Wowza Media Upgrades DRM, Multiscreen Streaming Support for Video Content Developers

With an eye to the multiscreen video future, Wowza (News - Alert) Media Systems LLC has upgraded the Wowza Media Server for content developers to version 3.5. The latest iteration adds more digital rights management (DRM) and security options for content protection, additional streaming functionalities, closed captioning and Silverlight support.

"With more than 120,000 licensees in more than 150 countries, Wowza Media Server has become one of the most trusted platforms for streaming media to users anywhere, on any type of device," said David Stubenvoll, cofounder and CEO at Wowza. "Our latest version is even more feature-rich, flexible, cost-effective and loaded with new functionality. It targets today's and tomorrow's disruptive media requirements and also gives customers more options to use the software for a number of applications in the ways they want and need. We've listened to our customers, and the result is Wowza Media Server 3.5."

The server’s DRM options now include Microsoft (News - Alert) PlayReady DRM for Apple HTTP Live Streaming (HLS), as well as the newest version of Apple HLS encryption. It can also now decrypt PlayReady-protected assets before packaging and re-encrypting them into multiple HTTP formats.

MediaSecurity is now incorporated directly into Wowza Media Server 3.5 rather than being an add-on MediaSecurity features such as SecureToken, RTMP authentication, RTSP authentication and StreamNameAlias help ensure a more secure stream when delivering content using Apple HLS, Adobe (News - Alert) HTTP Dynamic Streaming (HDS), Microsoft Smooth Streaming and MPEG-DASH.

It also adds the StreamLock add-on as a security option for network encryption that allows users to stream using RTMPS and provides near-instant provisioning of free 256-bit Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificates to verified Wowza customers using Wowza Media Server 3.5.

Meanwhile, a new feature called HTTP Origin fulfills requests from HTTP caching infrastructures for live and on-demand Apple (News - Alert) HLS, Adobe HDS and Microsoft Smooth Streaming. Downstream HTTP caches are ideal for scaling out streaming across larger regions and audiences.

Live Stream Record, formerly a free add-on, is now part of Wowza Media Server 3.5. The enhanced functionality allows server administrators to split in-process live stream recording archives automatically into multiple files based on video duration, clock time or file size.

This feature also includes a new developer user interface, which shows all current live streams with the option to record or stop recording streams in progress.

Closed captioning for live and on-demand video streaming accepts caption data from a variety of in-stream and file-based sources before converting captions into the appropriate formats for live and on-demand video streaming using the Apple HLS, Adobe HDS and RTMP protocols. This feature enables U.S. broadcasters to comply with the Twenty-First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010 by providing captioning for television programs distributed over the Internet.

The Silverlight Multicast Player is now integrated into Wowza Media Server 3.5, allowing users to stream MPEG-TS multicasts from Wowza Media Server to any Silverlight-enabled desktop. The application enables simultaneous live video broadcasts across the network to thousands of Silverlight-based players while only using single-stream bandwidth.