FIELD OF INVENTION

[001] The embodiments herein are generally relates to electronic devices, and more particularly to a mechanism for providing access to an electronic device using gesture based non-deterministic arithmetic and logical operations.

BACKGROUND

[002] Generally, almost all electronic devices (such as smart phones) are equipped with screen touch sensors which allow user to interact directly by touching the electronic device. These sensors allow the user to input the data just by touching the electronic device. Many applications have been designed/modified to take advantage of these touch screen as input devices. One such area includes security in which lock-screens prevent access to the electronic device.
[003] Different methods and systems have been proposed to authenticate and unlock the electronic devices. Conventional methods and systems include for example, but not limited to, pin code, password-string, pattern, face recognition, voice recognition, swipe to unlock, signature-based, and the like. The pin code and password-based lock mechanism provides a medium level of security and takes input by allowing the user to touch the numbers displayed on the screen or by drawing a pattern on the screen, which is vulnerable to shoulder surfing. Swipe to unlock may not provide any security to the electronic device and can be easily accessed by any unauthorized user.
[004] Though the existing systems and methods are effective to a degree in providing protection to electronic devices but, have tradeoffs in terms of ease of usage, drawing unique patterns on screen, security level, vulnerability, remembering password strings or patterns, shoulder surfing, user requirement, and the like.
OBJECT OF INVENTION
[005] The principal object of the embodiments herein is to provide a method and system for authenticating a user using gesture-based non-deterministic arithmetic and logical operations in an electronic device.
[006] Another object of the embodiments herein is to provide a mechanism for unlocking an electronic device by performing arithmetic and logical operations associated with gestures.
[007] Another object of the embodiments herein is to provide a mechanism to thwart shoulder surfing without explicitly entering password.

SUMMARY

[008] Accordingly the invention provides a method for authenticating a user to access an electronic device using gesture based operations. The method includes displaying a plurality of objects on the electronic device, and allowing the user to perform one or more gestures using the plurality of objects on the electronic device. Further, the method includes identifying an operation associated with the gesture, where the operation includes arithmetic and logical operation. Further, the method includes computing an input string by performing the identified operations on values associated with the plurality of objects, determining a match between the input string and a predefined password, and providing access to the electronic device in response to determining the match.
[009] Accordingly the invention provides a system for authenticating a user to access an access an electronic device using gesture based operations. The electronic device is configured to display a plurality of objects on the electronic device, and allow the user to perform one or more gestures using the plurality of objects. Further, the electronic device is configured to identify an operation associated with the gesture, where the operation includes arithmetic and logical operations. Further, the electronic device is configured to compute an input string by performing the identified operation on values associated with the plurality of objects, determine a match between the input string and a predefined password, and provide access to the electronic device in response to determining the match.
[0010] Accordingly the invention provides a computer program product for authenticating a user to access an electronic device using gesture based operations. The computer program product includes an integrated circuit. The integrated circuit includes a processor, a memory including a computer program code within the circuit. Further, the memory and the computer program code with the processor cause the product to display a plurality of objects on the electronic device, and allow the user to perform a gesture using the plurality of objects on the electronic device. Further, the memory and the computer program code with the processor cause the product to identify an operation associated with the gesture, where the operation includes arithmetic and logical operations. Further, the memory and the computer program code with the processor causes the product to compute an input string by performing the identified operation on values associated with the plurality of objects, determine a match between the input string and a predefined password, and provide access to the electronic device in response to determining the match.
[0011] These and other aspects of the embodiments herein will be better appreciated and understood when considered in conjunction with the following description and the accompanying drawings. It should be understood, however, that the following descriptions, while indicating preferred embodiments and numerous specific details thereof, are given by way of illustration and not of limitation. Many changes and modifications may be made within the scope of the embodiments herein without departing from the spirit thereof, and the embodiments herein include all such modifications.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF FIGURES

[0012] This invention is illustrated in the accompanying drawings, throughout which like reference letters indicate corresponding parts in the various figures. The embodiments herein will be better understood from the following description with reference to the drawings, in which:
[0013] FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating, among other things, a high level overview of a system, according to embodiments as disclosed herein;
[0014] FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing different modules present in electronic device, according to embodiments disclosed herein;
[0015] FIG. 3 is a flow chart illustrating a method for providing access to the electronic device using gesture based operations, according to embodiments disclosed herein;
[0016] FIGS. 4a, 4b, 4c, 4d, and 4e show an example illustration of the various operations performed to provide access to the electronic device, according to embodiments disclosed herein; and
[0017] FIG. 5 depicts a computing environment implementing the system and method, according to embodiments disclosed herein.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF INVENTION

[0018] The embodiments herein and the various features and advantageous details thereof are explained more fully with reference to the non-limiting embodiments that are illustrated in the accompanying drawings and detailed in the following description. Descriptions of well-known components and processing techniques are omitted so as to not unnecessarily obscure the embodiments herein. Also, the various embodiments described herein are not necessarily mutually exclusive, as some embodiments can be combined with one or more other embodiments to form new embodiments. The term “or” as used herein, refers to a non-exclusive or, unless otherwise indicated. The examples used herein are intended merely to facilitate an understanding of ways in which the embodiments herein can be practiced and to further enable those skilled in the art to practice the embodiments herein. Accordingly, the examples should not be construed as limiting the scope of the embodiments herein.
[0019] The embodiments herein achieve a system and method for authenticating a user to access an electronic device using gesture based operations. The system and method includes associating an arithmetic or logical operation to each gesture. The electronic device allows the user to perform a gesture using a plurality of objects displayed on the electronic device. The arithmetic or logical operation associated with the gesture performed by the user is identified. An input string can be computed by performing the identified arithmetic or logical operation, for each gesture, on values associated with the objects. The electronic device then attempts to match the input string with a predefined password and if the input string matches with the predefined password then the user is allowed to access the electronic device.
[0020] The method and system disclosed herein allows the user to input the password using different combination of gestures each time such that the imposters observing the user accessing the electronic device may have fewer chances to know the correct unlocking pattern or code. The method and system can be used to increase the protection of the electronic device by randomly displaying the objects and the values associated with them every time the user tries to access the electronic device. Further, the system does not restrict the user to a particular portion of the screen. The user is allowed to use the whole screen of the electronic device and use different combination of the objects or gesture to avoid shoulder surfing. Furthermore, the proposed system and method can be implemented using existing infrastructure, components, and modules, and may not require extensive set-up or instrumentation.
[0021] Referring now to the drawings, and more particularly to FIGS. 1 through 5, where similar reference characters denote corresponding features consistently throughout the figures, there are shown preferred embodiments.
[0022] FIG. 1 illustrating generally, among other things, a high level overview of a system 100, according to embodiments as disclosed herein. In an embodiment, the system 100 includes an electronic device 102. The electronic device 102 described herein can be for example, but not limited to, Smartphone, tablet, laptop, computer, wired devices, wireless devices, communicator, portable electronic device, wearable computing devices, flexible devices, electronic kiosk, and the like. In an embodiment, the electronic device 102 can include a touch surface 104 which senses touch from user 106 fingers into electrical signals and delivers the signals to the electronic device 102. A plurality of objects 108 associated with a character (c) can be displayed on the electronic device 102 (however the value associated with each object may or may not be displayed). The characters described herein can be alphabet, numeral, graphical representation, combination thereof, or any other character. The electronic device 102 can be configured to randomize the location and the characters associated with the objects 108 each time before displaying to the user 106.
[0023] The FIG. 1 shows a limited overview of the system 100 but, it is to be understood that another embodiment is not limited thereto. Further, the system 100 can include different modules communicating among each other along with other hardware or software components. For example, the component can be, but not limited to, a process running in the electronic device, an executable process, a thread of execution, a program, and/or a computer. By way of illustration, both an application running on an electronic device and the electronic device can be the component.
[0024] FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing different modules 200 present in the electronic device 102, according to embodiments disclosed herein. In an embodiment, the electronic device 102 can be configured to include an association module 202, a gesture recognition module 204, controller module 206, and storage module 208. In an embodiment, the association module 202 can be configured to associate the arithmetic and logical operations to the gestures. The associated operation can then be performed on the characters associated with the objects 108 used to perform the gesture. An example illustration of the gestures and associated arithmetic and logical operations are described below:
Gesture Operation
Pinch-out
Pinch-in
Drag-drop
Rotate clock wise
Rotate anti-clock wise
Swirl clock wise
Swirl anti-clock wise Subtraction
Addition
Compare
Subtraction
Addition
Division
Multiplication

[0025] In an embodiment, the gesture recognition module 204 can be configured to recognize the gestures performed by the user. The user may perform the gesture by selecting multiple objects. The user may perform the gesture with or without touching the touch surface of the electronic device 102. For example, but not limited to, the user may point the objects virtually in the electronic device 102 to establish the integration, may join fingers (such as thumb and forefinger) together to perform the gesture on the objects, may move hand in a waving motion without touching the touch surface of the electronic device 102 to perform the gesture, may use predefined signs, flags, arms, or strokes on the electronic device 102 for performing the gesture on the objects, and the like.
[0026] In an embodiment, the controller module 206 can be configured to identify the operation associated with the gesture performed by the user. For each gesture, a substring of password can be computed by performing the operation associated with the gesture on the values associated with the corresponding objects. For example, a sequence of gestures results into a sequence of substrings and these substrings can be concatenated in order to form an input string. Further, the controller module 206 can be configured to match the input string with the predefined password and provide access to the electronic device 102 in response to a successful match.
[0027] In an embodiment, the storage module 208 can be configured to store the predefined password, arithmetic and logical operations, objects and associated characters. In an embodiment, the storage module 208 can be configured to store other instructions and signals required to process different operations of the electronic device 102. Further, various operations performed by the system 100 is described in conjunction with the FIG. 3. The modules 200 described with respect to the FIG. 2 are only for illustrative purpose and does not limit the scope of the invention.
[0028] FIG. 3 is a flow chart illustrating a method 300 for providing access to the electronic device 102 using the gesture based operations, according to embodiments disclosed herein. The method 300 and other description described herein provide a basis for a control program which can be implemented using a microcontroller, microprocessor, or an equivalent thereof. In an embodiment, at step 302, the method 300 includes associating operations to gestures. The operations described herein can be for example, but not limited to, arithmetic, logical, or any other operation. The user can associate an operation for each gesture. For example, one user may configure the pinch-in gesture for addition and other user may associate the same gesture for concatenation of two characters. Furthermore, some of the gesture operations can be set to generate NULL values irrespective of the associated values of the selected objects 108. The associated operation can then be performed on the values associated with the objects 108 used to perform the gesture.
[0029] At step 304, the method 300 includes displaying the plurality of objects 108 on the electronic device 102. Each object 108 can be associated with a character displayed randomly on the electronic device 102. At step 306, the method 300 includes allowing the user to perform gesture on the electronic device 102 using the displayed objects. The user may perform the gesture by selecting different combination of objects. At step 308, the method 300 includes validating the gesture performed by the user. The method 300 allows the electronic device 102 to validate the gesture performed by the user by identifying the gesture using an association table. In an embodiment, the method 300 includes repeating the steps 302 to 308 in response to determining that the gesture performed by the user is invalid. In an embodiment, at step 310, the method 300 includes identifying the operation associated with the gesture performed by the user in response to determining that the gesture is valid. The method 300 allows the controller module 206 to identify the arithmetic or logical operation associated with the gesture in response to determining that the gesture performed by the user is valid.
[0030] At step 312, the method 300 includes computing an input string by performing the identified operation on the plurality of objects 108. A substring for each gesture performed by the user can be computed by performing the associated operations on the values associated with the objects 108 used to perform the gesture. Every time the user performs a valid gesture, the associated arithmetic or logical operation can be identified and performed on values associated with the objects 108 used to perform the gesture. The result of the each operation can be appended to the previous substring to form the input string until the length of the input string is equal to the predefined password. At step 314, the method 300 includes determining whether the length of the input string is equal to the length of the password. In an embodiment, the method 300 includes repeating the steps 302 to 314 in response to determining that the length of the input string is not equal to the length of the password. In an embodiment, at step 316, the method 300 includes determining a match between the input string and the predefined password in response to determining that the length of the input string is equal to the length of the predefined password. In an embodiment, the method 300 includes repeating the steps 302 to 316 in response to determining a mismatch between the input string and the predefined password. In an embodiment, at step 318, the method 300 includes providing access to the electronic device 102 in response to determining the match. The method 300 allows the user to access the electronic device 102 upon determining that the match between the input string and the predefined password.
[0031] The various steps, blocks, operations, and acts described with respect to the FIG. 3 can be performed in sequential order, in random order, simultaneously, parallel, or a combination thereof. Further, in some embodiments, some of the steps, blocks, operations, and acts can be omitted, skipped, modified, or added without departing from scope of the invention.
[0032] FIGS. 4a, 4b, 4c, 4d, and 4e show an example illustration of the various operations performed to pro, according to embodiments disclosed herein. In an example, consider the password to access the electronic device 102 is predefined as “1174”. The electronic device 102 displays a plurality of objects as shown in the FIG. 4a. Each object is associated with a character such as, 1, 2, 14, 4 6, 8, 15, and the like for displaying as well as values associated with the objects are same. The FIG. 4b shows some of the arithmetic operations associated with the gestures. Gesture (G1) is a pinch-in gesture associated to an addition operation and gesture (G2) is a pinch-out gesture associated to a subtraction operation. The associated operation can then be performed on the values associated with the objects used to perform the gesture. Further, the user can then perform a gesture using the objects. As shown in the FIG. 4c, the user performs gesture G1 on the selected objects with associated characters 2 and 9. The gesture G1 has the associated arithmetic operation of addition and hence the result of this operation is 11. Note that there can be many other combinations of objects and gestures which the user can select to produce the substring 11.
[0033] After this operation the electronic device screen can be refreshed with a new set of objects associated with the characters as shown in the FIG. 4d. As shown in the FIG. 4e, user may then perform the gesture G2 on two objects having associated values of 80 and 6, which results into a string 74 as the associated arithmetic operation is a subtract operation for the gesture G2. Furthermore, the electronic device 102 can be configured to concatenate or append the string value 74 (generated using the G2 based arithmetic operation) with the previous substring value 11 (generated using the G1 based arithmetic operation) to get a string value 1174. The electronic device 102 can then attempt to match the input string (1174) with the predefined password (1174) and if the match is successful, the user is allowed to access the electronic device 102.
[0034] Though the characters associated with the objects are shown as numerals but, it is to be understood that other embodiments are not limited thereto. Further, the characters associated with the objects can also be a picture or any graphical representation. For example, a character (C1) can be a name of a person and another character (C2) can be a picture of an apple. The user performs a gesture associated with a logical operation like AND (or NOT) by selecting the objects associated with C1 and C2. The electronic device can then perform the Boolean operation to determine whether the person likes or dislikes apple and computes the input string as “true” or “false”. The logical association between the person name and their likes can be already stored in the storage module 208.
[0035] The various labels, modules, components, devices, names, elements, operations, or the like described with respective to FIGS. 1 through 4 are only for illustrative purpose and does not limit the scope of the invention. Further, it is understood that any other labels, modules, components, devices, names, elements, operations, can be used to perform the same, similar, or substantially similar operations or functions without departing from the scope of the invention.
[0036] FIG. 5 depicts a computing environment 502 implementing the application, in accordance with various embodiments of the present invention. As depicted, the computing environment 502 comprises at least one processing unit 504 that is equipped with a control unit 506 and an Arithmetic Logic Unit (ALU) 508, a memory 510, a storage unit 512, a clock chip 514, plurality of networking devices 516, and a plurality Input output (I/O) devices 518. The processing unit 504 is responsible for processing the instructions of the algorithm. The processing unit 504 receives commands from the control unit 506 in order to perform its processing. Further, any logical and arithmetic operations involved in the execution of the instructions are computed with the help of the ALU 508.
[0037] The overall computing environment 502 can be composed of multiple homogeneous and/or heterogeneous cores, multiple CPUs of different kinds, special media and other accelerators. The processing unit 504 is responsible for processing the instructions of the algorithm. The processing unit 504 receives commands from the control unit 506 in order to perform its processing. Further, any logical and arithmetic operations involved in the execution of the instructions are computed with the help of the ALU 508. Further, the plurality of process units may be located on a single chip or over multiple chips.
[0038] The algorithm comprising of instructions and codes required for the implementation are stored in either the memory unit 510 or the storage 512 or both. At the time of execution, the instructions may be fetched from the corresponding memory 510 and/or storage 512, and executed by the processing unit 504. The processing unit 504 synchronizes the operations and executes the instructions based on the timing signals generated by the clock chip 514. The embodiments disclosed herein can be implemented through at least one software program running on at least one hardware device and performing network management functions to control the elements. The elements shown in the FIGS. 1-5 include various units, blocks, modules, or steps described in relation with methods, processes, algorithms, or systems of the present invention, which can be implemented using any general purpose processor and any combination of programming language, application, and embedded processor.
[0039] The foregoing description of the specific embodiments will so fully reveal the general nature of the embodiments herein that others can, by applying current knowledge, readily modify and/or adapt for various applications such specific embodiments without departing from the generic concept, and, therefore, such adaptations and modifications should and are intended to be comprehended within the meaning and range of equivalents of the disclosed embodiments. It is to be understood that the phraseology or terminology employed herein is for the purpose of description and not of limitation. Therefore, while the embodiments herein have been described in terms of preferred embodiments, those skilled in the art will recognize that the embodiments herein can be practiced with modification within the spirit and scope of the embodiments as described herein.

STATEMENT OF CLAIMS
We claim:
1. A method for authenticating a user to access an electronic device using gesture based operations, the method comprising:
displaying a plurality of objects on said electronic device, wherein each said object is associated with a value;
allowing said user to perform at least one gesture using said plurality of objects on said electronic device;
identifying at least one operation associated with said at least one gesture, wherein said operation comprises at least one of arithmetic and logical operation;
computing an input string by performing said at least one identified operation on at least one said value associated with said plurality of objects;
determining a match between said input string and a predefined password; and
providing access to said electronic device in response to determining said match.
2. The method of claim 1, wherein said at least one operation is pre-associated to said at least one gesture.
3. The method of claim 1, wherein said value is associated with at least one character.
4. The method of claim 1, wherein computing said input string further comprises concatenating substrings obtained for each gesture by performing said at least one identified operation.
5. A system for authenticating a user to access an electronic device using gesture based operations, wherein said electronic device is configured to:
display a plurality of objects on said electronic device, wherein each said object is associated with a value,
allow said user to perform at least one gesture using said plurality of objects on said electronic device,
identify at least one operation associated with said at least one gesture, wherein said operation comprises at least one of arithmetic and logical operation,
compute an input string by performing said at least one identified operation on at least one said value associated with said plurality of objects,
determine a match between said input string and a predefined password, and
provide access to said electronic device in response to determining said match.
6. The system of claim 5, wherein said at least one operation is pre-associated to said at least one gesture.
7. The system of claim 5, wherein said value is associated with at least one character.
8. The system of claim 5, wherein said input string is computed by concatenating sequence of substrings obtained by performing said at least one identified operation.
9. A computer program product for authenticating a user to access an electronic device using gesture based operations, the product comprising:
an integrated circuit comprising at least one processor;
at least one memory having a computer program code within said circuit, wherein said at least one memory and said computer program code with said at least one processor cause said product to:
display a plurality of objects on said electronic device, wherein each said object is associated with a value,
allow said user to perform at least one gesture using said plurality of objects on said electronic device,
identify at least one operation associated with said at least one gesture, wherein said operation comprises at least one of arithmetic and logical operation,
compute an input string by performing said at least one identified operation on at least one said value associated with said plurality of objects,
determine a match between said input string and a predefined password, and
provide access to said electronic device in response to determining said match.
10. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein said at least one operation is pre-associated to said at least one gesture.
11. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein said value is associated with at least one character.
12. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein said input string is computed by concatenating sequence of substrings obtained by performing said at least one identified operation.
Date: - 3rd day of October, 2013 Signature:-
Vikram Pratap Singh Thakur
Patent Agent

ABSTRACT
The embodiments herein provide a method and system for authenticating a user to access an electronic device using gesture based operations. The method includes displaying a plurality of objects on the electronic device, and allowing the user to perform a gesture using the plurality of objects on the electronic device. Further, the method includes identifying an operation associated with the gesture, where the operation includes arithmetic and logical operation. Furthermore, the method includes computing an input string by performing the identified operation on values associated with the plurality of objects, determining a match between the input string and a predefined password; and providing access to the electronic device in response to a successful match.
FIG. 3

CLAIMS:We claim:
1. A method for authenticating a user to access an electronic device using gesture based operations, the method comprising:
displaying a plurality of objects on said electronic device, wherein each said object is associated with a value;
allowing said user to perform at least one gesture using said plurality of objects on said electronic device;
identifying at least one operation associated with said at least one gesture, wherein said operation comprises at least one of arithmetic and logical operation;
computing an input string by performing said at least one identified operation on at least one said value associated with said plurality of objects;
determining a match between said input string and a predefined password; and
providing access to said electronic device in response to determining said match.
2. The method of claim 1, wherein said at least one operation is pre-associated to said at least one gesture.
3. The method of claim 1, wherein said value is associated with at least one character.
4. The method of claim 1, wherein computing said input string further comprises concatenating substrings obtained for each gesture by performing said at least one identified operation.
5. A system for authenticating a user to access an electronic device using gesture based operations, wherein said electronic device is configured to:
display a plurality of objects on said electronic device, wherein each said object is associated with a value,
allow said user to perform at least one gesture using said plurality of objects on said electronic device,
identify at least one operation associated with said at least one gesture, wherein said operation comprises at least one of arithmetic and logical operation,
compute an input string by performing said at least one identified operation on at least one said value associated with said plurality of objects,
determine a match between said input string and a predefined password, and
provide access to said electronic device in response to determining said match.
6. The system of claim 5, wherein said at least one operation is pre-associated to said at least one gesture.
7. The system of claim 5, wherein said value is associated with at least one character.
8. The system of claim 5, wherein said input string is computed by concatenating sequence of substrings obtained by performing said at least one identified operation.
9. A computer program product for authenticating a user to access an electronic device using gesture based operations, the product comprising:
an integrated circuit comprising at least one processor;
at least one memory having a computer program code within said circuit, wherein said at least one memory and said computer program code with said at least one processor cause said product to:
display a plurality of objects on said electronic device, wherein each said object is associated with a value,
allow said user to perform at least one gesture using said plurality of objects on said electronic device,
identify at least one operation associated with said at least one gesture, wherein said operation comprises at least one of arithmetic and logical operation,
compute an input string by performing said at least one identified operation on at least one said value associated with said plurality of objects,
determine a match between said input string and a predefined password, and
provide access to said electronic device in response to determining said match.
10. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein said at least one operation is pre-associated to said at least one gesture.
11. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein said value is associated with at least one character.
12. The computer program product of claim 9, wherein said input string is computed by concatenating sequence of substrings obtained by performing said at least one identified operation.