Additional contributor: Jack Lerner

Intel Insider is a hardware-based content protection mechanism that Intel is showcasing here at CES.

Essentially, Intel has repurposed some existing silicon and combined it with their new GPU (the graphics card now on the chip) so that protected media can now be decrypted, decoded and packaged for output to display over protected HDMI, without ever leaving the chip, making it very difficult to grab the media files in an unprotected state.

By coupling the decryption (their AES New Instructions silicon) with the GPU’s ability to decode video (typically H.264), they can send the protected stream to the CPU and keep it completely inside the black box there, beyond the reach of hacker tools, until it is output to the display which is protected via HDMI.  It’s a smart coupling of a few different technologies.

Even if the implementation of this feature goes smoothly (and doesn’t mistakenly hold up authorized content or suffer from other common DRM glitches), it could have difficulty catching on with consumers if it turns out to be nothing more than a virtual padlock that keeps content tied to one computer.  But the hope is that it will be part of a larger system such as UltraViolet — and that could encourage content providers to start offering more HD movies online, and sooner.