SHINE (Security and content right management in satellite assisted in network caching systems) project is program financed ESA-ARTES. CINI Consortium is the prime contractor and the subcontractors are: NITEL Consortium (skilled in satellite architecture and technologies), ITSLab (provider of satellite solution for the maritime communication) e ISCOM (certifying body of security architecture).
SHINE is focused around the design and implementation of an end-to-end secure infrastructure for the delivery of multimedia content over integrated satellite-terrestrial networks. The project makes use of a combination of both unicast and network-coded multicast. A number of reference scenarios are envisaged, all relying on in-network caching. The overall security architecture of the SHINE project is comprised of two main building blocks:
- A satellite-enabled broadcast distribution backbone leveraging network coding in order to improve both performance and security of the transmissions;
- A MPEG-DASH/WebRTC-enabled edge distribution network. In-between such building blocks lies a middle layer associated with the secure storage of cached multimedia content chunks.
SHINE has two main distinctive features, associated with, respectively, the broadcast-enabled satellite core and the edge distribution networks. Within the former part of the network, we rely on network coding in order to define a coded multicast technique allowing us to improve both performance and security of communications. At the edges of the distribution network, which also act as in-network caches, we instead leverage cutting-edge streaming technologies (namely, MPEG-DASH and/or WebRTC) in order to optimize content distribution towards the end users of the network. Also in this case, we look after both performance and security, with special reference to the capability of effectively managing digital rights.
The project is concluded, with the formal validation and acceptance of a Linux-based testbed demonstrating the projects objectives.
Additional aspects of caching and delivery models, including field trials with real satellites, will be approached in the extension of the project already and started.