Patent ID: 8327152

Claim:
A method, comprising: receiving, at a media device, a first certificate associated with a first user from a personal identification device after the first user is biometrically-authenticated at the personal identification device, the first certificate having a subscription privilege associated with the first user; sending a string from the media device to the personal identification device such that the personal identification device encrypts the string using a private key uniquely associated with the first certificate and sends the encrypted string to the media device; decrypting, at the media device, the encrypted string to verify an authenticity of the first certificate when the decrypted string matches the string; receiving, at the media device, a second certificate from the personal identification device after the first user is biometrically-authenticated at the personal identification device, the second certificate being associated with a second user and having a plurality of subscription privileges including the subscription privilege, the first certificate being based on the second certificate; and receiving, at the media device, media from a media provider based on the first certificate after the second certificate is received at the media device and the first certificate is verified, the media provider preventing the media associated with the first certificate from being sent to the media device until the second certificate is received at the media device and the first certificate is verified.