An Efficient Software Protection Scheme Antonio Maña, Ernesto Pimentel University of Málaga, Spain Trusted Information: The New Decade Challenge, IFIP TC11 Sixteenth Annual Working Conference on Information Security, June 11-13, 2001, Paris, France. Presented by Matt Barrett, mbar116@ec.auckland.ac.nz
Summary The paper describes a software based protection scheme using smart-card based hardware tokens allowing Internet based software distribution, with a powerful license management system.
Appreciative Comment Thorough description of problem Well stated and defensible justification “…it is concluded that to obtain a provable secure protection scheme we must have a tamperproof processor that contains and executes the protected software.”
Critical Comment Unclear definition of schemes Error in diagrams Fail to separate two descriptions Error in diagrams Marked difference in clarity Explanations could be more concise
Scheme One
Scheme Two
Appreciative Comment Licensing management Free distribution over the Internet Easy recovery of lost licenses Transfer of licenses to other smart cards Expiration of license Extremely useful features, giving scheme a wide scope of usefulness
Discussion Just not practical for use with software “The cat is already out of the bag.” Could the principles of this scheme be modified for use with pure content?