The present invention relates to a copy protection method for record carriers, i.e storage media, which store digital data as an asynchronous signal, e.g. Compact Discs (CDs) and Digital Versatile Discs (DVDs) including all existing or future formats of CD and DVD or other Optical Storage Media which work according to a similar concept.

In particular, the copy protection method according to the present invention prevents of the ability to make a physical copy or creating a complete data image of the media content.

Optical storage discs with information stored on one or both sides have come to be used for a variety of purposes, most notably in the music, games, video and computer industry. Digital information is stored on the optical storage media in the form of pits arranged along circular, concentric tracks on one or on both sides of the disc. The track is typically read from the inside out, but may also be read form outside in, as it is already used for some optical storage media.

The data itself on the track is subdivided into frames, each equal in length, containing equal amounts of information. Each frame has a dedicated layout depending on the type of optical storage media (CD, DVD). Such a frame always contains the user data symbols itself but also data for synchronization, merging data between data symbols and error correction.

The signal on a optical storage medium itself is asynchronous, which means that in the decoding process synchronization and timing information has to be spied out from the signal.

Due to the nature of such storage media copies can be made easily. To cope with this situation, there exist various copy protection schemes which try to prevent unauthorized access with the help of keys or passwords stored on the respective storage medium itself. Further, there exist methods which secure an optical disc with the help of stored invalid information which gets repaired during the copy process so that an application program can determine whether it is stored on an original or on a copy based on the presence or absence of this invalid information.

However, theses copy protection schemes only prevent the copying in an indirect way, i.e. copying is possible and only the access of a copied record carrier might be restricted.

Further, U.S. Pat. No. 6,005,839 describes a copy protection scheme for optical record carriers, in particular DVDs, according to which direct or dump copying is prohibited by inserting a synchronization pattern at an irregular position different from the regular position or by inserting a synchronization pattern different to the standard synchronization pattern at the regular position of certain areas or sectors of the optical record carrier. To assure an undisturbed reproduction of such a record carrier the reproducing obstructing area created with the misleading synchronization patterns is skipped by jumping based on position designating information (designating the reproducing obstructing area) which is recorded on the record carrier, preferrably in the Table Of Contents (TOC) area.

Therefore, it is an object underlying the present invention to provide an improved copy protection method, i.e. a method to produce a record carrier which comprises an improved copy protection, a record carrier with an improved copy protection, and a record carrier writing device which can produce such record carriers.

The method according to the present invention is defined in independent claim 1, a record carrier with a copy protection according to the present invention is defined in independent claim 11, and a record carrier writing device which can produce such record carriers is defined in independent claim 20. Preferred embodiments thereof are respectively defined in the claims dependent thereon. In particular, claims 9 and 10 define a computer program working according to the inventive method.

The central feature of the present invention is to write additionally generated data to at least one specific portion of the record carrier so that a general purpose reading device which can access record carriers of different formats which accesses said record carrier judges said record carrier to be unaccessable and that a record carrier according to the present invention comprises at least one specific portion with such additionally generated data.

Therewith, according to the present invention such additionally generated data which confuses a reading device is inserted in such areas which are not accessed by a reading device designed for that type of record carriers, e.g. a normal audio CD player for audio CDs, but which are always accessed by a general purpose reading device, e.g. a CDROM reading device.

The additionally generated data is generated and stored additionally to the data intended to be recorded and the data needed for accessing the data intended to be recorded.

The term 'write . . . to at least one specific portion of the record carrier' is not restricting the scope to a direct writing to the record carrier, e.g. to a CDR (CD recordable), but also includes the wanting to a master from which record carriers are replicated.

Record carriers of different formats are not only different types of record carriers, e.g. CDs and DVDs, but also one type of record carriers which can record multiple sessions of the same or different types.

A session in this sense means a data stream recorded without interruption with a lead-in portion at the beginning, a lead-out portion at the end, and eventually a middle area in-between different parts of the data stream.

According to the present invention said data generation comprises the step of generating at least one special pattern which is decoded so that no clock regeneration of the stored data can be performed by said reading device when accessing the at least one specific portion of the record carrier which stores said special pattern.

In case a reading device tries to access the specific portion comprising the so generated data it is not possible for said reading device to regenerate the clock of the stored data. In this case the general purpose reading device will generate an error message indicating that the inserted record carrier is not accessable.

Alternatively or additionally to achieve such a result said data generation comprises the step of copying a synchronization pattern at least once into said at least one specific portion of the record carrier at a respective position normally not having a synchronization pattern. In this case the reading device trying to access the specific portion does not find the correct synchronization, since it gets confused by the higher number of synchronization patterns, and the result is the same as in the case described before. Such a copying also includes the simulation of a synchronization pattern by modifying standard data bytes to look like a synchronization pattern.

Therewith, according to the present invention a method is defined how to modify the physical data stream on an optical storage disc to influence the decoding process in a way, that it is impossible to find the exact synchronization and timing. This may lead either to stopping of the decoding process or at least to a wrong decoding of data symbols.

However, according to the present invention this influencing of the decoding process is only performed in case a general purpose reading device which can access record carriers of different formats, i.e. record carriers which can record multiple sessions, tries to access the record carrier provided with the copy protection according to the present invention. Reading devices which are specially designed for a record carrier of a predetermined format, e.g. audio data recorded in one session, can still access a record carrier provided with the copy protection according to the present invention if that patterns are e.g. included in the lead-in portion of the second session. General purpose reading devices which support multiple formats need to at least analyze the lead-in portion of the second session and in this way the decoding process gets confused. Such reading devices which are specially designed for a record carrier of a predetermined format are not limited to new specially adapted reading devices, but all existing reading devices of this type already fulfill the necessary requirements.

This strategy according to the present invention is also applicable to the pregap portion of an audio CD, i.e. the gap portion before the audio content starts.

Alternatively or additionally to the inserted patterns for misleading the clock regeneration or the synchronization, it is also possible to generate a modified pointer to a further session on a multi session record carrier. Such a pointer to a further session on a multi session record carrier, in the following also referred to as session pointer, is arranged in the lead-in portion of a session and points to the beginning of the data area of the following session. An appropriate modification of this pointer leads to the wanted confusion of the general purpose reading device. According to the present invention, preferrably a recursive pointer might be defined, further preferrably in the third session, which does not point to the beginning of the data area of the following session, but to the beginning of the data area of the same session. In case a general purpose reading device tries to access the so modified record carrier, it gets confused and judges this record carrier as unaccessable.

Furthermore, it is an object underlying the present invention to provide a general purpose reading device which can access record carriers provided with the copy protection according to the present invention.

This object is solved by a record carrier accessing device according to independent claim 19 which is switchable or preprogramable to not read at least one predetermined portion of a predetermined type of record carriers to be accessed namely to not read the at least one specific portion of the record carrier which stores the above described additionally generated data.

The accompanying drawings, which are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate embodiments of the invention and together with a general description of the invention given above, and the detailed description of the embodiment given below, serve to explain the principles of the invention, wherein:

FIG. 1 illustrates the CD frame format;

FIG. 2 shows the decoding process for record carriers which store data in asynchronous streams; and

FIG. 3 elucidates the principle of a recursive session pointer according to the present invention.

The following description shows as an example how to modify the physical data stream of an audio CD to prevent correct decoding within a multi session capable reading device, i.e. a general purpose reading device. The format of the physical data stream is specified in the 'Red Book' specification and IEC 908.

The physical data stream on a CD is optimized in multiple ways to reduce errors and guarantee a simple decoding mechanism. Therefore every 3 to 11 bits must be a transition of the signal. Within the data symbols this is guaranteed by the EFM (Eight to Fourteen Modulation). The audio data is split into 8 bit symbols which are converted to a 14 bit symbol with the EFM table. This table consist of 256 entries of 14 bit values which are combinations of bits which contain more than 2 but less than 10 zeros continuously. Every '1' in the 14 bit symbol represents a transition of the signal. To also guarantee this restriction when symbols are concatenated there are additional 3 bits of merging, which must be chosen accordingly. The resulting signal between two transitions are called pits and lands. The length of each is bounded between 3 and 11 times the base length.

The final frame of audio data contains the following data: