They know what you have done, what you could do, or what you are capable of doing. And they are the future of digital media on the Internet.
“They” are Reciprocal and NetPD, two companies that teamed up Tuesday to create a secure online delivery system for businesses that comes complete with its own tracking service.
The joint venture allows Reciprocal to improve its secure delivery systems, while opening new sales avenues for NetPD software.
Reciprocal has primarily been a secure back-end delivery system for retailers and content creators. The system already works with eight different digital rights management systems, such as InterTrust and Microsoft. This ensures that consumers receive content that their media players can use.
The addition of tracking software also allows content owners to search the Internet for specific files that are distributed without consent.
“NetPD provides an intensive service of searching, identifying and removing any material on the Internet that infringes our clients’ copyrights,” NetPD CEO Jim Stoddard said in a written statement.
Like other tracking programs, the service creates a database of file names and IP addresses that can be sent to the offender’s Internet service provider.
Increasingly, digital rights management companies like Microsoft and InterTrust have been working to develop closed-loop systems that prevent users from playing tracks that have had their security removed.
However, Howard Singer, senior vice president of business development at Reciprocal, said systems designed to not play certain files were bound to confuse consumers, as buyers would never be sure which files would play on their media players.
In other words, today’s online retailers make it too confusing for consumers to comply with the law.
“Acceptance of a secure distribution depends on many things, and so far the software has been very intrusive,” Singer said.
“We’ve had a metal chain around the contents, as opposed to the small CD label that you peel off at the register. If it were less restrictive, I don’t think this would even be an issue.”
Instead, Singer said copyright holders would need to find new ways to protect their media files. One way to do this is to make DRM files less secure and then track the content as it travels over the Internet.
