Digimarc Corporation
Digimarc Corporation, commonly known as Digimarc, () provides products and services that enable the production of personal identification documents, including driver licenses, voter IDs and national IDs. Digimarc's digital watermarking technology provides a persistent digital identity for various media content and is used to enhance the security of financial documents, identity documents and digital images, and support other media rights management applications. Digimarc has an extensive intellectual property portfolio, having more than 340 issued U.S. patents. Digimarc also has more than 500 pending patent applications in personal identification, digital watermarking, and other related technologies.
Notable product offerings
Digimarc's main product offerings are government ID solutions that address the regulations of the Real ID Act and digital watermarking solutions. Digimarc's digital watermarking solutions for images allow photographers, creative professionals and enterprises to communicate image copyrights.
Secure ID solutions
Digimarc's secure ID solutions are used by governmental agencies all over the world. Such examples can be seen in the year 2007:
- In August Digimarc partnered with American Association of Motor Vehicles (AAMVA) and six driving license issuers to reduce fraud in out-of-state driver license applications. Colorado, Idaho, Nebraska, Nevada, Vermont and Wymoming are participating in this year long introductory phase of the Digital Image Exchange Program.
- In July, Washington State Department Of Licensing (DOL) chose Digimarc to support the state in implementing their newly developed Enhanced Driver License (EDL). Washington DOL and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) have agreed to run an initiative that allows the EDL to be used as an alternative travel document to re-enter the United States through sea and land border crossings. Washington's enhanced driver license system will utilize Digimarc applicant screening solutions to verify an applicant's identity documents and facial biometrics to ensure that only one license is issued to one legitimate card holder.
- In July, the Russian Federation will upgrade it driver license issuance system from a film-based photo ID to a more secure digital driver license.
- In May, the Tanzanian National Electoral Commission selected Digimarc to provide the secure ID materials for the photo registration of eligible voters around the country. The Digimarc solution is helping Tanzania with ongoing registration of new voters for national and local elections.
- In April, Vermont signed a two-year extension with Digimarc to continue their driver license issuance relationship.
- In March, Mozambique chooses Digimarc to supply secure enrollment and digital watermarking security to their driver license program. Mozambique is the second African nation to adopt Digimarc's secure digital driver license solutions.
Digital Watermarking Solutions
Digimarc provides digital watermarking solutions for commercial and government uses through licensing their intellectual property and products to business partners. Digital watermarking solutions are then used for a variety of different reasons, such as:
- Mobile Commerce
- Internet and Broadcast Monitoring
- Identity Authentification
- Media Management
- Counterfeit Prevention
Some digital watermarking news of note in the year 2007:
- In July Verance Corporation, a Digimarc licensee, announced the immediate availability of audio watermark technology for licensing by manufacturers of Blu-ray and HD-DVD players and components.
- In February Digimarc announced the U.S. Patent Office issued the Company a patent (U.S. Patent No. 7,171,016) that proposes a solution for identifying digitally watermarked music, images or movies on multiple Internet sites, enabling a range of associated applications, including Providing reports to rights holders to enable reasonable accounting for the distributed content.
- In January Digimarc announced it has licensed it Digimarc® IDMarc™ digital watermarking software development kit (SDK) to Card Scanning Solutions (Card Scanning), a provider of ID scanning and verification solutions, to bring this powerful new means of authenticating U.S. driver licenses to Card Scanning's network of users and value added resellers.