JPH05168009A - Tariff information transmitting system - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To obtain the tariff information transmitting system enabling repeated transmission for surely transmitting individual tariff information from a center to a terminal even when only an unidirectional data transmission line is provided in a toll television system to transmit toll programs. CONSTITUTION:A contract number is added to tariff information, which is transmitted from the center to the terminal, and transmitted and at a terminal equipment 8, the contract number is generated by a prescribed process based on the tariff information in a data memory 15. Only when this contract number is coincident to the contract number in the received tariff information, the received tariff information is added to tariff information stored up to the moment.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention includes, for example, a viewing permission amount from a broadcasting supplier side to a viewing subscriber side for realizing a prepaid contract viewing method in a pay television system for transmitting pay programs. The present invention relates to a transmission method of individual information.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, pay channel services based on monthly subscription contracts, which have been common in pay television systems such as CATV systems, have been demanded for pay program services in which a viewing fee is collected for each program viewed. ing.

A pay program service in a conventional pay television system will be described below. FIG. 2 shows a conventional CATV as a pay television system.
The system configuration is shown below. In FIG. 2, the program transmission device 1
Then, various pay programs are converted into television signals and supplied to the terminal device 8 in the subscriber's house through the mixer 2 and the coaxial cable line 3. The control data from the terminal control computer 4 is converted into a high frequency signal by the data modulator 5 and transmitted to the terminal device 8 via the mixer 2. The television signal input from the coaxial cable line 3 is converted to a specific channel after the predetermined scramble for preventing illegal viewing is released by the control signal from the microcomputer 11 in the converter unit 9 in the terminal device 8. , Is displayed on the television receiver 13. On the other hand, the control data is demodulated by the data demodulation unit 10 and the microcomputer 1
1, the ID number and the like are collated, and if the data is for itself, the microcomputer 11 takes in the received data and performs a predetermined process. The predetermined processing mentioned here is, for example, the addition or change of the viewing-permitted channel, or the acquisition of information for descrambling. A key input unit 12 in the figure is used for various inputs such as channel selection by the subscriber. Reference numeral 14 is a general telephone.

When trying to view a pay program, the subscriber first makes a call to the center using the telephone set 14, and when the line is connected, the center side network control device 6 automatically responds and a viewing contract is concluded and the center is contacted. The terminal control computer 4 on the side
The contents of the viewing contract applied by the center side network control device 6 is received, and the viewing permission information is transmitted to the subscriber side by the control data. After receiving the viewing permission information, the microcomputer 11 in the terminal permits the selection of the channel during the pay program broadcasting and performs the descrambling operation. At this time, the terminal control computer 4 also creates a viewing record for fee collection at the same time as sending the viewing permission information.

[0005]

However, in such a conventional configuration, the viewing application from each subscriber is concentrated immediately before the start of broadcasting of the pay program, so that the viewing permission information for all requests is transmitted. Has a problem that high-speed data transmission is required and the load is concentrated on the terminal control computer. In order to solve these problems, a method has been proposed in which fee data is transmitted to a terminal device in advance and the terminal device stores the fee data in a memory inside the terminal. This is the so-called prepayment method.
In this method, the subscriber can receive the program by applying to the terminal device for viewing when receiving the program. However, at this time, the charge data in the terminal memory must be sufficient for the program charge. Then, the charge data in the terminal is subtracted after watching the program, and when the charge data decreases,
The subscriber also makes a contract with the center according to the prescribed procedure,
Prepaid rate data is added.

However, the writing of the prepaid charge data to the memory must be processed by the addition method instead of the overwrite method. This is because there is no way for the center to accurately grasp information about how much previous charge data remains in the terminal memory. In order to process by the overwrite method, provide an upstream data transmission means to transmit data from the terminal to the center, or let the subscriber declare the current charge data balance at the time of viewing contract, and the center sign the new charge data balance It is necessary to transmit the data in which the charges are added as new prepaid charge data, but the upstream data transmission means complicates the configuration of the terminal device and the system and increases the device cost. In addition, the self-declaration method of the subscriber cannot avoid the exploitation of fee information due to improper declaration. However, in general unidirectional data transmission, an overwriting method capable of repeated transmission for reliable transmission of data is effective. When repeated transmission is performed by the addition method, the same data may be added many times, resulting in incorrect data.

In view of the above problems, the present invention is directed to unidirectional C
The ATV system provides a charge information transmission method that enables reliable transmission of prepaid charge data from the broadcast supplier side to the viewing subscriber side.

[0008]

In the charge information transmission method of the present invention, the terminal device stores the viewing contract charge and the contract number generation code sent from the center, and the stored viewing contract charge and contract number generation code are stored. The contract number for the additional contract is generated and displayed on the television receiver. At the time of a paying program viewing contract, the subscriber applies to the center the viewing contract amount and the contract number displayed on the television receiver by the terminal device. This is done using a general telephone line or the like. On the side of the center, when the subscriber has applied for the viewing contract, the charge information in which the contract number is added to the viewing contract charge is transmitted to the terminal device. This is a charge information transmission method characterized in that the terminal device receiving this charge information permits the fetching of the charge information only when the contract number in the charge information and the contract number generated by itself match.

[0009]

According to the charge information transmission method of the present invention, since the data is permitted to be taken in only when the contract number generated from the charge data matches, the terminal device which has once received the charge information has the same charge. It is possible to prevent information from being received multiple times, which makes it possible to reliably transmit the viewing contract fee data to the terminal device even in a pay television system having only a unidirectional data transmission path. , It is very useful for providing prepaid pay program services.

[0010]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to FIG.

Here, the same parts as those described above are designated by the same reference numerals and the description thereof will be omitted. The configuration newly added here is the data memory 15 and the display unit 16 in the terminal 8.
Is. The microcomputer 11 accumulates in the data memory 15 the prepaid paid program viewing contract fee data and the contract number generation code sent from the center upon application of the subscriber. The subscriber applies to receive a desired pay program by operating the key input unit 12 on the terminal device 8. When the viewing application is accepted by the microcomputer 11, the microcomputer 11 permits the viewing of the subscribed pay program when the price of the subscribed pay program is less than the viewing contract charge data stored in the data memory 15. , And performs predetermined descrambling control on the converter unit 9. Data memory 15 at the same time
The charge for the viewing program is subtracted from the viewing contract charge data in the above. If the pay program is viewed a number of times by repeating this operation, the viewing contract charge data decreases, and the charge of the desired pay program may not be satisfied. At this time, the microcomputer 1
1 calculates the contract number from the contract charge data and the contract number generation code that are still present according to a predetermined rule, controls the display unit 16, and sends a message to the television receiver 13 together with a message prompting the contract fee shortage and the additional contract. Display on top. If the subscriber desires to watch, he or she uses the ordinary telephone 14 or the like to apply for an additional contract to the center.
At this time, the contract number displayed on the television receiver is also reported to the center. At the center side, the terminal control computer 4 sends the charge information in which the contract number is added to the viewing contract charge data corresponding to the contract amount for the application. On the terminal side, when the control information is received from the center, the ID number is checked normally, and then the contract number is confirmed if it is the charge information. Only when the contract numbers match, new data is added to the existing viewing contract charge data. This allows the subscriber to continue watching the pay program.

Here, since the contract number is always updated with the latest viewing contract charge data, even if the charge information is transmitted a plurality of times in order to reliably transmit the control data from the center,
The reception process is normally performed on the terminal side and the data is added only once.

In the present embodiment, if it is desired to rewrite the data memory in the terminal by forcibly overwriting, it is possible to give meaning to the special contract number in advance. In addition, the data memory 15 has a sufficient memory content protection against noise, momentary power failure and the like.

[0014]

As is apparent from the above description of the embodiments, according to the charge information transmission method of the present invention, it is possible to take in data only when the contract numbers generated from the charge data match. Therefore, it is possible to prevent the terminal device, which has once received the charge information, from receiving the same charge information multiple times, so that even in a pay television system that has only a unidirectional data transmission path, the viewing contract charge data is sent to the terminal. This makes it possible to reliably transmit data to a device by repeating transmission, which is very useful for providing prepaid pay program service.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a system configuration showing an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a conventional system configuration.

[Explanation of symbols]

 6 network control device 8 terminal device 11 microcomputer 15 data memory 16 display unit

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In a pay television system in which a viewing contract fee is transmitted from the center to each terminal by a prepaid method, the subscriber side terminal receives the viewing contract fee and the contract number generation code sent from the center. A data memory to be stored, a microcomputer for generating a contract number for an additional contract from a viewing contract fee and a contract number generation code stored in the data memory, and a display unit for displaying the contract number Is provided with a network control device that creates charge information by adding the contract number to the viewing contract charge, and the contract number in the information signal transmitted from the network control device to the terminal device is an additional contract generated by the microcomputer. The fee information transmission method in which the data memory accepts the fetching of fee information only when the contract number for is matched.