Video hosting – the process of uploading, storing, and distributing your video content over the internet, has a long history. Way back in 1997, ShareYourWorld.com became the first video-hosting site in the world. With time, video hosting has only grown and grown, and with the likes of YouTube and TikTok, it has reached a whole new level.
But today, video hosting is not just limited to YouTube, Vimeo, and TikTok. Multiple business houses use Private Video Hosting platforms to distribute sensitive business information, employee training videos, and even product profiles. Also, video hosting software is now used as a full-fledged marketing tool. With the growing diversity in the purpose of video hosting, the importance of Secure Video Hosting has increased many folds.
Secure Video Hosting is a very broad term, it includes many aspects. The first aspect is of course protection from cyber crime. Especially if your videos contain any sensitive business-related data, you won’t want any unauthorized person to access them. So, you must be in a position to prevent any hacking attempt.
But, in video hosting services, piracy is an even bigger issue. That is why, any secure video hosting platform MUST ensure the protection of intellectual property rights of the content curators.
Pirates always try to steal content either by breaking into the database (which is a form of hacking too), while the content is being transferred from the server to the end-user’s device, or even while it is being played on their device, by recording the screens. So, protection from piracy itself involves multiple solutions to multiple issues, from encrypting the content to adding watermarks screen-recording protection, and many more!
Overall, secure video hosting deals with everything from hacking and cyber attacks to piracy attempts and unauthorized access or downloading.
Secure Video Hosting involves multiple tools and technologies, but DRM (Digital Rights Management) is undoubtedly the most important among them. So, to understand how secure video hosting works, you will first have to understand how DRM works.
DRM is basically a specific data encryption technique that helps protect your content from unauthorized access. Actually, when the content is uploaded into the hosting platform, it goes through a process called “Encryption”. During this process, the content is “Encrypted” using a DRM license.
In layman’s terms, understand it as if your content is getting locked within a tamper-proof container, and there is a lock to seal the container, which is the DRM license, that can be opened using a specific key called the “DRM License Key”.
Now this encrypted content gets stored in the cloud CDN or any server that you are using. Whenever the end user’s device requests the content during playback, the encrypted content is passed to the device player.
Now you must be wondering, how will the player play the content then? Here lies the real trick. If the device is authorized to play the content (that is, if the user is a genuine user), the DRM server will deliver the DRM license key to the player separately, as soon as the player tries to play the content. So, the player will use this key to unlock the content before playing it for you.
Now, there can be multiple DRM licenses used together, in a setup called the “Multi-DRM Security”. The basic workflow remains the same, with a small change in the number of DRM licenses used to encrypt and decrypt the content.
Apart from DRM, forensic watermarking, and protection from screen recording are also some of the efficient ways to secure video hosting.
Secure Video Hosting has multiple benefits, but some of the most prominent ones are discussed below.
Intellectual Property Rights are given to the original content creator, using which you can decide whether anyone else will be able to reuse or reproduce your content or not. Secure Video Hosting will let you safeguard your IPR as your viewers won’t be able to record their screens or download it illegally.
Business videos often include sensitive data, which can create trouble if they get leaked. Secure video hosting platforms often encrypt your videos, so they can’t be hacked or leaked while being transferred from the server to the end user’s device.
Piracy is a big threat in today’s times. A lot of capital is invested in creating video content, but a piracy attempt can lead to huge losses. Secure video hosting platforms often employ forensic watermarking and multi-DRM to ensure that pirates are never able to reproduce your content online.
Multi-DRM restricts any unauthorized user to access your video content. Hence, it automatically reduces the chances of multiple other security threats including data leakage and piracy.
Nowadays, businesses use video hosting for multiple purposes, like:
In most of these videos, sensitive data related to the company, its products, and its services are discussed, which should not be leaked or pirated at any cost.
Even if the videos are not for information purposes, a considerable amount of money is inverted while making the videos and the companies must get the chance to reap full benefits from it. Video piracy can create hindrances in this path. Due to these and many more reasons, secure video hosting is a must for businesses.
Though there are many video hosting solutions currently available, very few of them are able to solve all the security issues. Most of the free video hosting platforms do not offer advanced security features. Even in many paid ones, DRM – one of the key components of security – is missing. So, if security is your primary concern, you should be very careful while choosing a video hosting solution.
To help you out, our video hosting experts have tested multiple video hosting solutions, and have handpicked the best secure video hosting platforms for you, which are listed as per their rank below:
Let’s take a look at them one by one.
Muvi Flex is one of the leading video hosting solution, offering multiple features focusing on security, marketing, player setting and customization, content management system, encoding and transcoding, analytics and resorts, and marketing. It offers multiple video streaming formats, which help you spread your content across the globe very easily. You can merge your audio, video, images, and metadata into RSS feeds too. You can even bulk upload your content into their CMS. They also offer APIs.
But most importantly, Muvi Flex offers one of the strongest secure video hosting infrastructures. With built-in multi-DRM architecture, visible (static and dynamic) and forensic watermarking, and screen recording protection, you can rest assured that your videos are far away from any hacking or piracy attempt. Using their geo-blocking feature, you can even restrict access to your videos to certain geographical locations only.
Their premium plans are a bit higher in pricing.
Muvi Flex offers the following pricing plans:
Read more on Muvi Flex’s Secured Video Hosting here.
Kaltura is extremely popular amongst educational institutions and online educators, though they do cater to other forms of videos too. Kaltura is often used for online training and live webinars too.
Now coming to security features, Kaltura follows the AES encryption technique to encrypt your videos. They also offer forensic watermarking, authorized domains, access control, and geo-restriction features. They offer multi-DRM streaming too!
So, in our review, Kaltura scored very good marks in the security segment, but we have placed them in rank 2 because they are a specialist in a particular domain (which is education and training).
It does not deliver its content in China.
They follow a pay-as-you-go pricing model. But you can also request custom quotes based on your requirements.
Dacast is a reputed video hosting platform that offers many advanced features across monetization, distribution, and other verticals. They also offer some good security features like DRM, though their DRM is limited to Widevine and Fairplay. They also offer CDN for a lag-free streaming experience.
Using their solution requires technical understanding.
Dacast offers the following pricing plans:
But, if you need high-volume plans, they will offer you a customized pricing plan based on your requirements.
Brightcove is one of the oldest video-hosting providers and has been in the business since 2004. Their services are compatible with multiple devices and can be integrated with different marketing and communication tools. They also offer video cloud storage and video player.
Now coming to the security features, Brightcove hosts its customers’ data in a multi-tenant environment. Also, the admins can control access based on roles. They have achieved ISO 27001 certification. They do support multiple DRM but you need to sign up for each of them separately.
Brightcove offers custom pricing plans, so you need to connect to their sales team.
Wistia’s video hosting solutions are known for their premium quality. They claim to offer “TV-quality” streams, and hence professional broadcasters often prefer using their services. But are they offering secure video hosting? Let’s see.
Wistia focuses on maintaining 99.9% uptime and delivering the media via CDN. They also focus on SSAE 16 certification, which is offered by many other solution providers too. They keep monitoring for database vulnerabilities and offer SSH key-based authentication for their servers.
However, their website security page does not mention anything about DRM or watermarking.
They do not offer DRM, screen recording protection, or even forensic watermarking.
Wistia offers the following pricing plans:
Wistia also offers custom pricing options.
Secure video hosting platform must-have features like multi-DRM security, forensic watermarking, and geo-blocking, amongst others. In our review, we found that Muvi Flex and Kaltura tick all these boxes. Some other platforms like Dacast, Brightcove, and Wistia also offer some of these features, but not all.
If you are looking for a secure video hosting platform, look no further! Muvi Flex is definitely the best choice for you! You get 100+ industry-leading features along with 24×7 customer support. Why wait? Sign up to start your 14-day free trial today!
Click here to read more on the top 10 video hosting software in 2023.
What is a secure video hosting platform, and why is it important in 2023?
Secure video hosting involves protecting your videos from multiple cyber threats like hacking, content theft, and piracy. In 2023, the incidents of piracy and cyber attacks are increasing rapidly. That is why, safeguarding your video content becomes all the more important.
How does secure video hosting differ from regular video hosting?
Secure video hosting prevents any type of video theft attempts and minimizes piracy threats, which often take place in the case of regular video hosting.
Why should I consider secure video hosting for my content?
If your videos contain any sensitive information that cannot be leaked, or if you have spent a lot of money on creating video content and want to generate revenues from it, then you must consider secure video hosting to prevent leakage and piracy.
Can I trust the security of these top-ranked platforms in 2023?
Yes, top video hosting platforms like Muvi Flex ensure video security by implementing multi-DRM infrastructure.
Can I migrate my existing video content to these platforms easily?
Yes, you can migrate to platforms like Muvi Flex without any downtime.
Written by: Debarpita Banerjee
Debarpita is a Content Writer with Muvi. With around 2 years of experience in content creation, she has worked across industries like SaaS, EdTech, eLearning, AR-VR, and Metaverse. She believes in delivering content that can be of some value to the readers. In her free time, she likes to try her hand at website and app development.
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