Spot beam based authentication

• US 9,009,796 B2
• Filed: 11/18/2010
• Issued: 04/14/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 11/18/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: The Boeing Co.
• Original Assignee: The Boeing Co.
• Inventors: Gutt, Gregory M., Ayyagari, Arun, Whelan, David A.
• Primary Examiner(s): Nalven, Andrew
• Assistant Examiner(s): RUPRECHT, CHRISTOPHER S
• Application Number:
  US12/949,404
• Publication Number:
  US 20120131650A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,608 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 726/5
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/44 Program or device authentication
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2221/2111 Location-sensitive, e.g. geographical location, GPS
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/18593 Arrangements for preventing unauthorised access or for providing user protection arrangements for secret or secure communication H04L9/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2209/84 Vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/3236 using cryptographic hash functions
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/3297 involving time stamps, e.g. generation of time stamps
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/023 using mutual or relative location information between multiple location based services [LBS] targets or of distance thresholds
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 48/04 based on user or terminal location or mobility data, e.g. moving direction, speed

Abstract

In one embodiment, a method to authenticate a claimant comprises receiving, from the claimant, at least one of a set of beam data from a spot beam transmission, comparing the claimed at least one set of beam data to a known valid data set, and authenticating the claimant when a difference between at least one set of beam data and the known valid data set is less than a threshold.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

receiving, at a verifier device, one or more distinctive beam parameters corresponding to a spot beam transmission of a satellite, wherein the one or more distinctive beam parameters include a pseudorandom code and a time stamp;

receiving, at the verifier device, first location information indicating a location of an electronic device;

determining second location information based on the one or more distinctive beam parameters, the second location information indicating a location of a center of a projection of the spot beam transmission; and

authenticating the electronic device when a difference between the location of the electronic device and the center of the projection of the spot beam transmission is less than a threshold.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the spot beam transmission is emitted from at least one of a low earth orbit satellite, a medium earth orbit satellite, a geosynchronous earth orbit satellite, or a pseudo-satellite.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein authenticating the electronic device includes performing a one-way authentication process.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein authenticating the electronic device includes performing a multi-way authentication process.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein authenticating the electronic device includes performing a multi-way peer to peer device authentication process.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising receiving a second time stamp from the electronic device, wherein the second time stamp corresponds to the first location information.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the first location information is based on an earth-based coordinate system.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the earth-based coordinate system comprises of a latitude, a longitude, an altitude, a geographic locator, or any combination thereof.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more distinctive beam parameters further include a timing code segment, a spot beam transmitting vehicle identifier, a beam identifier, a time bias parameter, spot beam transmitting vehicle trajectory data, or any combination thereof.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein authenticating the electronic device is further based on an L-Band frame count.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the electronic device is authenticated independently for each message transmitted by the electronic device.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the electronic device establishes a communication session with a remote device; and

the electronic device is authenticated at least once for the communication session.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the first location information corresponds to at least two locations of the electronic device at different times, and wherein the at least two locations are compared to at least two locations of the center of the projection of the spot beam transmission at the different times.

14. The method of claim 1, further comprising enabling the electronic device to access a service when the electronic device has been authenticated.

15. The method of claim 1, further comprising denying service to the electronic device when the electronic device has not been authenticated.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein determining the second location information comprises searching a satellite orbit database based on the distinctive beam parameters and retrieving orbit data from the satellite orbit database.

17. The method of claim 1, wherein the second location information corresponds to a time indicated by the time stamp.

18. The method of claim 1, wherein the threshold is based on, but not equal to, a radius of the projection of the spot beam.

19. An apparatus comprising:

a processor; and

a memory module comprising instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to perforin operations comprising;

receiving one or more distinctive beam parameters corresponding to a spot beam transmission of a satellite, wherein the one or more distinctive beam parameters include a pseudorandom code and a time stamp;

receiving first location information indicating a location of an electronic device;

determining second location information based on the one or more distinctive beam parameters, the second location information indicating a location of a center of a projection of the spot beam transmission; and

authenticating the electronic device when a difference between the location of the electronic device and the center of the projection of the spot beam transmission is less than a threshold.

20. The apparatus of claim 19, wherein the distinctive beam parameters further include a timing code segment, a spot beam transmitting vehicle identifier, a time bias parameter, a beam identifier, spot beam transmitting vehicle trajectory data, or any combination thereof.

21. The apparatus of claim 19, wherein the electronic device is authenticated independently for each message transmitted from the electronic device.

22. The apparatus of claim 19, wherein:

the electronic device establishes a communication session with a remote device; and

the electronic device is authenticated at least once for the communication session.

23. The apparatus of claim 19, wherein the distinctive beam parameters include a series of waypoint data snapshots over time.

24. The apparatus of claim 19, wherein the operations further comprise enabling the electronic device to access a service provided by a remote host when the electronic device has been authenticated.

25. A system comprising:

at least one signal source configured to transmit a spot beam transmission in accordance with a spot-beam geometry;

an electronic device comprising a receiver, wherein the receiver is configured to receive one or more distinctive beam parameters corresponding to the spot beam transmission, wherein the one or more distinctive beam parameters comprise a pseudorandom code and a time stamp; and

a verifier device communicatively coupled to the electronic device, wherein the verifier device is configured to;

receive the one or more distinctive beam parameters;

receive first location information indicating a location of the electronic device;

determine second location information based on the one or more distinctive beam parameters, the second location information indicating a location of a center of a projection of the spot beam transmission; and

authenticate the electronic device when a difference between the location of the electronic device and the center of the projection of the spot beam transmission is less than a threshold.

26. The system of claim 25, wherein the electronic device is configured to determine the location of the electronic device.

27. The system of claim 25, wherein the at least one signal source comprises at least one of the following:

low earth orbit satellite, a medium earth orbit satellite, a geosynchronous earth orbit satellite, or a pseudo-satellite.

28. The system of claim 25, wherein the electronic device comprises a mobile phone, a portable computing device, a computer network node, a server, a wireless networking node, or any combination thereof.

29. The system of claim 25, wherein the electronic device further comprises a biometric verification system.

30. The system of claim 25, wherein the verifier device is further configured to compare the first location information to the second location information, wherein the difference between the location of the electronic device and the center of the projection of the spot beam transmission is based on the comparison.

31. A system comprising:

a receiving device configured to communicate with an electronic device and a host network device, wherein the receiving device is configured to receive a pseudorandom code and a time stamp associated with a spot beam transmission of a vehicle; and

an authentication server configured to communicate with the host network device,

wherein the receiving device is configured to transmit an authentication request from the electronic device to the host network device, the authentication request comprising the pseudorandom code and the time stamp, and

wherein the authentication server comprises instructions that, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to perform operations comprising;

receiving, from the electronic device, one or more distinctive beam parameters, wherein the one or more distinctive beam parameters comprise the pseudorandom code and the time stamp;

receiving first location information indicating a location of the electronic device;

determine second location information based on the one or more distinctive beam parameters, the second location information indicating a location of a center of a projection of the spot beam transmission; and

authenticating the electronic device when a difference between the location of the electronic device and the center of the projection of the spot beam transmission is less than a threshold.