A secure streaming content delivery system provides a plurality of content
servers connected to a network that host customer content that can be
cached and/or stored, e.g., images, video, text, and/or software. The
content servers respond to requests for customer content from users. The
invention load balances user requests for cached customer content to the
appropriate content server. A user makes a request to a customer's
server/authorization server for delivery of the customer's content. The
authorization server checks if the user is authorized to view the
requested content. If the user is authorized, then the authorization
server generates a hash value using the authorization server's secret
key, the current time, a time-to-live value, and any other information
that the customer has configured, and embeds it into the URL which is
passed to the user. A content server receives a URL request from the user
for customer content cached on the content server. The request is
verified by the content server creating its own hash value using the
customer server's secret key, the current time, a time-to-live value, and
any other related information configured for the customer. If the hash
value from the URL matches the content server's generated hash value,
then the user's request is valid and within the expiration time period
and the content server delivers the requested content to the user.