Optically encoded physical keys

Lock based security has been used since the early days of human history. Whenever people have wanted to keep their possessions safe, they have used locks to hinder those who would want to access their belongings against their will. As such, an arms race has ensued, consisting of ever more complex locks, and lock-defeating methods. This thesis is not the first time that optics have been used in locking mechanisms, but it puts forth a robust, versatile, and economical security system employing optics based on the spirit of physical keys. The proposed system uses a physical key with embedded optical fibers routed between optical ports on its surface. The corresponding reader scans the key by sequentially illuminating each port, and observing where the light exits the key. The reader then builds a matrix representing the internal connections of the key, and compares it to each key's unique identifying matrix to determine whether to grant or deny access to the current user.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2014

Author dc:creator

• Hounsell, Kyle

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• James W. Bales.

• Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/96455

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/96455