USPTO Grants Destiny Media's Watermarking Patent

Innovative Technology Enables Record Labels to Trace the Source of Pirated Content

VANCOUVER, June 2, 2011 /PRNewswire/ - Destiny Media Technologies (TSXV: DSY) (OTCBB: DSNY) is pleased to announce that the US Patent and Trademark Office has approved patent claims for a proprietary watermarking solution and a patent will be granted imminently for application number 11/874839 "Methods for Watermarking Media Data" (http://tinyurl.com/4y7yzye).  This technology enables content owners to trace back the source of pirated content.

This solution is initially being offered as part of Destiny's Play MPE® secure media distribution service, which major record labels use to distribute pre-release music to radio, but it is anticipated that with the patent in place, the technology can be licensed more widely and can be used to mark other types of audio and video content for both online and offline distribution.

When audio or video is first delivered to the recipient, the technique can be used to embed a message into that content (a watermark).  The message can contain any information the content owner wants to preserve for legal purposes, such as the identity of the recipient,  the date and time of the transaction, information about their device, operating system and IP address, etc.  The size of this unique message is not limited and it is preserved in every copy that is made.  The message is inaudible and can't be filtered out or removed without destroying the audio quality of the original content.  It survives conversion to other formats, compression and even duplication to non digital formats.

If an illegal copy is discovered, this message allows the content owner to hold the original recipient accountable.

The solution is already being deployed by the recording industry's global industry trade association.  They have a web crawler that visits websites and torrents searching for illegal content and if Destiny's watermark is detected, the Play MPE® server is contacted, that industry recipient is deleted from the network and the originating record label is notified to take further action.  The company also offers a high speed online service that record companies can use themselves to automatically detect the source of pirated content.

This is Destiny's second patented technology.  Destiny's "Digital Media Distribution Method and System" (7466823) is a system for recognizing individual recipient computers and locking the content so that it will only play back on that authorized device.  These two patents allow the content owner the choice of locking content so that it can't be copied or allowing copies, but holding the recipient accountable if the content is distributed more widely than allowed.

Patent applications for the watermarking patent are also pending in Canada, Europe and Japan.

About Destiny Media Technologies
Destiny Media is the developer of the Play MPE® system (http://www.plaympe.com) which the recording industry uses to securely distribute new pre-release music through the internet to trusted recipients such as radio, media and VIP's. Over 400,000 tracks have been delivered to 50,000 registered industry insiders since launch, representing 240 million deliveries.  Real time usage statistics are available at http://www.plaympe.com/v4/company/plaympestats.php and archived press releases are available at: http://www.dsny.com/v7/news/index.php

Neither the TSX Venture Exchange nor its Regulation Services Provider (as that term is defined in the policies of the TSX Venture Exchange) accepts responsibility for the adequacy and accuracy of this release.

SOURCE Destiny Media Technologies, Inc.