2D bar-codes for authentication: A security approach

In this paper, we investigate the authentication problem of real-world goods on which 2D bar-codes (2D-BC) were printed and we take the opponent´s point of view. The opponent is assumed to have access to N_c noisy copies of a genuine 2D-BC (noise being due to printing and scanning processes). A simple estimator of the 2D-BC based on copies averages is proposed, letting the opponent print a fake 2D-BC which aims at being declared as genuine by the system detector. Performance of the estimator in terms of error probability at the detector side is then derived with respect to N_c and compared with experimental results on real 2D-BC. It is shown that the opponent can produce a fake that successfully fools the detector with a reasonable number of genuine goods.