ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Basic Interoperable Scrambling System

Okay kiddo, so imagine you have a fun secret message that you want to send to your friend. But you don't want anyone else to be able to read it, so you want to scramble the letters and numbers in the message.

That's kind of like what the basic interoperable scrambling system (BISS) does. It's a system that takes TV signals and scrambles them so that only people who have the right key can unscramble them and watch the TV program.

Think of it like a secret code. The TV signal is the message, and the scrambling system is the code that scrambles it up. Only people with the right decoder box have the key to unscramble the code and watch the TV program.

So why do people use BISS? Well, sometimes TV programs are only meant for certain people, like if it's a sports game that's only airing in one region or country. By scrambling the signal, it makes it harder for people outside of that region or country to watch it.

But the key thing is that the scrambling system has to be "interoperable," which means it works with different types of decoder boxes. Think of it like having a bunch of different locks that all work with the same key. That way, people who have the right key can unscramble the code no matter what type of decoder box they have.

So in short, BISS is a system that scrambles TV signals so that only people with the right decoder box and key can unscramble it and watch the TV program. It's like a secret code that only certain people can crack!