Patent ID: 9639669
Date: 2017-05-02
CPC Classifications: G06F,H04L

Claim:
1. A method for generating a hardcopy of an input hardcopy document, implemented in a system including a connected device and a server connected to each other, the connected device being a copying device and/or a scanning device, the method comprising: maintaining, by the server, a digital rights management (DRM) system which stores a plurality of protected documents and a DRM database containing user access permission information; in response to instructions from a user to perform a requested action, scanning, by the connected device, the input hardcopy document to generate a scanned document image, obtaining document characteristics information from the scanned document image, and transmitting the document characteristics information to the server along with an identity of the user and the requested action, the requested action being one of: making a hardcopy of the input document, scanning the input document to generate an electronic version and to save the electronic version, and scanning the input document to generate an electronic version and to distribute the electronic version to specified recipients; performing, by the server, document matching to determine whether the document characteristics information received from the connected device matches that of any of the plurality of protected documents stored in the DRM system; when the document characteristics information matches that of a protected document stored in the DRM system: determining by, the server, based on the DRM database, whether the user has permission to perform the requested action to the matched protected document; when the user is determined to have permission to perform the requested action to the matched protected document, transmitting, by the server, a first response with an electronic version of the matched protected document to the connected device, or completing the requested action using the electronic version of the matched protected document in place of the scanned document image generated by the connected device in the scanning step, wherein the electronic version of the matched protected document is obtained from information pre-stored in the DRM system maintained by the server, and the electronic version is different from the scanned document image generated by the connected device in the scanning step; and when the user is determined to have no permission to perform the requested action to the matched protected document, transmitting, by the server, a second response to the connected device; and in response to receiving the first response with the electronic version of the matched protected document from the server, completing, by the connected device, the requested action using the received electronic version of the protected document in place of the scanned document image generated by the connected device in the scanning step, and in response to the second response, deleting, by the connected device,the document image generated by scanning the input hardcopy document without performing the requested action.