Method, device, and system for generating, repairing, and identifying an incomplete QR code
AssigneeAlibaba Group Holding Limited
InventorsJiaheng Wang, Jun Xie
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
The security of a QR code is substantially increased by removing an alignment pattern and/or a position detection pattern from a complete QR code to form an incomplete QR code. A complete QR code can be regenerated from the incomplete QR code with the proper imaging angle to the incomplete QR code. A malicious operator is unlikely to be able to obtain the proper imaging angle and is thereby unable to reconstruct a complete QR code from the incomplete QR code.
Claims17
A method of reading a QR code, the method comprising:
- capturing an image of an incomplete QR code, the incomplete QR code having a missing region with a functional pattern that is missing, wherein the functional pattern that is missing comprises a position detection pattern;
- determining a version of a complete QR code that corresponds with the incomplete QR code;
- identifying the functional pattern in the complete QR code that is missing in the incomplete QR code;
- adding the functional pattern to the missing region in the incomplete QR code to form a recovered QR code;
- in response to adding the functional pattern, randomly adding pixels to the missing region surrounding the functional pattern to add to the recovered QR code, wherein the recovered QR code comprises a number of functional patterns and a number of modules;
- and
- reading data from the recovered QR code.
A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having embedded therein program instructions, which when executed by a processor, cause the processor to execute a method of reading a QR code, the method comprising:
- capturing an image of an incomplete QR code, the incomplete QR code having a missing region with a functional pattern that is missing, wherein the functional pattern that is missing comprises a position detection pattern;
- determining a version of a complete QR code that corresponds with the incomplete QR code;
- identifying the functional pattern in the complete QR code that is missing in the incomplete QR code;
- adding the functional pattern to the missing region in the incomplete QR code to form a recovered QR code;
- in response to adding the functional pattern, randomly adding pixels to the missing region surrounding the functional pattern to add to the recovered QR code, wherein the recovered QR code comprises a number of functional patterns and a number of modules;
- and
- reading data from the recovered QR code.
A QR code device, comprising:
- a memory;
- an image capture device;
- and
- a processor coupled to the memory and the image capture device, the processor to:
- obtain data from the memory and a captured image of an incomplete QR code from the image capture device,
- the incomplete QR code having a missing region with a functional pattern that is missing, wherein the functional pattern that is missing comprises a position detection pattern;
- determine a version of a complete QR code that corresponds with the incomplete QR code;
- identify the functional pattern in the complete QR code that is missing in the incomplete QR code;
- add the functional pattern to the missing region in the incomplete QR code to form a recovered QR code;
- in response to the addition of the functional pattern, randomly add pixels to the missing region surrounding the functional pattern to add to the recovered QR code, wherein the recovered QR code comprises a number of functional patterns and a number of modules;
- and
- read data from the recovered QR code.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.