On the use of Attribute‐Based Encryption for multimedia content protection over Information‐Centric Networks

Abstract

ABSTRACTVideo streaming dominates the Internet traffic, a trend that is expected to increase in the next years. End users expect to access video content, regardless of their device, connection type and location. On the other hand, content providers set strict security requirements regarding the protection of their content, making up an overall difficult and challenging context for Over‐the‐Top service providers. A miscellany of proprietary approaches tries to address these issues, providing, however, only partial solutions, and composing a domain, highly fragmented by non‐interoperable products. In this paper, we propose an architecture that utilises Information‐Centric Networking (ICN) in order to provide scalable and efficient video distribution, and Attribute‐Based Encryption (ABE) to securely distribute this content in the ICN environment. ABE is incorporated into Digital Rights Management (DRM) schemes. We present the video license acquisition process, with a focus on orchestrating multiple authorities; subsequently, the video distribution over ICN is demonstrated, and finally, we investigate user revocation techniques in the ABE and ICN context and adopt the most appropriate one. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.