Patent ID: 8307439

Claim:
An add-in input/output (I/O) interface card comprising a processor, wherein the processor is independent and isolated from operating systems and applications running on a system processor for a system that the add-in I/O interface is to be part of; and processor accessible storage medium storing instructions, which, when executed by the processor cause the processor to read a manifest for an on-line application, wherein the manifest identifies certain parameters about the on-line application including at least some subset of an expected cryptographic signature for code for the on-line application, identification of code segments for the on-line application, expected cryptographic signatures for at least a subset of the code segments, identification of relocation fix-ups that reflect location of different segments of memory that the code for the on-line application is stored in, and identification of external cod segments defined in a process flow for the on-line application; compute a cryptographic signature for the manifest read by the processor using a public key of a private public key pair; compare the computed cryptographic signature for the manifest to an expected cryptographic signature for the manifest, wherein the expected cryptographic signature for the manifest was generated by the on-line application developer using a private key of the private public key pair; and detect cheating in use of the on-line application by detecting on-line application code modifications, wherein the detecting of the on-line application code modifications is based on non-matching of the computed signature for the manifest and the expected signature for the manifest, wherein matching of the computed signature for the manifest and the expected signature for the manifest validates the manifest and the parameters identified therein.