Patent ID: 8191158

Claim:
A rights management system for controlling the use of electronic content, the system comprising: an electronic appliance, the electronic appliance comprising: a secure processing unit, the secure processing unit comprising: a tamper-resistant housing; a processor; and memory, the memory including at least one cryptographic key; a computer readable medium operatively coupled to the secure processing unit and accessible by users of the electronic appliance, the computer readable medium including: one or more electronic content items, the electronic content items being encrypted at least in part, and tamper-resistant software for managing the rights of one or more users of the electronic appliance to use the one or more electronic content items in accordance with one or more electronic permissions, the tamper-resistant software being operable to use, at least in part, the secure processing unit and the at least one cryptographic key to enable a user of the electronic appliance to use at least one of the electronic content items in accordance with the one or more electronic permissions; wherein the tamper-resistant software is operable to impede users of the electronic appliance from circumventing the one or more electronic permissions, and wherein at least one of the one or more electronic permissions is electronically transmitted to the electronic appliance independently, via separate delivery, of an electronic content item to which the at least one of the one or more electronic permissions relates, and in which the at least one electronic permission is protected separately from the electronic content item to which it relates.