Patent ID: 7900260

Claim:
A method of storing digitally-encoded material, the method comprising: employing a processor to execute computer executable instructions stored in memory to perform the following acts: combining a unique identifier with the digitally-encoded material and encrypting the combination of the unique identifier and the digitally-encoded material, wherein the unique identifier persists throughout the lifetime of the digitally-encoded material, regardless of any changes made to any portion of the digitally-encoded material, and wherein the unique identifier further persists in copies and other derived digitally-encoded material that includes some but not all of the original digitally-encoded material as well as a portion of new digitally-encoded material not included in the copy, such that copies and derived digitally-encoded material include both the unique identifier of the digitally-encoded material and a new unique identifier for the copy or derived digitally-encoded material; associating one or more built-in functions with the encrypted digitally-encoded material such that the unique identifier and the built-in functions are coupled to the digitally-encoded material, the built-in functions governing transforms and rendering of the digitally-encoded material, wherein the digitally-encoded material can be transformed and rendered only by the built-in functions, wherein at least one of the built-in functions is configured to automatically notify a selected entity when a specified built-in function has been executed or when execution has been attempted, at least one of the built-in functions is configured to display the available built-in functions associated with the encrypted digitally-encoded material, and at least one of the built-in functions is configured to make visible one or more user-specified portions of the digitally-encoded material; storing a list of processors that are permitted to execute the built-in functions; receiving information regarding a first processor attempting to execute one or more of the built-in functions; verifying if the first processor attempting to execute the built-in functions is on the list of processors; and permitting the first processor to execute the one or more built-in functions if the processor is on the list else preventing the first processor from executing the one or more built-in functions.