”On-card“ user authentication for contactless smart cards based on gesture recognition

Abstract

Smart cards are widely used for security purposes. To protect smart cards against misuse an authentication process (e.g. entering a pin or password) is necessary. Due to missing input interfaces “on-card”, an external terminal is required to input the password. Unfortunately the required external hardware (e.g. keypads, etc.) opens up new security issues by being vulnerable against attacks like side channel, forgery & tampering, man in the middle, eavesdropping and others. An elegant solution for such problems is an authentication process “on-card” without the need for external devices. This paper presents a new class of contactless, ISO 14443 compliant smart cards which are equipped with a multipurpose user input interface as 2D gesture recognition sensor together with an optical feedback component. This offers new “on-card” authentication, card configuration and even front end interface capabilities. We will describe the basics of the general hardware design and discuss the gesture recognition process.