Phone Number Authentication via Messaging API
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Solution Overview
Problem
Users face difficulties in managing multiple application accounts on their devices, leading to cumbersome credential management and potential security risks due to forgotten sharing permissions and tedious authentication processes.
Innovation Solution
A phone-based authentication system that allows users to log into applications using their phone number, which is verified through a messaging application's API, eliminating the need for usernames and passwords and enhancing security by centralizing credential management.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If users manage multiple application accounts with separate credentials, then each application can be accessed independently, but the complexity of credential management increases and security risks arise from forgotten permissions
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a universal authentication system where a single phone number serves as the credential for multiple applications. The messaging application acts as a central authentication service that verifies the phone number and provides access tokens to various applications, eliminating the need for separate usernames and passwords for each app while maintaining security through centralized verification.
Solution Approach 2:
The messaging application serves as an intermediary between the user's phone number and the target applications. Instead of users directly managing credentials for each application, the messaging application mediates the authentication process by verifying the phone number through SMS code validation and issuing access tokens, thereby simplifying credential management while maintaining security.
2Ease of operation
If users create separate accounts for each application, then application-specific access is enabled, but the authentication process becomes tedious and time-consuming
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary authentication by verifying the user's phone number through SMS code validation in advance. Once the phone number is verified and stored in the messaging application, subsequent logins to various applications are expedited by simply entering the phone number, which the messaging application then validates against the pre-verified number, eliminating the need for repeated full authentication processes.
Solution Approach 2:
A single verified phone number provides universal access across multiple applications. The messaging application stores the verified phone number and uses it to authenticate the user across different applications, allowing the user to log in to any connected application with just their phone number rather than creating and managing separate credentials for each app.
3Reliability
If traditional username and password credentials are used, then application security is maintained, but users face difficulties remembering multiple credentials and managing sharing permissions
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the security verification function from individual applications and centralizes it in the messaging application. Instead of each application independently verifying usernames and passwords, the system extracts the authentication logic to a central service that verifies the phone number through SMS codes and manages access tokens, thereby maintaining security while eliminating the need for users to remember multiple complex credentials.
Solution Approach 2:
The system uses the user's existing phone number, which they already possess and can access, as the authentication credential. This replaces the need for users to create and remember separate usernames and passwords. The phone number serves as a universal copy of the user's identity that can be used across multiple applications without requiring memorization of additional credentials.
Data Source
AI summary
Systems and methods are provided for registering with a given application. The systems and methods include operations for receiving, with a messaging application, a request to authenticate a phone number from the given application, the phone number being input by a user to register an account with the given application; determining that the phone number received in the request matches a user phone number stored in a user account associated with the messaging application; in response to determining that the phone number received in the request matches the user phone number stored in the user account, transmitting a communication from the messaging application to the given application indicating that the phone number has been authenticated; and causing the given application to register the account for the user to enable the user to log into the given application.