RicRicho

Partial List:
US 5,490,216 A System for Software Registration
A registration system allows digital data of software to run in a use mode on a platform if and only if an appropriate licensing procedure has been followed.

US 60/713,926 Method for detection of tampering attack attempts against systems that use computing environments for identification purposes
The invention will provide a method of detecting when attempts have been made to circumvent or interfere with security or copy control systems that use the non-user-configurable information from a computing device for the purposes of identification and authentication.

US 60/713,928 Method for using imperfections and irregularities in optical media and optical fiber for identification purposes
The invention will allow the use of imperfections and irregularities present in optical media and optical fiber as a means of uniquely identifying the media or optical fiber, thereby allowing the component itself to become an integral part of an authentication security system that can protect the data being stored or communicated by the component. The invention will reduce the costs of adding security capabilities to optical media and optical fiber. The invention will simplify and increase the speed of the manufacturing process when secure optical media or optical fiber is desired.

US 60/716,400 System of dependent keys across multiple pieces of related scrambled information
The invention is designed to complicate and therefore make more secure a series of cryptographic keys across a number of separate but related pieces of information that are to be scrambled. The invention adds to the computational power required to attack and break the scrambling algorithm therefore making the protected information more secure. The invention is relatively easy to implement and therefore adds to the speed and effectiveness of the scrambling process while simplifying the steps involved to protect the information to be protected. The invention gives the publisher or originator of the information a high level of control over the protected information and therefore is ideal for information distribution applications.

US 60/716,421Method for using performance and stress tests on computing and digital storage devices for the purposes of device authentication
The invention is designed to use the results from performance and stress tests of computing and digital storage devices to develop a unique profile for the device that can be used for authentication in security, copy control and access control applications. The invention allows the device itself to be used as part of the authentication process and thereby reduces or eliminates the cost and time involved with adding and securing a separate identity token to the device to be secured or authenticated. The invention further capitalizes on the natural occurrence of many and varied irregularities that appear in the manufacturing process and during the product’s subsequent usage and to use these irregularities in identifying specific computing and digital storage devices. This in turn represents an ideal opportunity for developing unique identities that are hard to reproduce by attackers of authentication and security systems.

US 60/716,420Method for using imperfections and irregularities in computing and digital storage devices for the purposes of device authentication
The invention is designed to use the results from damage detection tests that may be currently used by computing and storage device manufacturers to develop a unique profile for the device that can be used for authentication in security, copy control and access control applications. The invention allows the device itself to be used as part of the authentication process and thereby reduces or eliminates the cost and time involved with adding and securing a separate identity token to the device to be secured or authenticated.
The invention further capitalizes on the natural occurrence of many and varied imperfections and irregularities in the manufacturing process and subsequent day to day use of computing and digital storage devices. This in turn represents an ideal opportunity for developing unique identities that are hard to reproduce by attackers of authentication and security systems.

Back in 1995 an opportunity came up to do a world first… combine a popular computer game AND digital music onto one CD. The game was an unlockable Uniloc-enabled copy of shoot-em-up DOOM and the music of the popular pop group Kulcha.

The idea was that the CD was purchased for the music and every buyer would get the opportunity to install and try the game DOOM as an added bonus. The game would only work for the first few levels of the game but would have to be purchased by getting an unlock code over the phone to play the game fully. It really worked well because the same kids that got into Kulcha aslo were only starting to get into computer games.

The album was set to be released by Warner Music but there was one big problem. When a CD player started playing it would try to play the game data which sounded like million gnats flying out your speakers and did real speaker damage.

A simple invention that I unfortunately never patented was the idea of hiding the game data from the CD players index, thereby tricking the player to see the fist track as the fisrt music track rather than the data. It worked. And the Kulcha CD was a success.

The CD was used as a lead component in a presentation to visiting Time Warner Chairman Gerald Levin, and resulted in an invitation to Ric to come visit the fortune 100 company later that year.

From the Uniloc website:
Device locking was invented by Uniloc’s founder, Ric Richardson, in 1992. Uniloc was subsequently granted the seminal device locking patent in 1996: US 5,490,216; System for Software Registration.

Today, Uniloc has over 10 related patents pending which leverage the power of device locking into several new markets and applications.

This is my first and most well known patent written back in 1992 in Australia and granted in the US in 1996. The patent covers the concept of locking a specific software licesne to a specific machine. This approach has been used by most of the world’s top software publishers and is even beginning to be used to secure financial and banking web transactions.

Ric has been working on businesses that exploit the patent ever since he invented the concept in 1992.