Biometrics authentication system registration method, biometrics authentication system, and program for same

• US 20060078170A1
• Filed: 03/18/2005
• Published: 04/13/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 10/08/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Fujitsu Frontech Limited (Fujitsu Limited), Fujitsu Limited
• Original Assignee: Fujitsu Frontech Limited (Fujitsu Limited), Fujitsu Limited
• Inventors: Kamata, Hideo, Eguchi, Shinichi, Kishino, Takumi
• Granted Patent: US 8,000,503 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/115
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 18/00 Pattern recognition
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 40/14 Vascular patterns
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 40/50 Maintenance of biometric data or enrolment thereof
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 9/257 electronically G07C9/26 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 9/27 with central registration
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 9/37 using biometric data, e.g. fingerprints, iris scans or voice recognition
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 9/38 with central registration

Abstract

A biometrics authentication system utilizes information of the palm of the hand of a body to perform individual authentication. A processing unit obtains an image of the palm of the hand of the same body a plurality of times from an image capture unit, judges the degrees of similarity among the characteristic data sets of the plurality of images of the palm of the hand, and registers a plurality of characteristic data sets with a high degree of similarity in a storage unit. And the shape of the hand in the image is checked from the outlines in the image of the palm of the hand, so it is possible to rapidly judge whether image capture has been successful and extract characteristic data, and registration processing can be executed in a short length of time.

Claims

1. A biometrics authentication system for performing individual authentication by detecting and registering characteristic data of the palm of a hand of a body for future use, detecting characteristic data from the palm of the hand of said body and verifying the detected characteristic data against said registered characteristic data, said system comprising:

an image capture unit which captures images of the palm of a hand of said body;

a storage unit which stores the registered characteristic data of the palm of the hand of said body; and

,

a processing unit which extracts outlines from an image of the palm of said hand captured by said image capture unit, judges from said extracted outlines whether said image capture has been successful, extracts said characteristic data from an image of the palm of a hand judged to have been captured successfully, and registers said characteristic data in said storage unit,

wherein said processing unit obtains an image of the palm of a hand of said body a plurality of times from said image capture unit, judges the degrees of similarity among characteristic data for each of said plurality of images of the palm of the hand, and registers in said storage unit a plurality of characteristic data sets with a high degree of similarity.

2. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 1, wherein said processing unit judges the degree of similarity of the second and subsequent characteristic data sets of the palm of the hand, with reference to the first characteristic data set of the palm of the hand.

3. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 1, wherein said processing unit obtains images of the palm of the hand of said same body from said image capture unit, until a prescribed number of characteristic data sets with a high degree of similarity are obtained.

4. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 1, wherein said processing unit, after registering said plurality of characteristic data sets with a high degree of similarity in said storage unit, obtains from said image capture unit an image of the palm of said hand, extracts said characteristic data, verifies said characteristic data against said plurality of characteristic data sets registered in said storage unit, and performs trial authentication.

5. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 1, wherein said processing unit extracts outlines from an image of the palm of said hand captured by said image capture unit, judges whether said image capture has been successful from said extracted outlines, extracts said characteristic data from an image of the palm of the hand judged to have been captured successfully, verifies said characteristic data against said plurality of characteristic data sets registered in said storage unit, and performs individual authentication.

6. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 1, wherein said processing unit judges the degree of similarity to be high when said degree of similarity is equal to or greater than a prescribed threshold.

7. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 2, wherein said processing unit registers the first biometrics characteristic data set, and for nth biometrics characteristic data sets, calculates all the degrees of similarity with the first to the (n−

1)th biometrics characteristic data sets, and when all degrees of similarity are equal to or greater than the threshold, registers said nth biometrics characteristic data set in said storage unit.

8. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 5, wherein, at the time of individual authentication, said processing unit reads said plurality of biometrics characteristic data sets from said storage unit according to identification information for said individual, and verifies said characteristic data obtained from an image of the palm of the hand obtained from said image capture unit against said read plurality of characteristic data sets.

9. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 8, wherein said processing unit detects the fact that said extracted characteristic data is similar to one among said plurality of registered characteristic data sets, and performs individual authentication.

10. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 1, wherein said processing unit judges, from the positional relation between outlines in an image of the palm of said hand and the image capture range of said image capture device, whether said image capture has been successful.

11. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 1, wherein said image capture unit captures a portion of a hand including the palm of the hand of said body and a portion of the fingers.

12. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 11, wherein said processing unit judges whether said image capture has been successful, from the number of outlines in an image of the palm of said hand within said image capture range.

13. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 11, wherein said processing unit judges whether said image capture has been successful, from the positional relation of the outlines of the image of the palm of said hand and the image capture range of said image capture device, and from the number of said outlines within said image capture range.

14. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 1, wherein said processing unit, upon judging that said image capture has not been successful from outlines of an image of the palm of said hand, causes said image capture unit to again perform image capture of the palm of said hand, and obtains the image of the palm of said hand.

15. The biometrics authentication system according to claim 8, wherein said image capture unit has a distance sensor which measures the distance between said image capture unit and the palm of said hand,

and said processing unit obtains the image of the palm of said hand from said image capture unit when the distance measured by said distance sensor is within a prescribed range, and changes said prescribed range between at the time of said registration and at the time of said individual authentication.

16. A registration method for a biometrics authentication system for performing individual authentication by detecting and registering characteristic data of the palm of a hand of a body for future use, detecting characteristic data from the palm of the hand of said body and verifying the detected characteristic data against said registered characteristic data, the method comprising the steps of:

obtaining an image of the palm of the hand of a body from an image capture unit which captures images of the palm of said hand;

extracting outlines of the image of the palm of said hand, and judging, from said outlines, whether said image capture has been successful;

extracting the characteristic data from an image of the palm of the hand capture of which has been successful;

judging the degree of similarity among a plurality of said characteristic data sets extracted from a plurality of said captured images; and

registering a plurality of characteristic data sets with a high degree of similarity in a storage unit.

17. The registration method for a biometrics authentication system according to claim 16, wherein said degree of similarity judgment step comprises a step of judging the degree of similarity of the second and subsequent characteristic data sets of the palm of the hand with reference to the initial characteristic data set of the palm of the hand.

18. The registration method for a biometrics authentication system according to claim 17, further comprising a step of obtaining images of the palm of the hand of the same body from said image capture unit, until a prescribed number of said characteristic data sets with high degree of similarity are obtained.

19. The registration method for a biometrics authentication system according to claim 16, further comprising the steps of:

obtaining an image of the palm of the hand from said image capture unit, after registering a plurality of said characteristic data sets with a high degree of similarity in said storage unit;

extracting outlines of the image of the palm of said hand and judging from said outlines whether said image capture has been successful;

extracting characteristic data from an image of the palm of the hand capture of which has been successful; and

verifying said characteristic data against a plurality of characteristic data sets registered in said storage unit for performing trial authentication.

20. The registration method for a biometrics authentication system according to claim 16, wherein said degree of similarity judgment step comprises a step of judging the degree of similarity to be high when said degree of similarity is equal to or greater than a prescribed threshold.

21. The registration method for a biometrics authentication system according to claim 17, wherein said degree of similarity judgment step comprises:

a step of calculating, for the nth biometrics characteristic data set, the degrees of similarity with all of the first to the (n−

1)th biometrics characteristic data sets; and

a step of judging said characteristic data set to be characteristic data suitable for registration when all degrees of similarity are equal to or greater than a threshold.

22. The registration method for a biometrics authentication system according to claim 16, wherein said step of judging whether image capture has been successful comprises a step of judging whether said image capture has been successful, from the positional relationship between outlines in the image of the palm of said hand and the image capture range of said image capture device.

23. The registration method for a biometrics authentication system according to claim 16, wherein said image obtaining step comprises a step of obtaining, from said image capture unit, a captured image of a portion of the hand including the palm of the hand of said body and a portion of the fingers.

24. The registration method for a biometrics authentication system according to claim 23, wherein said step of judging the success of said image capture comprises a step of judging whether said image capture has been successful from the number of outlines in the image of the palm of said hand within said image capture range.

25. The registration method for a biometrics authentication system according to claim 16, wherein said step of judging the success of said image capture comprises a step of judging whether said image capture has been successful from the positional relationship between the outlines of the image of the palm of said hand and the image capture range of said image capture device, and from the number of said outlines within said image capture range.

26. The registration method for a biometrics authentication system according to claim 16, further comprising a step of causing said image capture unit to again capture an image of the palm of said hand for obtaining the image of the palm of said hand, when said judgment step judges that said image capture is not successful from the outlines of the image of the palm of said hand.

27. The registration method for a biometrics authentication system according to claim 16, wherein said image obtaining step comprises a step of obtaining an image of the palm of said hand from said image capture unit when the distance measured by a distance sensor which measures the distance between said image capture unit and the palm of said hand is within a prescribed range.

28. A program, which causes a computer to execute the steps of:

obtaining an image of the palm of the hand of a body from an image capture unit which captures images of the palm of the hand;

extracting outlines of the image of the palm of said hand, and judging, from said outlines, whether said image capture has been successful;

extracting characteristic data from an image of the palm of the hand capture of which has been successful;

judging the degree of similarity among a plurality of said characteristic data sets extracted from a plurality of said captured images; and

registering a plurality of characteristic data sets with a high degree of similarity in a storage unit.

29. The program according to claim 28, further causing the computer to execute the steps of:

obtaining an image of the palm of the hand from said image capture unit after registering a plurality of said characteristic data sets with a high degree of similarity in said storage unit;

extracting outlines of the image of the palm of said hand and judging from said outlines whether said image capture has been successful, of extracting characteristic data from an image of the palm of the hand capture of which has been successful; and

verifying said characteristic data against a plurality of characteristic data sets registered in said storage unit for performing trial authentication.

30. The program according to claim 28, causing the computer to execute, as the step of judging whether said image capture has been successful, a step of judging whether said image capture has been successful from the positional relationship between outlines of the image of the palm of said hand and the image capture range of said image capture unit.