Ensuring Integrity in Online Content Usage and Download Counting with Smart Contracts

Abstract

In the fast-paced digital world, creating and distributing content has become easier with the rise of the Internet. However, content distribution faces challenges in ensuring integrity and accuracy in tracking consumption or downloads. Current centralized systems lack transparency and are vulnerable to breaches, raising concerns for both content owners and service providers. To address these issues, we propose a solution that leverages smart contracts to ensure tamper-proof tracking of content consumption. Our system comprises two secure smart contracts: an Elliptic Curve Cryptography based Proxy Re-encryption smart contract (ECC-PRE-SC) and a Counting smart contract (Count-SC). The ECC-PRE-SC handles the re-encryption process, while the Count-SC maintains a tamper-proof count of content downloads. Content owners deploy the ECC-PRE-SC smart contract and embed the list of service providers’ wallet addresses and encrypted content key, followed by the deployment of the Count-SC smart contract. It ensures only authorized access and prevents tampering of consumption counts, addressing the challenge of lack of trust between service providers and content owners. Security analysis proves the system’s resilience against defined threats, and implementation on an Ethereum private testnet demonstrates its feasibility. Our research aims to enhance trust and transparency in content distribution, benefiting content creators, service providers, and users.