MULTI-FACTOR AUTHENTICATION

• US 20150143496A1
• Filed: 10/22/2014
• Published: 05/21/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 11/18/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: TATA Consultancy Services Limited (Tata Sons Pvt Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: TATA Consultancy Services Limited (Tata Sons Pvt Ltd.)
• Inventors: Thomas, Annie, Garg, Shalin, Bose, Sneha, Vallat, Sathish
• Granted Patent: US 9,600,647 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 726/7
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/31 User authentication
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/32 using biometric data, e.g. fingerprints, iris scans or voiceprints
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/34 involving the use of external additional devices, e.g. dongles or smart cards
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/35 communicating wirelessly
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/40 by quorum, i.e. whereby two or more security principals are required
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 9/37 using biometric data, e.g. fingerprints, iris scans or voice recognition

Abstract

Methods, systems and devices for multi-factor authentication (MFA) are described. An MFA device includes a plurality of tiles, a frame to hold the tiles and a stylus movable over the frame and the tiles. Each of the tiles includes at least one of visible indicia and tactile indicia, for representing a notation, and at least one track of acoustic code generation indicia. The acoustic code generation indicia of each tile, on being swiped, generate a complex sound waveform that encodes a composite binary pattern. The composite binary pattern comprises information blocks including a device identifier block for a device identifier associating the MFA device with a user, a biometric block for at least a part of a biometric pattern of the user, and a data block for the notation of the corresponding tile.

Claims

1. A multi-factor authentication device for authenticating a user to whom the multi-factor authentication device is issued, the multi-factor authentication device comprising:

a plurality of tiles, each of the plurality of tiles including;

at least one of visible indicia and tactile indicia for representing a notation; and

at least one track of acoustic code generation indicia;

a frame to hold the tiles; and

a stylus movable over the frame and the plurality of tiles to swipe the acoustic code generation indicia of each of the plurality of tiles;

wherein, on being swiped, the acoustic code generation indicia of each of the plurality of tiles generate a corresponding sound waveform that encodes a composite binary pattern to facilitate authentication of the user, wherein the composite binary pattern comprises information blocks forming an acoustic code, the information blocks comprising;

a device identifier block corresponding to a device identifier that associates the multi-factor authentication device with the user;

a biometric block corresponding to at least a part of a biometric pattern of the user; and

a data block corresponding to the at least one of the visible indicia and the tactile indicia of the corresponding tile.

2. The multi-factor authentication device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the information blocks further comprise a start block corresponding to a start sequence of the acoustic code, an end block corresponding to an end sequence of the acoustic code, and an account identifier block corresponding to an account id of the user, and wherein each of the information blocks are separated by delimiters.

3. The multi-factor authentication device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the stylus comprises at least one pin to swipe the acoustic code generation indicia, and wherein the at least one pin is adapted to generate the sound waveform at a predefined frequency selected from an audible frequency, an ultrasonic frequency, a subsonic frequency, and a supersonic frequency.

4. The multi-factor authentication device as claimed in claim 3, wherein the stylus further comprises a combinatorial lock configured to release at least one decoy pin when an erroneous combination is selected, and wherein the at least one decoy pin is adapted to generate at least a part of the sound waveform at an incorrect frequency.

5. The multi-factor authentication device as claimed in claim 1, wherein each of the plurality of tiles includes the acoustic code generation indicia in multiple tracks, and wherein the multiple tracks comprise a reference track for reconstructing the composite binary pattern.

6. The multi-factor authentication device as claimed in claim 5, wherein the stylus comprises multiple pins, a pin corresponding to each of the multiple tracks, and wherein each of the multiple pins is configured to generate a part of the sound waveform at a corresponding predefined frequency.

7. The multi-factor authentication device as claimed in claim 1 further comprising an auxiliary unit including one or more of:

a device interface to couple the multi-factor authentication device to an MFA authentication system; and

a transducer to capture and convert the sound waveform into an electrical signal.

8. The multi-factor authentication device as claimed in claim 7, wherein the auxiliary unit is coupled to a biometric reader to read a live biometric pattern from the user.

9. The multi-factor authentication device as claimed in claim 8, wherein the live biometric pattern corresponds to at least one of fingerprint pattern, iris pattern, retina pattern, palm vein pattern, finger vein pattern, signature pattern, olfactory pattern, vascular patterns, keystroke pattern, voice signature pattern, face biometric pattern, hand geometry, DNA pattern, earlobe biometric pattern, and heart beat pattern.

10. The multi-factor authentication device as claimed in claim 1, wherein the frame includes at least one supplementary acoustic code generation indicia to generate an ancillary sound waveform that encodes an ancillary composite binary pattern to facilitate performance of a user action.

11. The multi-factor authentication device as claimed in claim 10, wherein the user action corresponds to at least one of logging in, locking, unlocking, calling back, resetting, blocking access, initiating cross-channel verification, and navigating through a shortcut to a nested menu on a user interface of the underlying application.

12. A multi-factor authentication system for authenticating a user to whom a multi-factor authentication device is issued, the multi-factor authentication system comprising:

a processor;

an interface to connect the multi-factor authentication system to an auxiliary unit to receive electrical signals from the multi-factor authentication device;

a code reconstruction module, coupled to the processor, to

obtain a binary data stream corresponding to a complex sound waveform generated on swiping of a sequence of acoustic code generation indicia of the multi-factor authentication device, wherein each of the sound waveforms encodes a composite binary pattern to facilitate authentication of the user, wherein the composite binary pattern comprises information blocks forming an acoustic code, the information blocks comprising;

a device identifier block corresponding to a device identifier that associates the multi-factor authentication device with the user;

a biometric block corresponding to at least a part of a biometric pattern of the user; and

a data block corresponding to at least one of visible indicia and tactile indicia and forming a part of a passphrase; and

generate a reconstructed data stream of data segments from the binary data stream, wherein each data segment corresponds to an information block; and

an authentication module, coupled to the processor, to authenticate the user based on a comparison of one or more of the data segments with authentication data corresponding to the user.

13. The multi-factor authentication system as claimed in claim 12, wherein the code reconstruction module is configured to group bits in the binary data stream into the data segments based on length of the data segments and extracting peaks at predetermined spacing in the frequency spectrum, corresponding to presence of binary digit, to form the reconstructed data stream.

14. The multi-factor authentication system as claimed in claim 12, wherein the authentication module performs the comparison by:

comparing the data segments corresponding to the device identifier block with the device identifier associated with the user in the authentication data;

comparing the data segments corresponding to the account identifier block with the account identifier associated with the user account in the authentication data;

gathering the data segments corresponding to the data block in the sequence of the swiped acoustic code generation indicia; and

comparing the gathered data segments with a passphrase of the user stored in the authentication data.

15. The multi-factor authentication system as claimed in claim 14, wherein the authentication module receives a live biometric pattern and compares data segments corresponding to the biometric block with the live biometric pattern to authenticate the user.

16. The multi-factor authentication system as claimed in claim 12, wherein the authentication module receives a live biometric pattern and compares the live biometric pattern with the biometric pattern of the user stored in an authentication data repository to authenticate the user.

17. The multi-factor authentication system as claimed in claim 12, further comprising a biometric reader coupled to the processor to receive a live biometric pattern.

18. A device customization system for customizing a multi-factor authentication device for issue to a user, the device customization system comprising:

a processor;

a data receiving module, coupled to the processor, to receive user data for customizing the multi-factor authentication device, wherein the user data includes user name, a device identifier for the multi-factor authentication device to be associated with the user and at least one biometric pattern of the user;

an indicia design module, coupled to the processor, to design acoustic code generation indicia in one or more tracks for each of a plurality of tiles of the multi-factor authentication device based on user and design data, such that the acoustic code generation indicia generates an acoustic code that encodes information blocks to facilitate authentication of the user, the information blocks comprising;

a device identifier block corresponding to a device identifier that associates the multi-factor authentication device with the user;

a biometric block corresponding to a biometric pattern of the user; and

a data block corresponding to at least one of visible indicia and tactile indicia; and

a stylus design module, coupled to the processor, to design a stylus having one or more pins based on the user and design data, each of the one or more pins corresponding to one track of the acoustic code generation indicia, wherein each of the one or more pins are configured to generate a part of the acoustic code at a corresponding predefined frequency.

19. The device customization system as claimed in claim 18, further comprising an indicia forming module to control marking of the acoustic code generation indicia and the corresponding at least one of visible indicia and tactile indicia on each of the plurality of tiles based on the designed acoustic code generation indicia.

20. The device customization system as claimed in claim 18, wherein the indicia design module further designs at least one supplementary acoustic code generation indicia for placement on a frame configured to hold the plurality of tiles.