A common smart-card-based conditional access system for digital set-top boxes

A new smart-card-based conditional access solution for digital set-top boxes (STBs) is proposed in this paper. It implements a separable CASS smart card platform, which is separated from the STB. Compared to traditional smart-card-based CASS, in which a STB is dedicated to one CASS only, our proposed system is more open, secure, and easy to update. Moreover, the cost is much less than the DVB common interface (CI) module solution.