System and method of restricting access to media content

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9866885-B2
Application number	US-201414543208-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Nov 17, 2014
Priority date	Nov 1, 2007
Publication date	Jan 9, 2018
Grant date	Jan 9, 2018

Abstract

A method includes receiving, at a service delivery platform from a first video source, a control stream associated with primary media content delivered via a video distribution network, where the control stream includes conditional access information associated with a second video source, wherein the conditional access information of the control stream indicates a restriction of the primary media content. The method also includes creating a substitution table, at the service delivery platform, based on the conditional access information including an indication of a geographic area, where the substitution table correlates the primary media content with substitute media content of the second video source, and when the restriction prevents access to the primary media content, the substitute media content is provided via the video distribution network. The method further includes sending the substitution table to the second video source.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method comprising:
receiving, at a service delivery platform from a first video source, a control stream associated with primary media content delivered via a video distribution network, wherein the control stream includes first conditional access information associated with a first geographic area and second conditional access information associated with a second geographic area, and wherein the first conditional access information indicates a restriction of the primary media content;
identifying a first particular second video source from a plurality of second video sources, the first particular second video source identified based on the first geographic area;
sending a first substitution table entry from the service delivery platform to the first particular second video source, but not to at least one other video source of the plurality of second video sources, the first substitution table entry based on the first conditional access information, wherein the first substitution table entry indicates first substitute media content to be output, by the first particular second video source in response to the restriction, in place of the primary media content;
identifying a second particular second video source from the plurality of second video sources, the second particular second video source identified based on the second geographic area; and
sending a second substitution table entry from the service delivery platform to the second particular second video source, the second substitution table entry based on the second conditional access information, wherein the second substitution table entry indicates second substitute media content to be output, by the second particular second video source in response to the restriction, in place of the primary media content.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the video distribution network comprises a television network.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first substitution table entry includes a channel number corresponding to the restriction, a first identifier corresponding to the first video source, and a second identifier corresponding to a third video source that provides the first substitute media content.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving, at the service delivery platform, an update command associated with the video distribution network, wherein the update command includes updated conditional access information; and
in response to the update command, sending an updated substitution table entry to the first particular second video source, the updated substitution table entry based on the updated conditional access information.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first substitution table entry causes the first particular second video source to create a conditional access event associated with the first conditional access information at the first particular second video source, wherein the conditional access event is associated with a time period corresponding to the primary media content being inaccessible, and wherein data indicating the conditional access event is stored at the first particular second video source.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the first particular second video source restricts access by subscribers to the primary media content based on the conditional access event.

7. The method of claim 5 , further comprising:
receiving, at the service delivery platform, a delete command indicating that the conditional access event is to be deleted; and
causing the conditional access event to be deleted at the first particular second video source, wherein the conditional access event is deleted by removing the data indicating the conditional access event from the first particular second video source.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the service delivery platform does not receive the primary media content.

9. A system comprising:
a processor; and
a memory including instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to perform operations including:
receiving, from a first video source, a control stream associated with primary media content delivered via a video distribution network, wherein the control stream includes first conditional access information associated with a first geographic area and second conditional access information associated with a second geographic area, and wherein the first conditional access information of the control stream indicates a restriction of the primary media content;
identifying a first particular second video source from a plurality of second video sources, the first particular second video source identified based on the first geographic area;
sending a first substitution table entry to the first particular second video source, but not to at least one other video source of the plurality of second video sources, the first substitution table entry created based on the first conditional access information, wherein the first substitution table entry indicates first substitute media content to be output, by the first particular second video source in response to the restriction, in place of the primary media content;
identifying a second particular second video source from the plurality of second video sources, the second particular second video source identified based on the second geographic area; and
sending a second substitution table entry to the second particular second video source, the second substitution table entry based on the second conditional access information, wherein the second substitution table entry indicates second substitute media content to be output, by the second particular second video source in response to the restriction, in place of the primary media content.

10. The system of claim 9 , wherein the operations further include receiving the control stream from an integrated receiver-decoder of the first video source.

11. The system of claim 9 , wherein the operations further include scheduling a conditional access event at the first particular second video source based on the first substitution table entry, wherein scheduling the conditional access event includes storing data indicating the conditional access event to the first particular second video source, and wherein the conditional access event corresponds to a time period when the primary media content is inaccessible.

12. The system of claim 9 , wherein the video distribution network is a television network.

13. The system of claim 9 , wherein the processor and the memory are included in a service delivery platform.

14. The system of claim 13 , wherein the service delivery platform is adapted to receive the control stream via a proxy system, and wherein the service delivery platform and the proxy system are included in a conditional access provisioning system.

15. The system of claim 9 , wherein the memory includes a database to log receipt of the first conditional access information.

16. The system of claim 9 , wherein the first conditional access information indicates the first geographic area, a start time for a conditional access event, an end time for the conditional access event, the primary media content, the first substitute media content, or any combination thereof.

17. A computer-readable storage device including instructions that, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to perform operations including:
receiving, from a first video source, a control stream associated with primary media content delivered via a video distribution network, wherein the control stream includes first conditional access information

Assignees

• At & T Ip I Lp

Inventors

• Chow Lee
• Piepenbrink David
• Rys Stephen

Classifications

• H04L67/18

  Electricity · mapped topic

• H04N21/2668

  Creating a channel for a dedicated end-user group, e.g. insertion of targeted commercials based on end-user profiles {(information retrieval from the Internet by querying with filtering and personalisation G06F16/9535; arrangements for replacing or switching information during the broadcast H04H20/10; push services over packet-switching network H04L12/1859; adaptation of message content in packet-switching networks H04L51/063)} · CPC title

• H04N7/1675

  Providing digital key or authorisation information for generation or regeneration of the scrambling sequence (pseudo-random number generators in general G06F7/58) · CPC title

• H04W4/02 Primary

  Services making use of location information · CPC title

• H04N21/4623

  Processing of entitlement messages, e.g. ECM [Entitlement Control Message] or EMM [Entitlement Management Message] {(arrangements for conditional access to broadcast information or to broadcast-related services H04H60/14)} · CPC title