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mQRCode: Secure QR Code Using Nonlinearity of Spatial Frequency in Light

Published: 11 October 2019 Publication History

Abstract

Quick response (QR) codes are becoming pervasive due to their rapid readability and the popularity of smartphones with built-in cameras. QR codes are also gaining importance in the retail sector as a convenient mobile payment method. However, researchers have concerns regarding the security of QR codes, which leave users susceptible to financial loss or private information leakage. In this study, we addressed this issue by developing a novel QR code (called mQRCode), which exploits patterns presenting a specific spatial frequency as a form of camouflage. When the targeted receiver holds a camera in a designated position (e.g., directly in front at a distance of 30 cm from the camouflaged QR code), the original QR code is revealed in form of a Moire pattern. From any other position, only the camouflaged QR code can be seen. In experiments, the decryption rate of mQRCode was > 98.6% within 10.2 frames via a multi-frame decryption method. The decryption rate for cameras positioned 20° off axis or > 10cm away from the designated location dropped to 0%, indicating that mQRCode is robust against attacks.

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cover image ACM Conferences
MobiCom '19: The 25th Annual International Conference on Mobile Computing and Networking
August 2019
1017 pages
ISBN:9781450361699
DOI:10.1145/3300061
Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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Published: 11 October 2019

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Author Tags

  1. nonlinearity
  2. screen-camera communication
  3. secure qr code

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Cited By

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  • (2024)Comparative Technical Analysis of QR Code and NFC in Contactless PaymentsProceedings of the 2024 10th International Conference on Computer Technology Applications10.1145/3674558.3674593(242-246)Online publication date: 15-May-2024
  • (2024)POSTER: Holographic Optical Tag enabled Omnidirectional IoT ConnectionProceedings of the ACM SIGCOMM 2024 Conference: Posters and Demos10.1145/3672202.3673726(31-32)Online publication date: 4-Aug-2024
  • (2024)MoiréTracker: Continuous Camera-to-Screen 6-DoF Pose Tracking Based on Moiré PatternIEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications10.1109/JSAC.2024.341461942:10(2642-2658)Online publication date: Oct-2024
  • (2024)Holocube: 3D Opitcal IoT Connections via Software Defined Pepper's Ghost2024 IEEE 32nd International Conference on Network Protocols (ICNP)10.1109/ICNP61940.2024.10858565(1-12)Online publication date: 28-Oct-2024
  • (2023)Enhancing Counterfeit Detection with Multi-Features on Secure 2D Grayscale CodesComputers10.3390/computers1209018312:9(183)Online publication date: 14-Sep-2023
  • (2023)Low-cost and Non-visual Labels Using Magnetic PrintingProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35932327:EICS(1-18)Online publication date: 19-Jun-2023
  • (2023)MoiréTag: Angular Measurement and Tracking with a Passive MarkerACM SIGGRAPH 2023 Conference Proceedings10.1145/3588432.3591538(1-10)Online publication date: 23-Jul-2023
  • (2023)UQRComProceedings of the ACM on Interactive, Mobile, Wearable and Ubiquitous Technologies10.1145/35715886:4(1-22)Online publication date: 11-Jan-2023
  • (2023)ScreenID: Enhancing QRCode Security by Utilizing Screen Dimming FeatureIEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking10.1109/TNET.2022.320304431:2(862-876)Online publication date: Apr-2023
  • (2023)MagneComm+: Near-Field Electromagnetic Induction Communication With MagnetometerIEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing10.1109/TMC.2021.313348122:5(2789-2801)Online publication date: 1-May-2023
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