Forensic Watermarking is supported for Enterprise Prime accounts only. Reach out to your Sales or Customer Success rep if you're interested in utilizing this feature.
Forensic Watermarking (FWM) provides Frame.io enhanced security and traceability for video assets. FWM offers the ability to embed unique, invisible identifiers into video files, enabling you to track and trace every view, download, and share of your content.
How it works
Unlike session-based watermarking which shows the viewer’s session information on-screen, Forensic Watermarking captures equivalent information after the embedding/detection process, but is not visible to the viewer. We embed an "invisible pixel" as a unique, traceable identifier that can track session ID, user info, location data in the video stream, even when downloaded. This will allow tracing a video playback session back to a user if further investigation is needed after a suspected or actual content leak. It is made to survive stream intercepting, recording of the display, unsecured video output, transcoding, image transforms and warps, re-edits, and other potential attacks on your asset.
FWM settings can by applied as a default at the Account level, or enforced at the Workspace and Share levels, making sure both internally and externally your media can be secured.
Account Settings
To apply FWM on the Account level, go to your Content Security tab in your Settings and you will see three options in the Forensic Watermark Settings section.
Default on Internal Playback & Downloads apply Forensic Watermarking to newly created workspaces in your account. Users who have access to your internal videos will have a clear indicator within the player whenever a forensic watermarked video is active with a "thumbprint" icon.
The default setting is set to all role types except for Content Admins & Owners, which will be displayed as Multiple Roles. This can also be any combination of roles selected for more granular control, all the way up to Everyone. Single roles can be selected as well. If all roles are deselected, the settings will toggle off.
Default on All Share Links will turn on Forensic Watermarking on all externally shared video assets within newly created shares.
The default role for this setting is applied to Content Admins & Owners. If all roles are deselected, the settings will be listed as No One, which means this setting is required on every Share and no one has the ability to turn this option off when creating a new Share Link (see Shares below).
Forensic Watermark Fallback is an option available where if Forensic Watermark fails to apply that another security method can take it's place. The options are Allow Playback without Watermark to allow the security bypass, Allow Playback with Default Template to revert to session-based watermarking, or Prevent Playback to block video playback altogether.
Workspace
To enforce FWM on the Workspace level, go to your Workspace Settings for any Workspace and scroll to the Forensic Watermarking section.
The same FWM settings in your Account Settings apply to all new Workspaces, but they can be customized at the Workspace level to meet specific security needs. Workspace-level settings override Account.
Note: Only Content Admins can adjust these settings.
Shares
In order to apply FWM security on your Share Links, you'll need to create a new Share Link and adjust the Forensic Watermarking setting in the Security section. The toggle will turn on or off DRM for this Share Link. If the either Account or Workspace setting for Shares is already applied, this setting will be locked toggled on and will not be adjustable.
Investigations
If you come across an unauthorized copy of your asset, you must obtain a copy of the leaked file and work with NAGRA to create a NAGRA Nexguard account, as this is required in order to initiate the investigation. Once you retrieve the Forensic ID number from them, contact Frame Support and based on that Forensic ID number, we will provide you information.
Note: It is highly recommended to set up a NAGRA Nexguard account before an investigation is needed. Please reach out to NAGRA on your own to enable. For any additional questions, reach out to your CSM.
Frame.io also cannot initiate forensic detections or decode the watermark. Customers must manage this directly through NAGRA.
The most optimal way to get in touch with Frame.io Support is through the Support Portal in your Frame.io account. Click the ? icon on the left panel and start a conversation with our support team. Select the SSO & Security category, followed by
Ask for a Forensic Watermarking Investigation Request and they will get in touch with you as soon as possible to help with your request.
For faster retrieval, it would also be helpful to provide the support representative with some optional information such as the name of the account housing that asset, the name of the project the asset came from, and if possible the asset ID of the clip you think the leak might have come from (available in the File Information tab of Frame.io).
Once the support representative has been able to obtain the session information corresponding to that file, you’ll be provided with the following information with which to facilitate your investigation:
Timestamp
Forensic Id
Session Id
Asset Id
Asset Name
Asset Description
Asset Filetype
Asset Filesize (bytes)
Asset Fps Asset Duration (seconds)
Asset Timecode
User Id
User Name
User Email
User Role
Account Id
Account Display Name
Account Company Name
Account Postal Code
Account Country
Team Id
Team Name
Project Id
Project Name
Project Description
Project Updated At
Project Collaborator
Count Review Link Id
Presentation Id
Player Type Ip
Forwarded For
User Agent Url
FAQ
Q: How do I begin an Investigation on my Forensic Watermarked media?
A: After completing the detection process with NAGRA, our technology partner, please contact our Support team . They will assist you in recovering session details and relevant information. See the details above for more context.
Q: Do you have the ability to discover any leaked media?
A: Frame.io is not responsible for discovering leaked media.
Q: Can I use Forensic Watermarking on all my media?
A: Currently, forensic watermarking is only supported for video assets. It applies to videos encoded between 10 and 120 frames per second (fps) with a fixed frame rate, and resolutions between 256 and 8192 pixels wide and 144 to 8192 pixels high. Both landscape and portrait orientations are supported. Note that forensic watermarking is applied to proxy files generated by Frame.io, not the originally uploaded files.
Q: Is HLS required for DRM to work on Frame.io?
A: Yes. Forensic watermarking is only available in official Frame.io clients that support HLS (Web, iOS app, tvOS app, and supported NLE integrations).
Q: Is the Forensic Watermarked video the original or a proxy?
A: Forensic watermarks are embedded in proxy files. Playback and downloads may have a very slight quality degradation since the proxy is encoded with a unique, lumen-based forensic watermark.