New technology boasts flexibility and aims for cross-platform capability

Xerox and Microsoft have launched a new independent company to help secure and control the movement of digital information.

Formally Xerox's unit in charge of researching digital rights management, ContentGuard lets copyright owners manage the distribution and usage of digital information.

Using a new technology named Extensible Rights Markup Language (XrML), the system can prevent unauthorised viewing or redistribution of files, and lets companies assign expiry dates to data, track a downloaded file's movements and apply charges on its use.

With XrML, a musician could release MP3 tracks that can only be played a certain number of times or from a specific machine; an entrepreneur could put an expiry date on his business plan; a reader could also be asked to pay per chapter for a novel.

Speaking at the launch at Xerox Palo Alto Research Centre (Parc) where the technology was developed, ContentGuard co-chairman and chief executive Michael Miron said publishers had been waiting a long time for a secure and open system for on-line publishing.

'We think this market is about to explode, because when you put this kind of capability into the hands of content owners . . . they will decide what kind of rights to put in place,' he said.