Abstract
Since the 80’s, conditional access systems protect broadcast content. We explore standardized systems such DVB, CI+ and OpenCard. The failed initiative of the broadcast flag illustrates some of the nontechnical traps of content protection.
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Notes
- 1.
In the US, the separation is more complex because there are also premium channels such as HBO and ShowTime.
- 2.
After a few years, it was a common exercise in some French electronic engineering schools to study how to hack the Canal+ signal.
- 3.
Line cut and rotate scrambling was never broken (at least practically). One implementation of line shuffling was broken due to a weak implementation of the random permutation. This permutation used a limited table of fixed permutations that was reverse engineered. Once the table was disclosed, it was easy to build a pirate decoder. In other words, the entropy of the permutation was too small.
- 4.
XORed means applying the Boolean exclusive OR operator. The result of the XOR operation on two operands is true if exactly one operand is true.
- 5.
In fact, DVB-CSA used a 56-bit key with only 40 bits of entropy. This was to comply with limiting regulations. Due to the short lifetime of the key, it is assumed to be long enough. A new version called CSA V2 uses the full range of 56 bits. A newer version CSA V3, using a 128 bit key, should be deployed in the coming years [217].
- 6.
Currently, STMicroelectronics and Broadcom, two IC manufacturers, dominate the market of SoC dedicated to STB.
- 7.
“Who wants peace, prepares for war.”
- 8.
A demodulator is an electronic circuit that extracts information from the modulated carrier.
- 9.
CENELEC is the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization and is responsible for standardization in the electrotechnical engineering field.
- 10.
The explanations will be simplified without going down to the detailed protocols and algorithms.
- 11.
CI+ uses a different vocabulary than this one, but the semantics is identical. For the sake of clarity, we use the usual CCI vocabulary.
- 12.
The possibility of revoking in one unique CRL a complete set of hosts belonging to one model or even one brand name was too dangerous. If ever an attacker was able to forge such a CRL, then she could create a lethal class attack. The same scenario could occur with a human error. Therefore, the designers of CI+ had to add the Certification White List to possibly counter such class attacks. The usual answer to such an attack is to avoid the granularity of models and brands.
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© 2012 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
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Diehl, E. (2012). Protection in Broadcast. In: Securing Digital Video. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-17345-5_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-17345-5_6
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