JP7540787B2 - Service providing system, service providing server and service providing method - Google Patents

Description

The present invention relates to a service providing system that provides services using storage media such as NFC (Near Field Communication) tags and two-dimensional codes.

In recent years, service provision systems have been developed that use storage media such as NFC tags and two-dimensional codes to provide services to users of terminal devices such as smartphones and iPhones (registered trademarks). Identification information associated with a specific service is readably stored in these storage media. Therefore, users of the terminal devices can receive the corresponding service by reading the identification information from the storage media.

Services provided using storage media include services that provide content such as text, images, videos, and music through a terminal device that reads identification information from the storage medium, services that provide control of equipment in the vicinity of the storage medium (e.g., opening and closing a door), services that provide electronic payments to payment terminals such as cash registers and vending machines in the vicinity of the storage medium, and services that provide payments (including the price of goods or services) to specific parties associated with the storage medium.

In systems that use such storage media, the spoofing of the storage media becomes an issue. In other words, there is concern that a fraudulent act (known as "phishing") could occur in which a storage medium containing the address information of a fake site different from the actual access destination is installed, and a mobile device that reads the storage medium is directed to the fake site.

Various inventions have been proposed to prevent such fraudulent activities. For example, Patent Document 1 discloses an invention related to a technology that displays an intuitive object that allows a user to intuitively understand what a specific object, such as a URL, email address, or corporate or personal address, corresponds to when that specific object is provided as a two-dimensional code.

JP 2007-188430 A

The technology of Patent Document 1 requires a reliable authentication device to sign the concrete object and the intuitive object in advance, which causes problems of the system becoming complicated and expensive.
The present invention has been made in consideration of the conventional circumstances described above, and aims to propose technology that enables a user of a terminal device to easily determine whether or not he or she has been directed to a fake site in a system in which the provision of a service begins by reading stored information from a storage medium using the terminal device.

To achieve the above objective, the service providing system, service providing server, and service providing method according to the present invention have the following technical features:

The service providing system according to the present invention includes a storage medium that readably stores identification information associated with a specific service, and a server that is accessed by a terminal device that reads the identification information from the storage medium, and the server transmits notification information that is designated in advance by a user of the terminal device in common to a plurality of contents to the terminal device in response to access by the terminal device, before transmitting content related to the provision of the service associated with the identification information to the terminal device, and causes the terminal device to output the notification information.

The service providing server according to the present invention is a service providing server that is accessed by a terminal device that reads identification information associated with a specific service from a storage medium, and includes a memory that stores notification information that is previously designated by a user of the terminal device in common for a plurality of contents related to the provision of the service in association with the terminal device or its user, and is characterized in that, in response to an access by the terminal device that reads the identification information from the storage medium, before transmitting the content related to the provision of the service associated with the identification information to the terminal device, the notification information stored in the memory in association with the terminal device or its user is transmitted to the terminal device and output from the terminal device.

The service provision method according to the present invention provides a service using a storage medium that readably stores identification information associated with a specific service, and is characterized in that a server accessed by a terminal device that reads the identification information from the storage medium transmits notification information that is previously designated by a user of the terminal device in common for a plurality of contents to the terminal device in response to access by the terminal device, before transmitting content related to the provision of the service associated with the identification information to the terminal device, and causes the terminal device to output the notification information.

According to the present invention, in a system in which the provision of a service is initiated by a terminal device reading stored information from a storage medium, it becomes possible to easily determine whether or not a user of the terminal device has been directed to a fake site.

1 is a diagram illustrating a schematic configuration example of a service providing system according to an embodiment of the present invention. 2 is a diagram showing an example of an address management table included in the service providing server of FIG. 1 . 2 is a diagram showing an example of a notification management table included in the service providing server of FIG. 1 . FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an example of a processing flow by the service providing server of FIG. 1 . 2 is a diagram showing an example of output of notification information by the terminal device of FIG. 1;

A service providing system according to an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.
1 shows a schematic configuration example of a service providing system according to an embodiment of the present invention. The service providing system of this example includes a storage medium 10, a terminal device 20, and a service providing server 30, and the provision of a service is started by the service providing server 30 when the terminal device 20 reads stored information from the storage medium 10. The following describes an example of a service that provides content such as text, images, videos, and music to a user via the terminal device 20.

The storage medium 10 is for providing a predetermined content to the terminal device 20, and is installed at any location. The storage medium 10 readably stores identification information unique to the storage medium (hereinafter, a medium ID). For example, the medium ID may be set as a parameter together with an address in a uniform resource identifier (URI) format indicating the location of the service providing server 30 on the network. There are also system forms in which it is not necessary to store a server address in the storage medium 10, such as when a dedicated application previously associated with the service providing server 30 is used to provide a service. As the medium ID, a unique value different for each storage medium 10 is used. A group ID having a common value among multiple storage media 10 may be used instead of or together with the medium ID unique to the storage medium 10.

The storage medium 10 is realized by an electronic tag (e.g., an NFC tag) that transmits a medium ID or an address in a URI format that includes the medium ID by contactless short-distance communication, or a two-dimensional code that is an image obtained by converting a medium ID or an address in a URI format that includes the medium ID according to a predetermined rule. If a storage medium 10 that includes both an electronic tag and a two-dimensional code is used, the server address and the medium ID can be read even by a terminal device 20 that only has the function of reading electronic tags or the function of reading two-dimensional codes.

The terminal device 20 is a communication terminal device owned by a user who is to receive the content. The terminal device 20 may be a portable communication terminal device equipped with at least one of an electronic tag reading function or a two-dimensional code reading function, and may be of various types such as a mobile phone, smartphone, iPhone (registered trademark), tablet PC, etc. The terminal device 20 can receive the content associated with the storage medium 10 by accessing the service providing server 30 using the medium ID read from the storage medium 10.

The service providing server 30 is provided on a network to which various communication terminal devices, including the terminal device 20, can be connected via communication. The service providing server 30 in this example includes a service providing control unit 31 and a data storage unit 32.

The data storage unit 32 stores various data for controlling the provision of services to the user of the terminal device 20. In this example, the data storage unit 32 has an address management table (Figure 2) that manages the addresses of content providing sites associated with the storage medium 10, and a notification management table (Figure 3) that manages notification information designated in advance by the user of the terminal device 20.

The address management table illustrated in FIG. 2 is structured to store data that associates the "media ID" of the storage medium 10 under system management with "address information" that indicates the location on the network of the content providing site. The notification management table illustrated in FIG. 3 is structured to store data that associates the "user ID" that identifies the user of the terminal device 20 (or the "terminal ID" that identifies the terminal device 20) with "notification information" that has been specified in advance by the user.

The notification information may be, for example, visually recognizable information such as numbers, text, images, videos, background colors, etc. Furthermore, for example, auditorily recognizable information such as voice, music, and ringing patterns, or tactilely recognizable information such as vibration patterns, etc. A combination of these may also be used as the notification information. Furthermore, multiple pieces of notification information may be specified in advance, and the notification information to be used may be switched in a predetermined order or randomly. Furthermore, different notification information may be used for each site, or the same information may be used for multiple sites.

In response to an access from the terminal device 20 using the medium ID, the service provision control unit 31 controls the execution of a service to provide the terminal device 20 with content corresponding to the medium ID. At that time, notification information designated in advance by the user of the terminal device 20 is transmitted to the terminal device 20 and output from the terminal device 20, and after the user of the terminal device 20 confirms it, the service provision control unit 31 executes the provision of the content through the terminal device 20.

4 shows an example of a process flow by the service providing server 30 of this embodiment. Here, a case will be described in which a server address in a URI format including a medium ID is stored in the storage medium 10.
A user of the terminal device 20 reads the server address and the medium ID from the storage medium 10 with the terminal device 20. The terminal device 20 accesses the service providing server 30 based on the server address and the medium ID read from the storage medium 10, and requests address information of a site having content corresponding to the medium ID (step S11).

In response to access from the terminal device 20, the service providing server 30 performs the following processes using the service providing control unit 31.
The service provision control unit 31 first obtains notification information designated in advance by the user of the terminal device 20 from the notification management table in the data storage unit 32 (step S12) and transmits it to the terminal device 20 (step S13). This causes the notification information to be output from the terminal device 20. Thereafter, the service provision control unit 31 waits with the notification information output until a predetermined time (several seconds) has elapsed, or until a specific process is completed, or until a confirmation notification of the notification information is received from the terminal device 20 (step S14). Alternatively, the service provision control unit 31 may proceed to the subsequent process (step S15) without waiting. An example of a case where the service provision control unit 31 does not wait is a case where notification information with a fixed output time is used (for example, video, audio, vibration pattern, etc.).

Then, the service provision control unit 31 obtains address information (destination address information) of the content providing site corresponding to the medium ID received when accessed by the terminal device 20 from the address management table of the data storage unit 32 (step S15) and transmits it to the terminal device 20 (step S16). The terminal device 20 changes (redirects) the connection destination to the content providing site corresponding to the medium ID based on the address information received from the service provision server 30. As a result, the content associated with the storage medium 10 is provided to the user of the terminal device 20.

Figure 5 shows an example of notification information output by terminal device 20. In the example of Figure 5, a numerical value designated in advance by the user of terminal device 20 is displayed on terminal device 20 as notification information. Therefore, by checking the notification information output to terminal device 20, the user of terminal device 20 can confirm that he or she is attempting to access the correct content providing site (i.e., that he or she is not attempting to access a fake site).

The output of the notification information by the terminal device 20 may be until a predetermined time (several seconds) has elapsed, or until a specific process is completed, or until the user of the terminal device 20 performs a confirmation operation. When the user of the terminal device 20 performs a confirmation operation, a confirmation notification of the notification information is sent from the terminal device 20 to the service providing server 30.

As described above, the service providing system of this example includes a storage medium 10 that readably stores a medium ID associated with a specific service, and a service providing server 30 that transmits an address of a content providing site to a terminal device 20 in response to access by the terminal device 20 that has read the medium ID from the storage medium 10. The service providing server 30 is configured to transmit notification information designated in advance by a user of the terminal device 20 to the terminal device 20 and cause the terminal device 20 to output the notification information, immediately before transmitting the address of the content providing site to the terminal device 20 in response to access by the terminal device 20.

Therefore, by checking the notification information output from the terminal device 20, the user of the terminal device 20 can recognize that he or she has not been directed to a fake site. On the other hand, if no notification information is output from the terminal device 20, or if notification information other than that previously specified by the user of the terminal device 20 is output, the user can recognize that he or she has been directed to a fake site. In this way, according to the service provision system of this example, the user of the terminal device 20 can easily determine whether or not he or she has been directed to a fake site.

In the above explanation, the service providing server 30 manages address information of the content providing site, and sends the address information in response to a request from the terminal device 20 to change the connection destination. This is a redirection type system configuration, but the service providing server 30 itself may provide the service. In this case, instead of the address management table (Fig. 2), a service management table may be provided that associates and manages the "medium ID" of the storage medium 10 with the "content" related to the provision of the service, and the content in response to a request from the terminal device 20 may be obtained from the service management table to provide the service to the terminal device 20.

In the above description, the notification information specified by the user of the terminal device 20 is output from the terminal device 20 immediately before the address of the content providing site is transmitted to the terminal device 20, but the notification information may be output from the terminal device 20 at other times.

For example, in a system that provides a service after receiving input of authentication information (user name, password, etc.) and personal information (real name, address, telephone number, bank account information, credit card information), the service providing server 30 may be configured to transmit notification information to the terminal device 20 and have it output from the terminal device 20 before receiving input of the authentication information or personal information from the user of the terminal device 20.

For example, in a system that requires electronic payment when providing a service, the service providing server 30 may be configured to transmit notification information to the terminal device 20 and have it output from the terminal device 20 before receiving an electronic payment operation from the user of the terminal device 20.

Also, for example, the service providing server 30 may be configured to continue outputting notification information while providing the service. In this case, it is preferable to be able to stop the output of the notification information in response to an instruction from the user of the terminal device 20. Here, when visually recognizable information is used as the notification information, the notification information may be configured to continue to be displayed in a part of the site related to the provision of the service or in the background. Note that, when the notification information is to be continuously displayed in a part of the site, it is preferable to display the notification information on the periphery of the display area (e.g., top, bottom, left, right) so as not to interfere with the site content.

The service providing server 30 in the above-mentioned service providing system is composed of a computer equipped with hardware resources such as a processor such as a CPU (Central Processing Unit) that performs various arithmetic processing, a main memory such as a RAM (Random Access Memory) that serves as the processor's working area and a ROM (Read Only Memory) that records basic control programs, an auxiliary memory such as a HDD (Hard Disk Drive) that stores various programs and data, a display device that displays and outputs various information, and an input/output interface unit to which input devices such as operation buttons and touch panels are connected, and a communication interface unit that communicates with other devices via wired or wireless communication. Then, the functions of the service providing server according to the present invention are realized on the computer by causing the computer to execute a program related to the service providing server according to the present invention.

The service providing server 30 is not limited to the above-described software configuration that realizes each functional unit, and each functional unit may be realized by a dedicated hardware module. The service providing server 30 may be realized by a single device, or may be realized by multiple devices that operate in cooperation with each other.

Although the present invention has been described in detail above, it goes without saying that the present invention is not limited to the above-mentioned configuration, and may be realized with configurations other than those described above.
The present invention can also be provided as a method for executing the above-described processing, a program for realizing such a method by a computer having hardware resources such as a processor and memory, a readable storage medium for storing the program in a readable manner, etc.

The present invention can be used in a service provision system that provides services using storage media such as NFC tags and two-dimensional codes.

10: Storage medium, 20: Terminal device, 30: Service providing server, 31: Service providing control unit, 32: Data storage unit

Claims (3)

A storage medium that readably stores identification information associated with a predetermined service;
a server that is accessed by a terminal device that reads the identification information from the storage medium,
A service provision system characterized in that, in response to access from the terminal device, the server transmits notification information to the terminal device that is previously specified in common for multiple contents by a user of the terminal device before transmitting content related to the provision of a service corresponding to the identification information to the terminal device, and causes the terminal device to output the notification information. A service providing server that is accessed by a terminal device that reads identification information associated with a predetermined service from a storage medium,
a memory for storing notification information designated in advance by a user of the terminal device in common for a plurality of contents related to the provision of the service, in association with the terminal device or the user thereof;
A service providing server characterized in that, in response to access by a terminal device that has read the identification information from the storage medium, before transmitting content related to the provision of a service corresponding to the identification information to the terminal device, the notification information stored in the memory corresponding to the terminal device or its user is transmitted to the terminal device and output from the terminal device. 1. A method for providing a service by using a storage medium that readably stores identification information associated with a specific service, the method comprising:
A service provision method characterized in that a server accessed by a terminal device that reads the identification information from the storage medium, in response to access by the terminal device, transmits notification information that is previously designated in common for multiple contents by a user of the terminal device to the terminal device and causes the terminal device to output the notification information before transmitting content related to the provision of a service corresponding to the identification information to the terminal device.

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