Fingerprint Authentication Quality Profile Segmentation

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Solution Overview

Problem

Fingerprint recognition systems face accuracy issues due to noise in fingerprint images obtained from sensors, leading to false acceptances or rejections, as the images may include deformations and noise from varying pressure applied during scanning.

Innovation Solution

An authentication apparatus that includes a quality assessor to generate a quality profile of the fingerprint image, determining effective regions by assessing the quality of each unit region and excluding noisy areas, thereby improving the accuracy of authentication by comparing only the high-quality fingerprint information.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Reliability

If fingerprint images are obtained from sensors during authentication, then authentication functionality is provided, but noise and deformations are introduced leading to reduced authentication accuracy

Engineering Contradiction:
Improveauthentication accuracyVSAvoidnoise in fingerprint image
Core Design Contradiction:
ReliabilityVSObject-affected harmful factors

Solution Approach 1:

The fingerprint image is divided into multiple unit regions, and a quality profile is generated for each region to assess local image quality. This segmentation allows selective processing of different image areas, identifying and excluding noisy regions while preserving clean fingerprint data for authentication comparison.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #1Segmentation

Solution Approach 2:

The patent extracts and removes noisy unit regions from the fingerprint image by comparing quality profiles against threshold values. Only high-quality regions that meet the quality criteria are retained for authentication processing, effectively separating useful fingerprint information from harmful noise.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #2Taking out (Extraction)

2Measurement precision

If quality assessment of each unit region is performed to exclude noisy areas, then authentication accuracy is improved, but processing complexity increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improveimage quality assessment accuracyVSAvoidprocessing complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
Measurement precisionVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

Instead of processing the entire fingerprint image uniformly, the patent applies local quality assessment to each unit region independently. This allows tailored processing where only regions requiring quality verification are analyzed in detail, reducing overall computational complexity while maintaining precision where needed.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #3Local quality

Solution Approach 2:

The patent performs quality assessment on a partial basis - not all unit regions require full quality profile generation and threshold comparison. By selectively applying quality assessment only to regions that may contain noise or deformations, the processing complexity is reduced while still achieving the necessary measurement precision for accurate authentication.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #16Partial or excessive action

Data Source

PatentEP3190544B1Methods and apparatuses for authentication using biometric information
Publication Date: 2020.06.17 SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS CO LTD
  • EP3190544B1 patent drawingFigure 1
  • EP3190544B1 patent drawingFigure 2A~2B
  • EP3190544B1 patent drawingFigure 3

AI summary

Authentication methods and apparatuses are disclosed. An authentication method may include generating a quality profile of an authentication image, and determining an effective region in the authentication image based on the generated quality profile.