1. 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,

2. 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.

3. 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.”

4. 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

5. Scheme One

6. Scheme Two

7. 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

8. 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?