Cost effective card reader and methods to be configured to be coupled to a mobile device

• US 8,701,996 B2
• Filed: 03/14/2013
• Issued: 04/22/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 10/13/2010
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Block, Inc. (f/k/a Square, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Block, Inc. (f/k/a Square, Inc.)
• Inventors: Dorsey, Jack, Henderson, William, Grassadonia, Brian, McKelvey, James M., Wen, Xuancong
• Primary Examiner(s): Haupt, Kristy A
• Application Number:
  US13/829,056
• Publication Number:
  US 20130204788A1
• Time in Patent Office: 404 Days
• Field of Search: 235/380, 235/449, 235/491, 235/493
• US Class Current: 235/449
• 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 20/3226 Use of secure elements separate from M-devices
• 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 decoding system, with a decoding engine, runs on a mobile device. The decoding engine decodes signals produced from a read of a first party'"'"'s financial transaction card. The decoding engine accepts and initializes incoming signals from a read of the first party'"'"'s financial transaction card until the signals reach a steady state, identifies peaks in the incoming signals and digitizes the identified peaks into bits. A transaction engine is coupled to the decoding engine. The transaction engine receives, as its input, decoded first party'"'"'s financial transaction card information from the decoding engine, and serves as an intermediary between the first party and a second party. The first party does not have to share his/her financial transaction card information with the second party. The transaction engine is configured to be coupled to a payment system and a first party'"'"'s financial transaction card institution or a first party'"'"'s financial account.

Claims

1. A decoding system, comprising:

a decoding engine running on a mobile device, the decoding engine in operation decoding signals produced from a read of a buyer'"'"'s financial transaction card, the decoding engine in operation accepting and initializing incoming signals from a read of the buyer'"'"'s financial transaction card until the signals reach a steady state, detects the read of the buyer'"'"'s financial transaction card once the incoming signals are in a steady state, identifies peaks in the incoming signals and digitizes the identified peaks in the incoming signals into bits;

a transaction engine running on the mobile device and coupled to the decoding engine, the transaction engine in operation receiving as its input decoded buyer'"'"'s financial transaction card information from the decoding engine, and serving as an intermediary between the buyer and a merchant, so that the buyer does not have to share his/her financial transaction card information with the merchant; and

the transaction engine configured to be coupled to a payment service, the payment service including a secure server, a product or service database, a user database and a transaction base, the payment service being in communication with a buyer financial account of a financial institution, the payment service being a non-affiliate of the financial institution.

2. The decoding system of claim 1 wherein the mobile device a mobile digital device.

3. The decoding system of claim 1 wherein the incoming signals are generated by swiping of the buyer'"'"'s financial transaction card through a card reader configured to be coupled and de-coupled with the mobile device.

4. The decoding system of claim 3 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.

5. The decoding system of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine in operation detects presence of the read of the buyer'"'"'s financial transaction card by looking for points in the incoming signals that exceed a minimum signal amplitude threshold.

6. The decoding system of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine in operation detects presence of the read of the buyer'"'"'s financial transaction card by capturing signal of interest in the incoming signals via Fast Fourier Transform (FFT).

7. The decoding system of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine in operation detects peaks in the incoming signals to be resistant to ringing in the incoming signals.

8. The decoding system of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine in operation 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.

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

10. The decoding system of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine in operation identifies the track from which data of the incoming signals are read through the read of the buyer'"'"'s financial transaction card when only one track of data in a magnetic stripe of the buyer'"'"'s financial transaction card is read.

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

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

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

14. The decoding system of claim 1 wherein the decoding engine in operation scales and adjusts decoding to account for at least one of, different amounts of noise, sampling speed variations, signal ringing, and a swipe direction of the buyer'"'"'s financial transaction card when the buyer'"'"'s financial card is swiped through a slot of a card reader.

15. The decoding system of claim 1, wherein an output jack signal received by a card reader coupled to the mobile device is an encrypted output jack signal.

16. The decoding system of claim 15, wherein the output jack signal is an encrypted and signed output jack signal.

17. The decoding system of claim 16, wherein the output jack signal is a synchronous Manchester encoded stream.

18. The decoding system of claim 1, wherein the card reader includes a front end with an amplifier/filter, differentiator and a comparator.

19. The decoding system of claim 18, wherein the front end further includes wake-up electronics.

20. The decoding system of claim 19, wherein the wake-up electronics is a wake-up circuit.