How about using PHP as a pipe to funnel the MPG files through:
<?
// Place your security logic here and exit if
// auth is not successful
// $filename is the path of the file
// to server
header ("Content Type:video/mpeg");
readfile ($filename);
?>
This way you can place your MPG files completely outside the server root
and your users will have to go through your scripts in order to even get
to them. Even better, they won't be able to bookmark them because even
if they do they'll still have to go through your script (you could even
add a random token to the URL so that they can't bookmark the files at
all.).
Marco
On Mon, 2002-10-14 at 08:58, Adam Royle wrote:
> I was wondering about people's thoughts on file security through php
> using database authentication.
>
> Take the following example:
>
> I have a folder (in webroot) called /videos/ which contains a heap of
> files like so:
>
> video_1_14-06-2002.mpg
> video_2_15-06-2002.mpg
> video_3_16-06-2002.mpg
> video_4_17-06-2002.mpg
>
> Now, in a database I have table with a heap of users, with some sort of
> security identifier which allows them to access only the files they are
> given access to. Now, doing this in PHP is no problem, but I want to be
> able to stop them from 'predicting' what the next filename would be and
> just typing that in.
>
> I thought about using .htaccess, where if they try to access one of the
> files, it sends it off to a php page which authenticates and displays a
> list of files they are allowed to view, although I would like it if
> they had the opportunity to type in the url of the file if they are
> actually authorized to do so.
>
> I would prefer not to keep a file listing of allowed usernames and
> passwords using .htaccess, as this information could potentially be
> updated frequently with a large amount of users (or would this not be a
> problem).
>
> Has anyone implemented this type of system before? are there any good
> resources people know of for this type of thing?
>
> Thanks,
> Adam.
>
>
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