If you operate a streaming service, chances are at least some of your content is getting pirated right now. Just in 2023, the United States accounted for the highest share of traffic to unlicensed TV content websites, responsible for over 13.8% of all global visits to TV piracy sites. Of these visits, approximately 63% target platforms offering TV shows and movies, 26.5% focus on anime content, and around 9% are directed to sites streaming live sports.
On top of this, streaming culture has moved from single-device households to fully connected ecosystems with Smart TVs, gaming consoles, smartphones, browsers, set-top boxes, and beyond. In this environment, deploying DRM in a way that’s flexible across workflows, devices, and business models is a must.
Let’s break down how DRM video protection operates in the current reality.
What Is a DRM Solution?
Before piracy can be detected or prosecuted, it can be prevented—and that’s where Digital Rights Management (DRM) comes in the OTT security chain.
At its core, DRM is a framework that controls who gets to watch your content, on what devices, and under what conditions. It’s the full system that governs licensing, playback rights, and device access.
In streaming, DRM works behind the scenes to make sure only authorized viewers can decrypt and play your content. It prevents copying, stops redistribution, and helps you stay compliant with content rights agreements.
Here are some of the leading DRM systems in use today:
- Widevine: Google’s DRM, widely used for Android and Chrome environments, secures playback across various devices.
- FairPlay: Apple’s DRM, optimized for iOS/macOS ecosystems, offering enterprise-grade protection.
- PlayReady: Microsoft’s DRM for cross-platform use, enabling secure distribution and playback.
- Multi-DRM: A unified solution combining technologies like Widevine, FairPlay, and PlayReady to ensure secure streaming across all major platforms.
How Does DRM Work?
A complete DRM implementation involves two interconnected processes: content packaging before distribution and license-controlled decryption during playback. Let’s break it down.
Content Packaging (Before Streaming)
When content is prepared for OTT delivery, it’s encrypted during the packaging phase before it’s sent to a CDN or made available to users. This is also when it’s wrapped into adaptive streaming formats like HLS, DASH, or MSS, which split the video into small chunks that adjust quality based on each viewer’s connection. Think of it as putting your video in a digital safe. Here’s what happens under the hood:
- Key request: The packager (usually part of your transcoding or streaming pipeline) requests an encryption key from the DRM license server.
- Key issuance: The DRM server stores the encryption key and a corresponding license configuration.
- Encryption: The packager encrypts the content using this key.
- Distribution: Encrypted files are uploaded to a Content Delivery Network (CDN) for scalable access.
At this point, the content is secured. Even if someone gets unauthorized access to the file, it won’t play unless they’re authorized.
Content Playback (On the User Side)
Once a user initiates playback on a supported device (browser, mobile app, smart TV), the DRM kicks in again:
- Content request: The user selects a title to watch. The user’s device fetches the encrypted content from the CDN.
- License Key Generation: Before the player can ask for permission to unlock the video, the platform’s middleware steps in. It generates a license request URL, which includes necessary session information like user ID, device ID, content ID, and access rights. This URL tells the player where and how to request a decryption license.
- License request: The player’s DRM client (like Widevine, FairPlay, or PlayReady) recognizes the file is encrypted and sends a license request to the DRM server. This includes device info, user credentials, and playback context.
- License validation: The DRM server validates the request (checking user credentials, playback rules, and device ID) and returns a license.
- Decryption and playback: The player receives the license, which contains a decryption key and playback policies, and initiates playback. This process is secure, invisible to the end user, and enforces rules like device limits or geo-blocking.
This end-to-end loop ensures that only authorized users and devices can decrypt and watch the content, even if the file itself has been copied or intercepted.
Benefits of DRM-Protected Video Streaming
Adherence to Compliance (Which Isn’t Optional)
Major studios and premium content licensors require DRM enforcement as a baseline condition for distributing their content. Compliance extends to policies such as secure key exchange, hardware-level encryption, output protection, and device authentication.
Without adequate industry-grade DRM video protection, operators may be excluded from licensing deals for premium or early-window titles. DRM systems align with global legal frameworks like the U.S. DMCA and EU Copyright Directive, which criminalize DRM circumvention.
Beyond legal risk, strong DRM signals professionalism and trust to both partners and consumers who prefer to use a convenient, legal service that won’t bombard them with forced and questionable ads.
Content Protection Beyond Encryption
While encryption scrambles video data, DRM adds a license-management layer, enforcing viewing rules (e.g., geo-blocking, device limits) and preventing simple copying or sharing. Encryption alone is insufficient, as stolen keys can render encrypted content accessible, even to pirates.
Improves Analytics & Forensic Traceability
Many DRM integrations now allow watermark embedding and user-specific license tagging. When combined with playback analytics, this supports forensic tracing of leaks and strengthens IP protection strategies.
Challenges With Video DRM Solution
While DRM provides essential protection, it also comes with several real-world trade-offs that OTT operators must navigate.
DRM Cost Factor for FAST and AVOD Services
For FAST operators and platforms relying on ad-supported monetization, DRM must be both effective and economically viable. The best multi-DRM solutions today run in the cloud, using a usage-based model. You pay for what you use, and that means:
- No huge upfront licensing fees
- Instant scalability during live events or traffic spikes
- Pay-as-you-grow pricing
Piracy Evolves with DRM Tech
Even the most advanced DRM technologies can’t guarantee 100% content protection. Once content is decrypted for legitimate viewing, it’s vulnerable to screen recording, HDCP-stripping, or other capture methods. The result? A narrowed window between official release and the first pirated upload. Operators should consider real-time content monitoring and takedown workflows to supplement their DRM investment.
Performance Overhead and Technical Complexity
Implementing DRM adds processing overhead, especially on the client side. From decryption to license verification, these processes can put a strain on lower-end devices, especially during high-traffic events like live sports. Moreover, if license servers fail or are misconfigured, users may experience blocked playback or outages. For extra reliability, your DRM system, CDN, and video player should be tightly coordinated.
Regulatory Pressure
Many DRM platforms include session tracking or device fingerprinting to enforce usage rules. While useful for managing licenses, these features may raise privacy concerns in some territories, particularly under laws like GDPR. OTT providers need to ensure transparency in their data security practices.
Insider and Endpoint Vulnerabilities
DRM is primarily focused on protecting streams in transit or during playback, but it’s not always equipped to handle threats that originate earlier in the content chain. Operators should pair DRM with session monitoring, behavioral analytics, and robust endpoint security to minimize these risks.
Choosing The Right DRM Solution
Here are the non-negotiables for any DRM system that aims to support a truly multi-device, multiscreen world:
- Full DRM coverage: must support Widevine, FairPlay, PlayReady.
- Hardware integration to support HWRoT (Hardware Root of Trust) for associating unmanaged devices securely at the chip level.
- The ability to generate licensing and audit logs on demand, per device and user session.
- Secure per-session key provisioning and encryption support for all major file formats and streaming protocols.
- Seamless support for TVs, mobile apps, browsers, and legacy STBs.
- End-to-end compliance with Enhanced Content Protection (ECP) and other industry benchmarks to maintain content integrity.
Content Value vs. Workflow Complexity
Not all content is created equal, and neither should your DRM strategy be. A local FAST channel may not need the same security profile as early-window Hollywood releases. If you’re managing 4K HDR content with premium licensing terms, hardware-level protection, and forensic watermarking are likely non-negotiable. On the other hand, for freemium or AVOD services, the focus might be on fast deployment, user accessibility, and cost containment.
The most strategic DRM deployments start with business modeling:
- What type of content are you distributing?
- What are your monetization tiers (SVOD, AVOD, FAST)?
- How many devices per user are you supporting?
- What platforms must you launch on today—and which ones in the next 12 months?
Looking to secure content while staying compliant and flexible with monetization? We built Setrix Transcoder precisely to simplify all these operations in a single solution.
Elevating OTT/IPTV Content Delivery with Security In Mind
Setrix is a high-performance OTT/IPTV media processor designed to enhance content delivery through advanced transcoding, encoding, and streaming capabilities. It offers a comprehensive solution for operators seeking efficient, scalable, and secure video processing.
Real-Time Transcoding and Encoding That Keeps Up
Setrix handles all your input feeds—live or on-demand—and gets them ready for delivery across any network or device. It works with digital and analog signals and outputs in formats like UDP, HLS, SRT, and DASH. Thanks to hardware acceleration, it keeps latency low and stream quality high.
DRM Support That’s Ready for Studio Demands
Setrix has built in compliance and supports all the major DRM systems—Widevine, PlayReady, and FairPlay—and integrates with trusted DRM providers like EzDRM, PallyCon, Irdeto, and ExpressPlay.
Built to Scale with Your Audience
Whether you’re running one channel or hundreds, Setrix can scale with you. It supports multi-tenant environments, so you can assign user roles, permissions, and keep resources isolated, perfect for operators managing multiple services or partner accounts.
It also supports load balancing, so as your viewer base grows, the infrastructure keeps up—no bottlenecks, no crashes.
Flexible Playback and Compatibility
With full codec and protocol support, Setrix gives you the flexibility to stream in the formats your devices demand, whether it’s old-school set-top boxes or modern Smart TVs. You can even create broadcast-style playlists by stitching together MP4s, MOVs, and more into a continuous feed.
Proactive Monitoring with Built-in Alerts
If something goes wrong, you’ll know right away. Setrix sends alerts via email or SMS (Twilio) for issues like stream outages, CPU overloads, or service failures—so your team can jump in before your users even notice.
Ready to see how Setrix handles DRM, transcoding, and secure delivery—without extra integration headaches? Download the Setrix Transcoder spec sheet or book a demo for our Setplex team to walk you through its DRM workflows.
