JP2001202748A - Method and device for controlling information - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To perform proper parental control of contents where a parental level is not set or contents where the parental level is loose. SOLUTION: An information control method and its device are characterized by registering an ID intrinsic to the contents and performing parental control to the contents having the registered ID.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an information control method and an information control apparatus for controlling information such as video and audio.
In particular, the present invention relates to an information control method and an information control device capable of setting a parental level based on age, time, qualification, and the like.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, with the development of digital technology, digital satellite broadcasting for transmitting and receiving video data and audio data using satellites has become widespread. In addition, video data and audio data can be recorded on a disk-shaped storage medium for a long time, and are widely used as DVDs.

For example, in a DVD player, whether the contents of video and audio are appropriate for the age of the user is determined by a parental level set in the DVD software in advance and a reproducible parameter set arbitrarily by the user in the DVD player. The DVD player automatically judges while comparing with the maximum age of the rental level (user parental level), and plays back if appropriate. This is called parental control.

As shown in FIG. 1, between a video 1 and a video 2, a video 2 of a parental level 4 and a video 3 of a parental level 3 exist on DVD software. When the setting of the user parental level is set so as to enable the reproduction at the parental level 4 or higher, the DVD player reproduces the route of (a) and the parental level 4
Is selected. Therefore, reproduction is performed in the order of video 1, video 2, and video 4. On the other hand, when the user parental level is set to 3, the DVD player plays the route of (b) and the parental level 3
Can be reproduced. Therefore, reproduction is performed in the order of video 1, video 2, video 3, and video 4.

[0005] In the case described above, the parental level is treated as having a smaller number of reproductions as the number is larger. If there is no video below the parental level set by the user, it means that the video cannot be reproduced. May be displayed.

In order to perform such parental control,
DVD players have a function to change the setting of the user parental level. For the method of setting the user parental level, for example, perform a special operation using a remote control or the like to shift to the password setting change mode, and then enter the password using the numeric keypad etc. to shift to the screen for changing the user parental level By doing so, the settings can be changed. Then, the user parental level is changed on this screen. As described above, when changing the parental level, authentication using a password or the like is performed, and if they do not match, the user parental level is not changed.

[0007]

However, the above-mentioned parental level is freely set by a setter such as a copyright holder or a creator, and is currently left to the setter's own judgment. It is. In other words, there is a problem that the parental level can be set to the lowest level even if the content requires the parental level to be set strictly, and anyone can view the content.

[0008] For example, even if the parent does not want to show the content including extreme violence scenes to the child, if the parental level of the content is set to the least, the parental level of the reproducing apparatus side is set. Even if is set most strictly, the above-mentioned content can be reproduced and viewed by the drive.

According to the present invention, in order to solve the above-mentioned problems, the management of contents that are not desired to be viewed by a child or a third party by a parental level is performed by using a content or an ID unique to a recording medium on which the content is recorded. Without fail.

[0010]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION Accordingly, the present invention is an information control method for performing parental control for restricting viewing of content information such as video and audio according to age and other conditions. An information control method includes a step of registering a unique ID and a step of disabling reproduction of content information in which the ID is registered.

An information control apparatus for performing parental control for restricting viewing of content information such as video and audio according to conditions such as age, etc., comprising: an ID detecting means 4 for detecting a unique ID of the content information. And the I
ID registration and holding means 2 for registering and holding D;
Authentication input means 6 for inputting an authentication required for registering an ID, authentication comparing means 7 for determining whether the authentication matches an already registered authentication, and reproduction of the content information registered with the ID And an information control device including a control unit that disables the information control.

[0012] Further, there is provided an information control method for performing parental control for restricting viewing of content information such as video and audio in accordance with conditions such as age, wherein a step of registering a unique ID possessed by the content information, There is provided an information control method including a step of setting a parental level for content information in which an ID is registered, and a step of reproducing the content information according to the parental level.

An information control device for performing parental control for restricting viewing of content information such as video and audio according to conditions such as age, etc., comprising: ID detection means 4 for detecting a unique ID of the content information; ID registration and holding means 2 for registering and holding the ID, and authentication input means 6 for inputting authentication required for registering the ID
An authentication comparison unit 7 for determining whether the authentication matches an already registered authentication, a parental level input unit 9 for setting a parental level for the registered content information of the ID, Provided is an information control device including a parental level holding unit 8 for holding a parental level, and a control unit 1 for reproducing the content information registered with the ID according to the parental level.

[0014]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Hereinafter, a first embodiment of an information control method and an information control device according to the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. First, the administrator of the content (in this embodiment, a disc) registers a disc ID of a disc that the child or a third party does not want to watch. FIG.
According to this, a special operation different from the normal operation issues a disk ID detection registration request to the control means 1. Such a special operation can be realized by, for example, pressing a plurality of buttons provided on a disk playback device main body or a remote controller for operating the disk playback device in a combination that is not normally used.

Next, the control means 1 sends a password input request to the password input means 6. The password input by the password input unit 6 is compared with the current password registered in the password registration holding unit 5, and if they match, a detection request is issued to the disk ID detection unit 4. The disk ID detecting means 4 detects a disk ID from data on the disk. Taking a DVD as an example, there are a disc key and a title key which can be freely set by the copyright holder or the creator and are necessary for decrypting the encrypted data, and this is detected as a disc ID. ing.

The detected disk ID is held in the disk ID registration holding means 2. At this time, for a disk whose content name or the like cannot be inferred from the disk ID, or a disk in which displaying the disk ID itself to the user is prohibited, a procedure in which the user changes the setting of the disk ID name may be added. For example, DVD disk k
Since the user cannot directly view the key and title key, the detected disk key and title key are not displayed, and the user sets a new disk ID name and holds it in association with the disk ID described above. good. This makes it very easy to see which disk is registered.

This registration procedure is performed after the password input is completed and the authentication is completed, thereby preventing a third party from deleting the registered disk ID without the administrator's permission.

Next, a method for setting the user parental level will be described. When the user wants to set or change the user parental level, the user issues a user parental level setting request in the same manner as in the above-described disc ID registration procedure. The control means 1 receives the password and sends the password input means 6
The password input into the password registration unit 5 is used to authenticate the password using the current password held in the password registration holding unit 5 and the password comparison unit 7. If the passwords match, an input request is issued to the user parental level input means 9. Upon receiving an input request from the control means 1, the user parental level input means 9 is in a state of waiting for input from the user. Then, after the user inputs the user parental level, the user parental level holding unit 8 holds the newly input user parental level.

The operation of reproducing a disk by the information reproducing apparatus or the disk reproducing apparatus employing the information controlling method will be described with reference to FIGS. First, a desired disc is set in a disc reproducing device (not shown), and a disc I
D is detected (step S1).

Next, the disk IDs are sequentially called from the disk ID registration / holding means 2, and the disk ID comparing means 3 determines whether the disk ID detected in step S1 is registered in the disk ID registration / holding means 2. (Step S2).

Here, if the detected disk ID is registered in the disk ID registration holding means 2 (step S
(2, YES), the control means 1 stops the reproduction of the disc set in the disc reproducing apparatus irrespective of the user parental level held in the user parental level holding means 8 (step S3).

On the other hand, if the detected disk ID is disk I
If not registered in the D registration holding means 8 (step S
(2, NO), the user parental level stored in the user parental level holding means 8 is read, and the disc set in the disc reproducing apparatus is reproduced with the level being the upper limit (step S4).

As described above, according to the present embodiment, the disk for which the administrator has registered the disk ID can be made unplayable by a child, a third party, or the like. It is possible to prevent a child or a third party from appreciating a disc having a loose parental level.

In this embodiment, in order to play a disk having a disk ID registered in the disk ID registration / holding means 8, a password is inputted from the password input means 6 and the control of the control means 1 to stop the reproduction of the disk. Need to be released.

Next, a second embodiment of the information control method and the information control device according to the present invention will be described with reference to FIG.
First, the content manager sets the parental level of each disc that he does not want to be viewed by children or third parties. The parental level newly set in this way may be the same as or different from the parental level preset for each disc, and may be set for a disc for which no parental level has been set. It is also possible.

First, a special operation different from the normal operation issues a request to the control means 1 for detecting and registering the disk ID of the disk. Next, the control means 1 sends a password input request to the password input means 6. Password input means 6
The password input by the user is compared with the current password registered in the password registration holding unit 5, and if they match, a detection request is issued to the disk ID detection unit 4. The disk ID detecting means 4 detects a disk ID from data on the disk.

The detected disk ID is held in the disk ID registration holding means 2. At this time, in the same manner as in the above-described embodiment, the user changes the setting of the disc ID name for a disc whose content name or the like cannot be inferred from the disc ID or for a disc in which the disc ID itself is prohibited from being displayed to the user. Procedures may be added.

Here, when the user sets or changes the disk parental level, the user issues a disk parental level setting request in the same manner as the above-described procedure for registering the disk ID.

The control means 1 receives the password and authenticates the password input to the password input means 6 using the current password held in the password registration holding means 5 and the password comparison means 7. And
If the passwords match, an input request is issued to the user parental level input means 9. Upon receiving an input request from the control means 1, the user parental level input means 9 is in a state of waiting for input from the user. Then, after the user inputs the disk parental level, the user parental level holding unit 8 holds the newly input disk parental level.

As described above, it is possible to individually set a parental level for each disk for which a disk ID has been registered. In the above-described embodiment, the means for inputting the parental level for each disc and the means for holding the parental level for each disc are shared by the user parental level input means 9 and the user parental level holding means 8, respectively. However, it goes without saying that they may be provided exclusively. In addition to setting the parental level for each disc, the parental level may be set for each of a plurality of contents recorded on the disc.

Next, the operation for reproducing such a disk will be described with reference to FIGS. First, a desired disk is set in a disk reproducing device (not shown), and a disk ID is detected from data of the disk (step S11).

Next, the disk IDs are sequentially called from the disk ID registration / holding means 2, and the disk ID comparison means 3 checks whether the disk ID detected in step S1 is registered in the disk ID registration / holding means 2, If the detected disk ID is registered in the disk ID registration holding unit 2, it is detected whether a parental level for each disk is set for the disk ID (step S12).

Here, it is determined whether or not the parental level for each disc is set (step S13). If the parental level is set (step S13, YES), the parental level corresponding to the disc ID is set by the user. Called from parental level holding means 8. Then, the user parental level set for the disc reproducing apparatus is compared with the parental level for each disc. If the parental level for each disc is equal to or less than the user parental level, the disc is reproduced, and the disc for each disc is reproduced. If the parental level is equal to or higher than the user parental level, the reproduction of the disc is stopped (step S15).

On the other hand, if the parental level for each disk is not set for the detected disk ID (step S13, NO), the user parental level held in the user parental level holding means 8 is read, and The disc set in the disc reproducing apparatus is reproduced with the level as the upper limit (step S14). That is, the reproduction is performed at the parental level of the original disc.

As described above, according to this embodiment, since the parental level can be set for each disk in which the disk ID is registered, the reproduction of the disk in which the disk ID is registered as in the first embodiment described above must be stopped. Since the reproduction is determined according to the parental level set for each disk without performing the above, more detailed parental control can be performed. It is also possible to set a parental level for a disc for which a parental level has not been set.

In the above-described embodiment, the password is used to authenticate the administrator at the user parental level. However, instead of the password, authentication is performed using an ID card, or a user such as a fingerprint, voiceprint, or cornea is unique. Needless to say, the authentication may be performed using the information.

[0037]

As described above, according to the information control method and the information control apparatus according to the present invention, the parental control can be appropriately performed on a disc with no parental level set or a disc with a low parental level. The effect is that it can be applied.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating a playback order of videos for which parental control has been performed.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing an information control method and an information control device according to the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an operation of the first embodiment of the information control method and the information control device according to the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an operation of a second embodiment of the information control method and the information control device according to the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Control means 2 Disk ID registration holding means 3 Disk ID comparison means 4 Disk ID detection means 5 Password registration holding means 6 Password input means 7 Password comparison means 8 User parental level holding means 9 User parental level input means

Claims (4)

[Claims] 1. An information control method for performing parental control for restricting viewing of content information such as video and audio according to conditions such as age, wherein a step of registering a unique ID included in the content information; Disabling reproduction of content information for which an ID has been registered. 2. An information control apparatus for performing parental control for restricting viewing of content information such as video and audio according to conditions such as age, wherein the ID is a unique ID included in the content information.
Detecting means; ID registration holding means for registering and holding the ID; authentication input means for inputting authentication required for registering the ID; and whether the authentication matches the already registered authentication. An information control device comprising: an authentication comparison unit that determines whether the content information has been registered; and a control unit that disables reproduction of the content information registered with the ID. 3. An information control method for performing parental control for restricting viewing of content information such as video and audio depending on conditions such as age, and wherein a step of registering a unique ID of the content information is provided. An information control method, comprising: setting a parental level for content information in which an ID is registered; and performing reproduction of the content information according to the parental level. 4. An information control device for performing parental control for restricting viewing of content information such as video and audio according to conditions such as age, wherein the ID is a unique ID included in the content information.
Detecting means; ID registration holding means for registering and holding the ID; authentication input means for inputting authentication required for registering the ID; and whether the authentication matches the already registered authentication. Authentication comparison means for determining a parental level, parental level input means for setting a parental level for the content information registered with the ID, parental level holding means for holding the parental level, and registration of the ID Control means for reproducing reproduced content information in accordance with the parental level.