US Patent 7130829 Digital rights management

A method, program, and system for augmenting digital rights management are provided. The invention comprises associating two fields with an electronic document. The first field identifies the current owner of the electronic document, and the second field contains information about previous ownership of the electronic document. If ownership of the electronic document is transferred from the current owner to a subsequent owner, the current owner's name in the first field is replaced with the subsequent owner's name. In addition, information about the subsequent owner is added to the ownership history field.