Copyright Protection for Electronic Publishing over Computer Networks

The increased availability of computers, printers and high-speed networks could make electronic publishing a reality. One of the major technical and economic challenges faced by electronic publishing is that of preventing individuals from easily copying and illegally distributing electronic documents. In this paper, we explore the use of cryptographic protocols to discourage the distribution of illicit electronic copies. We propose an architecture and two separate schemes for making electronic document distribution secure. The rst strategy requires special-purpose rmware in the printers and displays to decrypt encrypted documents. In the second strategy, encrypted documents are decrypted in software in the recipient's computer.