What's the difference between PlayReady/Widevine and ClearKey?

javascript html video video-streaming drm
Jacob picture Jacob · May 6, 2017 · Viewed 13.2k times · Source

Like the title states, what is the difference between PlayReady/Widevine and ClearKey? Is PlayReady/Widevine better than ClearKey?

Answer

Offbeatmammal picture Offbeatmammal · May 6, 2017

ClearKey is a free alternative to commercial DRM solutions for MPEG-DASH content (MPEG-CENC compliant), but as it is only an encryption solution it does not offer the same level of protection as PlayReady, Widevine or Fairplay.

[Opinion:] If you need a complete DRM solution then working with a provider who supports an integrated DRM solution for origin and playback (eg BuyDRM or Ooyala) is going to provide more protection

  • Widevine: Widevine is a Hollywood grade DRM technology initially developed by Widevine Technologies and acquired by Google in 2010. Widevine is natively supported on a broad range of devices and browsers such as Google Chrome Browser, Android, Chromecast, etc.
  • PlayReady: PlayReady was developed by Microsoft and is one of major DRM systems available, with broad device support, sophisticated features, and has been used for very large scale events such as the Olympics in Sochi, Russia.
  • Fairplay: Fairplay is designed for Apple HTTP Live Streaming (HLS) supporting playback on devices such as iPhone, iPad, Apple TV and Mac OS X. Fairplay is also used as Content Decryption Module (CDM) of the Safari browser. This enables HTML5 native playback of (non-standard) DRM encrypted Fairplay streams without plugins in that browser.

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