Anti-counterfeiting using reflective micro structures - Based on random positioning of microstructures

We present a novel anti-counterfeiting and product security technique using a secure optical tag based on randomly distributed reflective micro particles. This technique can complement the existing security and logistics mechanisms like 1D/2D barcodes, DataMatrix, holograms etc. or can be used as a standalone solution too. The concept revolves around the use of random distribution of reflective microstructures as physically unclonable function (PUF). The particles are embedded into product surface or in the document. These particles are invisible to naked eye, the verification is done by imaging the reflections from these micro structures with a camera enabled cellphone equipped with some add-on optics. Here we present an overview of the system for using the secure optical tag, its registration and authentication.