NDS Selects Cinea's Running Marks Watermarking Technology for Integration with Its Conditional Access and DRM Solutions

Conditional access market leader will make Cinea’s compressed domain watermarking solution available to its VOD and live broadcast customers

Reston, Va. — Cinea, Inc., a subsidiary of Dolby Laboratories, Inc. (NYSE: DLB), announced today that NDS Group plc (NASDAQ: NNDS), a majority-owned subsidiary of News Corporation, has licensed the company’s forensic watermarking technology for use with its extensive product line of conditional access and digital rights management solutions for video-on-demand (VOD) and live broadcast.

NDS will integrate Cinea’s Running Marks™ technology in NDS’ leading conditional access and security solutions. This combination provides NDS’ customers with the ability to embed invisible, unique product IDs in individual video streams, allowing tracking of pirated content back to its source. By leveraging Cinea’s capability to watermark compressed video streams, NDS can offer session-based watermarking for both VOD head-end as well as set-top box applications. A key advantage of this approach is that it enables system operators to add subscriber-specific serialization capabilities to their VOD head-end, with no changes to the downstream devices. This same feature also offers significant advantages in the set-top box and other devices by enabling watermarking of all video outputs, including compressed digital content in home video networks.

“Session-based watermarking is increasingly important to our customers, and our goal has always been to meet their evolving needs with the market’s best possible solution,” said Nigel Smith, VP and Chief Marketing Officer of NDS. “The Running Marks robust and flexible architecture made it a clear choice to integrate within our existing security solutions.”
Forensic watermarking, also known as serialization watermarking, enables a unique, session-specific ID or serial number to be placed in every video stream distributed by a system operator. By watermarking individual streams, the natural flow of distributed content remains untouched and uninterrupted, yet any source of illegally redistributed content can be identified. Forensic marks also provide a proactive “deterrent” value by removing the anonymity usually associated with the downloading and sharing of content.

“From the beginning, our company has aimed to provide the most flexible and robust anti-piracy solutions to the cable, telecommunications, and satellite video markets,” said Robert Schumann, General Manager of Cinea. “Running Marks was designed to make the deployment of watermarking into existing video delivery infrastructures both straightforward and cost-effective. We’re honored that a world-class company like NDS selected our technology to offer to its customer base around the world.”

Links: Cinea; NDS