System and method for access control using liveness detection

Abstract

The invention provides, in some aspects, a method of access control that includes receiving one or more frames (“depth frames”) of a depth image stream acquired by a depth camera and, for each of those depth frames, generating one or more scores of the liveness of the image and/or of a candidate individual therein. The method includes creating a point cloud from a respective depth frame and generating the liveness score from a vector based on geometric characteristics of eigenvalues of point-wise neighborhoods within that point cloud. That vector, which characterizes the respective depth frame and surface contours of a face of the candidate individual represented therein, can serve as a measure of how that surface varies and, thereby, permits it to be distinguished from a spoof, e.g., a depth image of faces printed on paper or shown a digital display.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.