Autonomous Vehicle Access via Biometric Authentication
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Solution Overview
Problem
Autonomous vehicles lack effective security measures for user access control, as they operate without human oversight, making it difficult to ensure that only authorized individuals can access the vehicle.
Innovation Solution
A computer-implemented method using biometric authentication through user computing devices to verify the identity of users before granting access to autonomous vehicles, ensuring secure and controlled access by providing authentication result data to the vehicle's control systems to unlock doors or perform other access actions.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If biometric authentication is implemented through user computing devices, then security and access control are improved, but device complexity and computational requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses the user's existing computing device (smartphone, tablet, or wearable) as an intermediary to perform biometric authentication. This mediator contains the biometric sensors and processing capabilities, eliminating the need to embed complex authentication hardware directly in the autonomous vehicle. The user device acts as a portable security gateway that communicates with the vehicle system to grant or deny access.
Solution Approach 2:
The system leverages the user's own computing device and its built-in biometric capabilities (fingerprint sensors, facial recognition, iris scanning) to perform authentication. The user's device serves itself by utilizing its existing hardware and software resources for verification, rather than requiring the vehicle to provide all authentication functions. This self-service approach reduces the vehicle's computational burden and hardware requirements.
2Reliability
If local verification processes are performed at the autonomous vehicle, then access control is achieved, but computational resources are consumed that could be used for navigation and operation
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the computationally intensive biometric authentication process from the autonomous vehicle system and relocates it to the user's computing device. By taking out the verification function from the vehicle, the system eliminates the need for the vehicle to process biometric data, saving valuable computational resources and energy that can be dedicated to navigation, sensor processing, and autonomous operation.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces the mechanical/computational authentication system that would reside in the vehicle with a software-based solution running on the user's device. The biometric verification is performed through software algorithms on the user device, and only the authentication result (approved or denied) is transmitted to the vehicle. This substitution eliminates the need for the vehicle to maintain complex authentication hardware and software, reducing its computational load.
Data Source
AI summary
Systems and methods are directed to providing controlled user access to an autonomous vehicle. In one example, a computer-implemented method for providing access to an autonomous vehicle includes requesting, by a computing system comprising one or more computing devices, an authentication of a user desiring access to an autonomous vehicle, wherein the authentication of the user is to be performed by a user computing device associated with the user using one or more biometric sensors. The method further includes receiving, by the computing system, user authentication result data indicating that the user authentication was successful; and in response to receiving the user authentication result data indicating that the user authentication was successful, providing, by the computing system, user access data to the autonomous vehicle, wherein the user access data comprises instructions for the autonomous vehicle to perform one or more actions to enable access to the autonomous vehicle.