Patent ID: 7421579

Claim:
A method for securing digital content in a computer system, the method comprising: implementing, in the computer system, a first level counter, where a first-level counter provides a first-level counter value, where said first-level counter provides an operation to increment the value of said first-level counter; implementing, in the computer system, a second-level counter associated with a digital content file, where the second-level counter provides a second-level counter value and where the second-level counter provides an operation to increment the value of the second-level counter, the operation to increment the value of the second-level counter triggering the operation to increment the value of the first-level counter, and where data comprising a first-level counter value and said at least one second-level counter value are stored together in at least one file with verification information for said data; receiving a request to read the value of the second-level counter; authenticating the verification information for said data; comparing the current value of the first-level counter to the first-level counter value stored in said at least one file; and returning the value for said at least one second-level counter, when the current value of the first-level counter is equal to the first-level counter value stored in said at least one file.