System and method to optically authenticate physical objects

Abstract

A system and method to verify the authenticity of a physical object, based on the efficient acquisition and digital post-processing of a large amount of optical data. An optical system, comprised of an array of microscope-type 'micro-cameras' and a patterned illumination source, acquires spatial, spectral and angular information about the physical object in the form of micro-camera images. The set of all acquired images comprise one object dataset, which a post-processing system then digitally transforms into a multi-gigabyte set of semi-random keys. Authentication takes place at a later date following a challenge-and-response protocol. The high resolution (<15 μm) of the acquired data presents a significant challenge to attempted duplication of the physical object, and the large size (>1 Gigabyte) of the key set similarly prevents both physical and digital forgery attempts.