Protecting non-Drupal directories

Is there any way to use this module to protect a directory or domain outside of the Drupal install...

For instance...

I have Drupal installed on http://www.example.com
I have files on a server http://files.example.com

Would it be possible to have this module or a similar module interact with the Drupal Database to only allow access to http://files.example.com to people that have a certain type of Role on http://www.example.com?

Maybe the module could be extended... interact with the .htaccess and .htpasswd files... ;)

Lots of Ubercart users selling access to files would love you for sure.