Watermark payload encryption methods and systems

1 . A message generating method comprising:

receiving a first message portion comprising a first checksum associated therewith;

encrypting the first message portion with a private key;

receiving a second message portion comprising a second checksum associated therewith;

combining the encrypted first message portion with the second message portion to yield a signature;

encrypting the signature with a common key; and

steganographically embedding the encrypted signature in media.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the first checksum comprises error correction coding.

3 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the second checksum comprises error correction coding.

4 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the first checksum comprises a Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC).

5 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the second checksum comprises a Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC).

6 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the private key is uniquely associated with a jurisdiction or entity.

7 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the common key is to be commonly used by more than one jurisdiction or entity.

8 . The method claim 1 , wherein prior to encrypting the signature with the common key, said method comprises error correction coding the signature.

9 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising printing the media on a physical object.

10 . A method of validating the physical media of claim 9 , comprising:

receiving optical scan data representing at least a portion of the physical media;

analyzing the scan data to obtain the encrypted signature;

decrypting the encrypted signature with a decryption key corresponding with the common key;

obtaining the encrypted first message portion from the decrypted signature;

decrypting the encrypted first message portion with a decryption key corresponding with the private key;

determining whether the first message portion and the first checksum correspond in an expected manner.

11 . The method of claim 10 , further comprising determining whether the second message portion and the second checksum correspond in an expected manner.

12 . The method of claim 10 , wherein a computer processor executing the method generates the first and second checksums.

13 . A method of securing steganographic messages in a system including a first party and a second party, said method comprising:

providing the first party with a first unique encryption key;

providing the second party with a second unique encryption key; and

providing each of the first party and the second party with a common encryption key,

wherein steganographic media associated with the first party includes a message including encryption by the first encryption key and the common encryption key, and

wherein steganographic media associated with the second party includes a message including encryption by the second encryption key and the common encryption key.

14 . The method of claim 13 , wherein the media comprises identification documents.

15 . An identification document comprising:

a photographic representation of a bearer of the identification document;

a background or graphic;

a first digital watermark embedded in the photographic representation;

a second digital watermark embedded in the background or graphic,

wherein at least one of the first digital watermark and the second digital watermark comprises a message, the message comprising:

a first portion and a first checksum associated therewith, wherein at least the first portion is encrypted with a first encryption key, and

a second portion including a second checksum associated therewith, and

wherein at least the second portion and the encrypted first portion are encrypted with a second encryption key.

16 . The method of claim 15 , wherein the encryption is based on an XOR key.

17 . The method of claim 15 , wherein the encryption is based on a scrambling sequence, the result of the encryption yielding an encrypted signature having the same bit length as the signature.

18 . A watermark reader comprising:

electronic processing circuitry;

a communications bus;

memory in communication with said electronic processing circuitry via said communications bus, said memory including executable instructions to:

decrypt an encrypted portion of a watermark payload by individually using a plurality of decryption keys, wherein each decryption key is uniquely associated with a document issuing jurisdiction;

identify a corresponding decryption key through successful decryption of the encrypted portion of the watermark payload; and

identify a document issuing jurisdiction that is associated with the decryption key.

19 . The watermark reader of claim 18 , wherein said identify a corresponding decryption key through successful decryption of the encrypted portion of the watermark payload comprises analysis of a checksum match.

20 . The watermark reader of claim 18 wherein the watermark payload is carried by an identification document, and wherein said executable instructions further comprise instructions to:

authenticate the identification document by reference to at least the identified jurisdiction.

21 . The watermark reader of claim 18 , wherein said instructions to authenticate cross-correlates the identified jurisdiction with machine-readable indicia carried by the identification document.

22 . The watermark reader of claim 21 , wherein the machine-readable indicia comprises at least one of a digital watermark, a bar code, a data matrix, optical character recognition, magnetic stripe, and indicia carried by optical memory or electronic memory circuits.

23 . A method of appending information to a digital watermark message comprising:

receiving at a first device a digital watermark message that has been decoded by a remote second device;

appending or combining demographic information to the digital watermark message, wherein the demographic information is associated with a registered user of the first device; and

communicating the appended or combined digital watermark message to a remote third device.

24 . The method of claim 23 wherein the demographic information comprises at least one of: i) usage information associated with the first device or the registered user; ii) user preferences of the registered user; iii) age; iv) place residence; and v) gender.

25 . The method of claim 23 further comprising receiving information from the third device that is associated with the digital watermark message, and forwarding the information to the second device.

26 . The method of claim 23 wherein the message comprises at least one of a XML format and a WAL format.