Secure multicast in IPTV services

Technological evolution is leading telecommunications to all-IP networks where multiple services are transported as IP packets. Among these are the group communications services with confidentiality requirements. Secure IP multicast may be used to secure the broadcast of video channels. However, in scenarios such as cable TV where the concept of video channel and bundle are present, groups are very large, and users switch very rapidly between channels (zapping), a sort of problems still need to be addressed. The solution proposed in this paper addresses these problems. For that purpose, a centralized form of secure group communications is proposed also used to transmit, not data, but group cryptographic material. Threes types of cryptographic keys are used. End systems use this material to decrypt the data sent by the content providers. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.