JPS6338746B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a method for identifying whether or not an individual is a specific pre-registered individual when a computer system provides a service to the individual.

Traditionally, personal identification has been conducted using methods that use physiological and morphological characteristics of individuals such as faces, fingerprints, palm shapes, and signatures, methods that use personal belongings such as seals and magnetic cards, and methods that use personal belongings such as seals and magnetic cards. Methods using numbers (passwords) have been widely considered and some have been put into practice.

Some of these require image processing equipment and take a lot of time to process.
There are many problems, such as difficulty in identifying in real time.
Additionally, some other devices have security issues such as loss or theft, and this is one of the biggest factors limiting their uses.

Therefore, an object of the present invention is to provide a personal identification method that does not require special and expensive equipment such as an image processing device and is extremely safe for the individual using the system.

In order to achieve the above objectives, the personal identification method of the present invention does not rely on external features such as the face or palm shape, but rather on things that lie deep within the individual's heart, that is, the past history and experiences of the individual. Use the "knowledge" based on This knowledge data is once encrypted,
The encrypted data is divided into two parts, one part being stored in the computer system and the other part being stored in the personal belongings. This personal item may be a magnetic card, but more effectively a small card-like device containing electronic circuitry. While conventional magnetic cards are passive storage media with a relatively small storage capacity, this device is a storage medium with an active element that can also be called an electronic card and has a relatively large storage capacity. After encrypting it in this way, if you divide it into two parts and store them separately, even if only this electronic card is stolen,
Conversely, even if personal knowledge data in a computer system is stolen, it will be impossible to decipher it because each piece of data is incomplete. Therefore, only when these two pieces of data are combined, decrypted with an appropriate key, and the computer system can accurately answer all the questions asked based on the decrypted knowledge data, can the identity of the person be identified. This makes it an extremely safe system. In particular, when this method is applied to a banking system, the above-mentioned electronic card is
It can be used as an electronic wallet that not only has the function of storing knowledge data for personal identification, but also has the function of managing monetary data. It is possible to build a system that allows users to make purchases using this electronic card.

Hereinafter, the present invention will be explained in detail with reference to Examples.

FIG. 1 shows an example of a system in which the personal identification method according to the present invention is implemented. In the figure,
A part of encrypted personal knowledge data is stored in the file device 2 of the host computer 1. A user sitting in front of a terminal device 3 connected to a host computer 1 sets his or her electronic card 4 in an electronic card reader 5 and inputs his or her password from a keyboard 6. At least two types of information are stored in the electronic card 4, the first type being the rest of the knowledge data described above, and the second type being used to search for the corresponding knowledge data from the file device 2. This is the information. As the second type information, for example, a file number or an electronic card issue number can be used. Since this information is encrypted using the personal password as a key, the host computer 1 decrypts the type 2 information read from the electronic card 4 using the password entered from the keyboard 6. A part of the corresponding knowledge data can be extracted from.

The retrieved knowledge data is combined with the knowledge data stored in the electronic card, for example, by the terminal device 3. The terminal device 3 can be an intelligent terminal that has its own computing power. Based on the synthesized knowledge data, the terminal device decodes it using the input password, displays a question on the display device 7 based on the result, and prompts the user to input the answer. In this case, the question may be uttered in synthesized voice using the attached speaker 8. The answer is input using the keys on the keyboard 6 or by voice into the attached microphone 9. In this case, the questions may be answered in a “yes” or “no” format, or in a multiple choice format with 1 to 5 items.
The technology of making one of the numerical values of the degree uttered and recognized has already reached the stage of practical use.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a specific embodiment of the electronic card 4 used in the personal identification system of the present invention. With the recent development of semiconductor technology, electronic circuits can be made extremely small and thin, and in this example, the overall size is the size of a normal credit card, and even if it is thick, it is less than several times that size. This can be achieved with The core of this electronic card is a microcomputer 11 and an electrically rewritable ROM 12.
(EEPROM, electrically erasable and
programmable read-only memory). In this embodiment, a circuit driving power source and a ROM writing power source are supplied from an external device, that is, the electronic card reader 5 described above, via terminals 16 and 17, and signals are exchanged with the transmitting/receiving control circuit 13. By the action of the optical conversion element 14, the signal is converted into a bit-serial optical signal. The microcomputer 11 has a function of executing predetermined programs in response to a plurality of input command signals, and each program is stored in the ROM 12. A part of the ROM 12 contains the above-mentioned type 1 and type 2 information, and this part operates the power switch circuit 15 under the control of the microcomputer 11 to return to the normal state when necessary. The contents can be rewritten by supplying a different power supply for writing than in the case of .

FIG. 3 shows part of an example of knowledge data used in this personal identification device. Here, symbols and numbers are each made up of 1 byte as an ASCII code, and Kanji and kana characters can be made up of 2 bytes each using codes specified in JIS C6226. Therefore, the information shown in FIG. 3 is essentially information made up of a series of bytes. This information includes basic data such as an individual's name, date of birth, gender, and address, as well as information about their past experiences and career, such as the name of the stream that runs through their hometown, and memories of mountains they have climbed. Your name, cities where you have lived in the past, the name of your teacher from school, the manufacturer of your favorite watch, your car's registration number, your mother's surname before marriage, etc. are listed after the corresponding item number. has been done. Among these, prefecture names are not character codes, but 1 is Hokkaido,
It may also be stored as a code number such as 2 for Aomori.

A technique in which the terminal device 3 issues questions using such knowledge data can be realized very easily. For example, the simplest method is ``you''.
The three character code strings "wa" and "ka?" are memorized, and one of several items, for example (28) Shiogama City in Figure 3, is selected using random numbers. Then, in response to (28), the terminal device inserts the character code "City where I have lived in the past" stored in the system into the character code of the question, and also inserts the character code "Shiogama City" of the answer. , to create the sentence "Is Shiogama City the city where you have lived in the past?" and display this on the display device 7. The display device 7 usually has a built-in character generator for kanji, kana, etc., and can be easily configured so that the display can be automatically performed simply by writing character codes into the display buffer memory. At this time, it is also possible to display and teach how to answer, such as "Please answer yes or no." In addition, in the above example, you can enter the name of a city other than Shiogama City and expect a "no" answer, and you can also use character code strings such as "you,""ha," and "which of the following?" ``Which of the following cities have you lived in in the past?''
...Shiogama City, 3...Himeji City, 4...Sakaiminato City, 5...
The question can be made more complex by giving about five examples, such as Matsuyama City, and inserting the real answer example ``Shiogama City'' anywhere or not at all. This type of questioning technique has already become a practical technique.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a method of storing personal knowledge data as shown in FIG. 3. If knowledge data is stored in its original form (as a normal character code), it is easily readable, which poses a major data security problem. This personal identification system is characterized by encrypting this, and furthermore, dividing the encrypted results into two and storing them separately. In general, the encryption method is to convert data in blocks (hereinafter referred to as blocks) using a certain key symbol.
An encryption method called ``Encryption Standard'' is available. Note: (Data Encryption
Standard Publication Number FIPS PUB 46, National
Bureau of Standard, USDepartment of
(Commerce) In this method, as shown in Figure 4, the original information is divided into 8 bytes each and encrypted as a block. In this case, an 8-byte password known only to the user can be used as the key. This encryption method treats 8-byte data as a series of 64-bit information, and begins by replacing the bit positions in a predetermined manner. Then, a complex operation decorated with keys is executed several times. Therefore, it is impossible to infer the original data from the output without the key, and the only way to decipher it is to try each key one after the other. DES requires 8 bytes for a key, and since 56 bits excluding the check bit can be taken freely, there are actually ²⁵⁶ different keys. Therefore, according to some calculations (assuming that one key is decrypted every 1 μs), the average time it takes to find the correct key by sequentially trying these keys is 1000 years. But the problem is
In a practical system, it is impossible to obtain even ²⁵⁶ types of keys. In the above example, it is convenient to encrypt a password entered by an individual as a key, but it is difficult to remember a sequence of 56 1's and 0's as a password. Therefore, the only option is to use a number entered from a numeric keyboard such as a normal numeric keypad as a password, and in that case, there are only 10 ⁸ combinations of 8-digit numbers. This is 3 minutes using the same calculation as above. In other words, if you decipher it with a powerful computer, you can see its contents in three minutes. In this way, even strong encryption methods for encrypted communications between computers can reveal unexpected weaknesses at the point of contact between computers and humans. In order to reliably eliminate this weakness, in the personal identification method of the present invention, knowledge data is encrypted in chunks and then a portion of it is extracted from each chunk.
In this method, the security of the data depends on the smaller of the extracted amount or the remaining amount. In other words, if you extract 1 bit from each of the 5 blocks, you only need to try ²⁵ times to guess these 5 bits using the remaining data (in reality, you need to try it ¹⁰⁸ times more). become). If 5
If we extract one byte at a time from each chunk, it would take ²⁴⁰ attempts to guess these five bytes using the remaining data. Therefore, in theory, both the extracted data and the remaining data are at their highest level of security when they are divided exactly in half. In the above example, 8 bytes of original information is converted into 8 bytes of encrypted information, and then converted into 4 bytes each, and one side is transferred to host computer 1 as shown in the figure.
The data is stored in the file device 2 of the individual, and the other is stored as a personal file in the ROM 12 of the electronic card 4 owned by the individual.

In this way, the information (i.e. 40 bytes) consisting of the five blocks in the above example becomes 20
If each byte is separated and one is to guess the other without a key, the key is an 8-digit number (i.e., 10 ⁸ ways), and 2 ^{32 × 5} × 10 ⁸ ways of trial calculation are required. This is a quantity that is virtually impossible to decipher. Moreover, some plausible information appears in several of these calculations, making it even more difficult to decipher. For example, in the example of FIG. 3, the information corresponding to the first block in FIG. 4 is "(01) Isono". This is because "(01)" is 1 byte each and "Isono" is 2 bytes each, totaling 8 bytes of information. At this time, in the process of deciphering "Isoda" and "Isoguchi"
A variety of plausible deciphering results will appear, such as ``Isoshima,''``Ueno,'' and ``Yamano.'' (01) (02)
If we knew that the numbers were in order, like (03), it would be a little easier to decipher it, but since half of the data was originally missing, it wouldn't be that much easier.

As described above, when encrypted data is divided into two parts for each encryption unit and stored separately, the security becomes extremely high. in this case,,
If the amount of original information is large, it is not necessarily necessary to separate it into halves. That is, even if a small amount of data is extracted from each block, the larger the number of blocks, the larger the number of combinations, and therefore only enough data needs to be extracted to maintain the necessary security. In this method, as described above, decryption is possible only when both are combined and the correct key is presented.

FIG. 5 shows an embodiment of an apparatus for creating knowledge data for the personal identification system of the present invention. Data creation terminal device 3 connected to host computer 1
3 includes a display device 7 for displaying questions presented from the host computer 1, a data input circuit 36 for inputting the answers, and data for holding the input data until it reaches a certain number of bytes. It is also connected to a holding circuit 37. Every time the input data reaches a certain number of bytes (i.e. 1 block), the encryption circuit 39 is activated to encrypt it using the key number input separately and held in the key register 38, and the resulting encrypted output is activated. It is configured such that it is divided into two by a dividing circuit 40, one is sent to the file device 2 via the host computer 1, and the other is written to the electronic card 4 by the electronic card writing device 44. in this case,
In principle, the data input circuit 36 may be a multi-character input keyboard such as a kanji tablet, but in order to improve man-machine performance, it is recommended that the questions displayed on the display device be selected as much as possible. This can also be done with a key.

The personal identification method described above can be applied to, for example, a banking system. That is, in FIG. 1 already shown, it is assumed that the host computer 1 also manages cash payments and payments as a bank computer. At this time, the user inserts his/her electronic card 4 into the terminal device 3 at the counter and inserts it into the electronic card reader 5.
and answer the questions displayed on the display device 7 one after another. When the identity of the person is confirmed,
The terminal device 3 reads out the third type of information contained in the electronic card 4 and displays it on the display device.
This third type of information is information on the deposit amount that is stored in addition to the first and second types described above. Therefore, users can know the amount of deposits in their electronic card, and can also easily display the amount of deposits remaining in their bank account at the same time. Determine whether to put the amount of money in the electronic card, and then
Enter the amount from . The terminal device adds the deposit amount remaining in the electronic card and the entered deposit withdrawal amount, encrypts this, and writes it into the electronic card again. This electronic card is essentially an electronic wallet, and when combined with a cash register at a store, the total amount of purchases can be easily deducted from it automatically.
It becomes possible to purchase cashless items.

In this personal identification method, the items (100) in Figure 3 are
As exemplified in , it is possible to include characteristic data of an individual's voice. This feature data is data obtained by voice analysis when a certain word is uttered, and may be, for example, a PARCOR coefficient, or may include other sound quality features. In this case, if item (100) is selected as a personal identification question, the terminal device instructs the user to ``please enter a password.'' When the user speaks the pre-registered words, it is analyzed and
It is possible to check whether the item (100) matches what is stored in the item (100) not only in terms of content but also in phonetics. In order to see such vocal consistency, it is not necessary to limit the question to just one of several question items (i.e., item (100)). If you input the answer to any question by voice, you can analyze the quality of the person's voice and get very accurate responses even from short words such as "yes,""no," and "number 3." Judgment becomes possible. In this way, since voice characteristic data can be included in the electronic card, it is possible to test whether the answer content is correct or not, as well as the voice quality. There is no need to go to a counter to interact with the bank's computer system, and deposits can be transferred to an electronic card using any telephone. In this case, the questions can be easily realized using speech synthesis technology, which is already in its mature stage, and it is also becoming easier to recognize the answers. Furthermore, since the electronic card includes active circuit elements, the optical conversion element 1 of the configuration described in FIG.
If 4 is replaced with a sound conversion element, communication can be easily performed using a conventional acoustic coupler, and the contents of the electronic card can be freely sent or rewritten according to the commands sent.

As explained above, according to the present invention, a safe personal identification system can be realized and can be put to practical use in various service systems, reservation systems, security systems, etc. including banking systems, and its effects are extremely large.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an example of a system in which the personal identification method according to the present invention is implemented, and FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a specific embodiment of an electronic card used in the personal identification method according to the present invention. FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of knowledge data used in the personal identification method of the present invention, FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a method for storing knowledge data as shown in FIG. 3, and FIG. FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an embodiment of an apparatus for creating knowledge data for a personal identification method. 1...Host computer, 2...File device, 3
...Terminal device, 4...Electronic card, 5...Electronic card reader, 6...Keyboard, 7...Display device, 8...Speaker, 9...Microphone, 11
... Microcomputer, 12 ... Electrically rewritable memory (EEPROM), 13 ... Transmission and reception control circuit, 14 ... Light conversion element (or sound conversion element), 15 ... Power switch circuit, 33 ... For data creation Terminal device, 36...Data input circuit, 3
8...Key register, 39...Encryption circuit, 40...
...Division circuit, 44...Electronic card writing device.

Claims (1)

[Scope of Claims] 1. Personal data obtained by dividing and storing personal data into a common storage means and separate storage means, and combining data from these means for identification. A personal identification method characterized by presenting a question based on the question and determining whether the answer to the question is correct or incorrect. 2. In the personal identification method described in claim 1, encrypted personal data is divided into two parts and stored in a common storage means and separate storage means, and upon identification, data is extracted from these means. A personal identification method characterized in that data is synthesized and decoded, a question is presented based on the decoded personal data, and the correctness or failure of a circuit in response to the question is tested. 3. A personal identification method according to claim 1 or 2, characterized in that the personal data is knowledge information based on the past career and experience of the individual. 4. The personal identification method according to claim 1 or 2 is characterized in that the answer to the question is input by voice, and the correctness of the answer is tested as well as the quality of the voice is tested. Personal identification method.