Sony Turns to Blockchain for Copyright Management

Japanese electronics giant Sony has developed a new blockchain-based digital rights management system that may see commercial rollout.

According to a press release from the firm Monday, the system will help manage copyright-related information for digital content, citing educational content as a prime use case. The firm states that, with content rights management currently largely being carried out manually by industry organizations or the creators themselves, its new system is designed to make that process more efficient.

Using the platform, participants will be able to share and verify information such as date and time of creation, and the author's details. It will also automatically verify the rights generation of a piece of written works, the firm adds.

Digital content such as ebooks, music, video, virtual reality content and more are said to be supported by the new system, which is based on a similar system developed by the conglomerate previously. Sony says is now considering the possible commercialization of the system as a service.

The Japan-based firm is no stranger to blockchain innovation.

Last month, research by iPR Daily, a media outlet specializing in intellectual property, showed that Sony is in the top 30 companies for blockchain-related patents, having filed at least 20 applications. Notably, some of those point towards the direction Sony has taken with the system announced today.

As CoinDesk reported in April, one of the patents filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office describes a concept that stores digital rights data using blockchain. The company has also filed for inventions including a system to authenticate user data and manage education data.