Systems and methods for decoding card swipe signals

• US 20110084140A1
• Filed: 10/13/2010
• Published: 04/14/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 10/13/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Block, Inc. (f/k/a Square, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Block, Inc. (f/k/a Square, Inc.)
• Inventors: Wen, Sam
• Granted Patent: US 8,231,055 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 235/449
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/087 flux-sensitive, e.g. magnetic, detectors G06K7/10336 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/204 comprising interface for record bearing medium or carrier for electronic funds transfer or payment credit
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/209 Specified transaction journal output feature, e.g. printed receipt or voice output
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/322 Aspects of commerce using mobile devices [M-devices]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/3224 Transactions dependent on location of M-devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/326 Payment applications installed on the mobile devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/34 using cards, e.g. integrated circuit [IC] cards or magnetic cards
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/347 Passive cards
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/40 Authorisation, e.g. identification of payer or payee, verification of customer or shop credentials; Review and approval of payers, e.g. check credit lines or negative lists
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/06 Buying, selling or leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/02 Banking, e.g. interest calculation or account maintenance credit or loans G06Q40/03
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 7/0886 the card reader being portable for interacting with a POS or ECR in realizing a payment transaction

Abstract

A new approach is proposed that contemplates systems and methods to enable an individual to complete a financial transaction by swiping a magnetic stripe card through a card reader connected to a mobile device. The size of the card reader is miniaturized to be portable for connection with the mobile device. The card reader is configured to reliably read data encoded in a magnetic strip of the card with minimum error in a single swipe and provide a signal that corresponds to the data read to the mobile device, which then decodes the incoming signal from the card reader and acts as a point-of-sale device to complete the financial transaction. Such an approach enables a person to become either a micro-merchant (payee) or a buyer/customer (payer) without having to purchase expensive card reader devices or software.

Claims

1. A decoding system, comprising:

a decoding engine running on a host, wherein the decoding engine comprises a plurality of decoders, which in operation,

accept and initialize incoming signals from a swipe of a card until the signals reach a steady state;

detect the card swipe once the incoming signals are in a steady state;

identify peaks in the incoming signals once the card swipe is detected;

digitize the identified peaks in the incoming signals into bits;

convert the digitized bits into card information.

2. The device of claim 1 wherein the host is a mobile device.

3. The device of claim 2 wherein the mobile device is one of a cell phone, Apple'"'"'s iPhone, iPod, iPad, iTouch, and Google'"'"'s Android device.

4. The device of claim 1 wherein the incoming signals are generated by swiping of the card through a card reader connected with the mobile device.

5. The device of claim 4 wherein the incoming signals of low quality due to one or more of:

low quality of data read from a single and/or low density track of a magnetic stripe of the card, sampling speed limitations of the mobile device, and noise introduced into the mobile device.

6. The device of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine detecting presence of the swipe by looking for points in the incoming signals that exceed a minimum signal amplitude threshold.

7. The device of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine detecting presence of the swipe by capturing signal of interest in the incoming signals via Fast Fourier Transform (FFT).

8. The device of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine detects peaks in the incoming signals to be resistant to ringing in the incoming signals.

9. The device of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine detects peaks in the incoming signals to be resistant to scratches in the card that cause slow quality or false peak information to manifest in the incoming signals.

10. The device of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine detects peaks in the incoming signals by looking for local maxima and minima within a window of digital samples.

11. The device of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine identifies the track from which data of the incoming signals are read through the swipe of the card when only once track of data in a magnetic stripe of the card is read.

12. The device of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine digitizes the identified peaks in the incoming signals into bits only by checking and comparing polarities of peaks.

13. The device of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine combines various peak detection and digitization approaches to cover various ranges of degradation in quality of the input signals read.

14. The device of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine chooses and optimizes different process combinations and parameters depending on hardware platform of the mobile device.

15. The device of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine scales and adjusts decoding to account for different amounts of noise, sampling speed variations, signal ringing, and swipe direction.

16. A processor-implemented decoding method, comprising:

accepting and initializing incoming signals read from a swipe of a card until the signals reach a steady state;

detecting presence of the swipe once the incoming signals are in a steady state;

identifying peaks in the incoming signals once the presence of the card swipe is detected;

digitizing the identified peaks in the incoming signals into bits;

converting the digitized bits into card information.

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

detecting presence of the swipe by looking for points in the incoming signals that exceed a minimum signal amplitude threshold.

18. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

detecting presence of the swipe by capturing signal of interest in the incoming signals via Fast Fourier Transform (FFT).

19. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

detecting peaks in the incoming signals to be resistant to ringing in the incoming signals.

20. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

detecting peaks in the incoming signals to be resistant to scratches in the card that cause slow quality or false peak information to manifest in the incoming signals.

21. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

detecting peaks in the incoming signals by looking for local maxima and minima within a window of digital samples.

22. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

identifying the track from which data of the incoming signals are read through the swipe of the card when only once track of data in a magnetic stripe of the card is read.

23. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

digitizing the identified peaks in the incoming signals into bits only by checking and comparing polarities of peaks.

24. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

combining various peak detection and digitization approaches to cover various ranges of degradation in quality of the input signals read.

25. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

choosing and optimizing different process combinations and parameters depending on hardware platform of the mobile device.

26. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

scaling and adjusting decoding to account for different amounts of noise, sampling speed variations, signal ringing, and swipe direction