Encrypting Videos Just Once: Improving Security and Efficiency

What is it about?

When you watch videos on streaming services like Netflix or Disney+, your device connects securely to servers using encryption, which protects videos from unauthorized viewing. However, this method requires a lot of work from servers and caches because videos must be encrypted individually for every connection. Our research introduces a simpler and more efficient way: we encrypt the videos themselves just once, instead of encrypting each connection separately. This means videos can be stored safely in many places without needing to be encrypted again for each viewer. Users are given special keys based on their permissions, allowing them to easily unlock only the videos they’re allowed to see. If someone’s access needs to be removed, we simply take away or change their key, without needing to re-encrypt the videos. We tested this approach thoroughly and found it significantly reduces the workload on servers and caching systems—up to half the effort compared to traditional methods. The viewers still get the same high-quality streaming experience without noticeable differences. This new way of handling video security could help streaming services become faster, more efficient, and less expensive to operate, all while maintaining robust protection of video content.

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Photo by freestocks on Unsplash

Photo by freestocks on Unsplash

Why is it important?

Current streaming platforms, like Netflix and Amazon Prime, rely heavily on encrypting every individual streaming connection. This traditional approach is very secure, but it’s also expensive and inefficient—it puts a huge workload on servers and caching systems because they constantly have to encrypt and decrypt videos for each user. This can slow down video streaming, raise operational costs, and limit scalability as more users watch more videos at higher qualities. In our work, we introduce a simplified encryption method that secures video content directly, rather than securing each individual streaming connection. By encrypting videos just once at the source using Attribute-Based Encryption (ABE), we allow the encrypted content to be safely stored and distributed anywhere—without needing to be decrypted and re-encrypted along the way. This greatly reduces the computational burden on servers and caches, making streaming faster, cheaper, and more scalable. At the same time, ABE gives us fine-grained control over who can access what content, enabling flexible and efficient access management. We validated our approach through extensive real-world testing, showing up to 50% reduction in server and cache CPU usage while maintaining high video quality and user experience.