A method to force a multimedia unit to update an application for viewing broadcast conditional access content by linking said update to an update of the conditional access module firmware. The firmware update is initialized by means of version information transmitted in the content stream. In particular, this version information may be included in ECM or EMM messages or in services information tables in order to be processed by the conditional access module independently from the multimedia unit. The version information comprises of a minimum version and of an available maximum version. If the conditional access module detects that the current version of the firmware is inferior to the available maximum version, it transmits a message requesting an update of the application that initiates downloading a firmware updating from a management center. The update installation is carried out simultaneously in the conditional access module and in the multimedia unit.