Peer-to-peer content networking with copyright protection and jitter-free streaming

Compare to traditional Client/Server architecture, Peer-to-peer (P2P) network is especially suitable for distributing contents to large amount of concurrent users. In particular, P2P video streaming system has become popular among Internet users in recent years. This thesis studies two critical issues and proposes new solutions to P2P content distribution: copyright protection and jitter-free streaming.;Studies show that playback jitter is one of the most important indications of the Quality of Service in P2P video streaming systems. This thesis presents a queuing model applicable to general online video streaming and derives a lower bound of jitter-free probability. Applying this model in P2P network architecture leads to a design methodology for P2P video streaming systems with high jitter-free probability.;Content poisoning is normally treated as a security threat, but some researchers and commercial efforts have attempted to use it against P2P piracy with mixed results. This thesis proves that the underlying chunking schemes and hashing mechanisms ultimately determine the effect of content poisoning. A proactive content poisoning scheme using identity-based signature is proposed. This scheme selectively targets content poisoning to pirates while legitimate peers are unaffected. Such a completely distributed copyright protection mechanism is highly resistant to security breaches at individual peers.;One of the unique security challenges facing P2P file-sharing networks is called index poisoning attacks. Unlike content poisoning, index poisoning attacks threat the stability of the entire P2P network. The proposed P2P network design for copyrighted content distribution is also highly resistant to index poisoning attacks. Both theoretical modeling and experimental results prove that peers applying our design are immune to index poisoning attacks. Further more, the severity of index poisoning attacks is drastically reduced if majority of the peers in the network are immune.;This thesis pushes two frontiers in P2P content networking. These findings will enable the construction of cost-effective P2P video streaming networks. These new generation P2P networks provide legitimate clients with jitter-free services and penalize pirates with intolerable jitter interferences. Such type of P2P video streaming network paves the road for legitimate and large scale commercial application of P2P technology in digital content industry.