GB2523597A - Product authentication - Google Patents

Abstract

A method for authenticating proprietary 3D printing products 11 comprising assigning an identifier 12 to each item printed and incorporating said identifier 12 as a component in the printing operation. The identifier may be a machine readable device such as an RFID tag, bar code or QRC code, or may be alphanumeric or take on any other form. Multiple portions of contrasting material may be incorporated at multiple levels (fig 2). The identifier may be unique to each individual component, and a print data file may be rendered unusable after a permitted number of articles have been printed.

Description

Product Authentication This invention relates to authenticating products, in particular products that can be manufactured in more than one place and outwith the immediate control of a proprietor of rights in regard thereto, and products that are manufactured using additive manufacturing methods or 3D printing Many products, generally high value products, such as watches, or moderate value, high sales prodLicts, such as clothing, whisky and vodka, golf clubs, vehicle spare parts, medical products such as artificial hip oints, and bank notes, are counterfeited.

Anticounterfeiting measures usually involve security labelling, which may comprise difficult to replicate markings such as a hologram or the incorporation of DNA having a IS unique sequence.

This is relatively easy to do when the products are made in one factory or at least a number of factories under common control.

However, with technological advances in 3D printing that mean valuable products can be made, and the increasingly widespread use of 3D printers, the trend is to license the right to create one or a small number of particular products made according to a design incorporated in a media file adapted to control the 3D printer.

The question arises as to how the licensor is to ensure that products are not made outwith the terms of the licence. This can happen through overproduction by the licensee, by third party access to the media file, or by reverse engineering from a product made under licence.

It has been proposed to control or monitor production, both in 2D and 3D printing.

US2O 13/235412 discloses dividing the media file into two parts, used consecutively, in which the first part must be deleted before the second part can be run. This means that licences cannot be granted otherwise than for the production of a single product.

US7872772, concerned in any event only with 2D printing, prevents a user in a printer network from accessing a print file unless specifically authorised.

No method has to date been proposed that would impact on the production of a copy of a 3D printed product by reverse engineering.

The invention provides a method for authenticating proprietary 3D printing products that provides substantially better control over the unauthorised production of such products.

The invention comprises a method for authenticating proprietary 3D printing products comprising assigning an TD to each item printed and incorporating said ID as a component in the printing operation.

I

IDs will he incorporated only into authorised products. A product that does not comprise an ID or has an incorrect ID will be regarded as unauthorised and counterfeit, possibly infringing patent, design or copyright.

The ID may take many forms. It may, for example, comprise a security label which is incorporated in the product during the printing operation, and may comprise any of the commercially available such labels, such as a bar code or a QRC label, ahologram or an alphanumeric label, which would he so located as to he visible for inspection Or it may comprise a machine-readable ID such as an RFID label, which may be passive, so that it can be interrogated by a reader powering it by induction, or active, with its own power supply. Such labels maybe introduced manually during the printing process. Such machine readable IDs may be concealed from view in the product, and may be arranged to respond only to a particular interrogation procedure, militating against reverse engineering or straightforward scanning and reproduction. Labels may be provided in IS appropriate numbers to licensees, and will themselves he difficult to copy. As, however, nothing, and in particular no security label, is impossible to copy, further security may be had by the print file halting the printing process at different points in the process for the introduction of the label, so that the mere copying of a label is not enough to guarantee the production of an undetectable copy product will depend also on the correct placement of the copy label.

The ID may comprise information in regard to the licensor, the licensee, a product name or part number, one or more dates, such as a date relevant to Design Right or copyright protection, a patent number or a Registered Design number. A licence to produce a limited number of products may involve the assignment of a unique code to each.

Where an ID is machine readable, it may also be changeable, as by writing new data into a register of an RFID chip, which may comprise the date on which the ID was read and information as to where it was at the time and the identity of the reader. Information read may be communicated to a licensor database. In this way, an ID can provide a transaction history.

The ID may be produced by the printing process. Contrasting material can be printed as an alphanumeric code a barcode, a QRC code or any other visually or machine readable, and maybe printed on a single printed layer or distributed between multiple layers to constitute a 3D code, which may only make sense when viewed from a particular direction. The contrasting material may comprise material of a different colour or material which is differently responsive to electromagnetic radiation of a different wavelength outwith the optical spectrum such as infra-red, ultra-violet or microwave, and which is thus not apparent unless appropriately illuminated.

For such TDs, the printing instruction maybe built into the print file, and need not even he known to the licensee. For a multiple product licence, the file may contain a counter function that changes the ID code with each print so that all products have different IDs, and, when all the permitted products have been made, renders the file inoperable.

However, provision maybe made for the file to he updated after payment of a licence renewal fee.

Incorporating ID into a product according to the invention facilitates tracking of a product through a supply chain and allows an authenticity check on presentation for resale. For some types of ID, e.g. holograms or other security printing, expert knowledge is often needed to verify authenticity, while for others special equipment is needed, as, for example, RFTD chips or IDs revealed under ultra-violet, infra-red or microwave radiation However, codes such as bar codes and QRC codes may be read and verified or otherwise by a suitahl y-apped smartplione or tablet computer, which facilitates verificaUon in the field, by a prospective purchaser, for example, who may read the code and submit it for verification to the licensor, all under the control of the app, and may add purchaser information again as a unique code, adding provenance at each step through a supply IS chain.

Methods for authenticating proprietary 3D printing according to the invention will now he described with reference to the accompanying drawings in which: Figure 1 is a view of part of an unfinished printed product with various iDs; and Figure 2 is a cross section through part of another printed product.

The drawings illustrate a method for authenticating a proprietary 3D printing product 11 comprising assigning an TD 12 to each item printed and incorporating said ID 12 as a component in the printing operation.

The purpose of the authentication is inter alla to authenticate products made under licence on a third party 3D printer. The print file that operates the printer to make the product may be sent in any convenient way, as, for example, on a recording medium such as a CD or on a IJSB stick, or downloaded over the internet. Ordinarily, a security label could he sent through the mail, hut might well he a label that could be printed by the licensee, such as a barcode or a QRC code that might be printed on paper or plastic film or such other substrate as may be incorporated into the 3D printing operation.

Figure 1 illustrates an ID 12 in the form of a security label 12a which can be a complex printed label using fine printing of the kind used for banknotes, or a hologram, such as appears also on banknotes and credit and dehit cards, or an RFID label that can he read by a reader that powers the RFID chip to emit a signal incorporating an ID.

Figure 1 shows the product 11 during the printing operation, when the label 12a is physically inserted into the product as it is being laid down by the printing head 14 layer by layer, so that when printing is done the label 12a will be buried inside the product.

However, the ID may equally well he produced by the 3D printing process, and Figure i illustrates an alphanumeric ID 12h made during the 3D printing operation by printing a material different from the background material, and a barcode I 2c made, again, in a contrasting material. A QRC code may of course be substituted for the barcode 12c.

Depending on the nature of the material being printed and how deeply it is buried, the label will be more or less visible. Clearly, for visual inspection, the material needs to be transparent and the label not very deep. While an RFID chip can be totally concealed as it is interrogated by causing it to broadcast a radio frequency signal.

Figure 2 illustrates distribution of the ID between different layers 11 a, 11 h, 11 c etc of the product, a contrasting material 13 being printed in dots or lines 13 as an additional security measure. This, along with the labels 12b, 12c in Figure 1, can be incorporated 1 the 3D print file for the object.

Where the 3D printing is directly under the control of the proprietor of the rights, any other ID may be used in addition to the embedded ID, such, for instance, as external IS labelling with smart water or even a stick-on hologram label.

Authenticating methods as disclosed herein may form the basis of 3D printed product authentication service in which a curator contracts with proprietors of intellectual property in designs for 3D printing to procure the labelling of their products.

Clearly, machine-readable labelling has advantages over other methods, particularly when, as with RFID chips, the label can be changed when the product is examined by reading new information to a register on the chip, and especially when information is passed back to a curator when the RFID chip is read, this enabling supply chain tracking and provenance trail for resale of valuable 3D printed products. RFTD chips have a unique identity of their own, burnt in by the manufacturer. User added information such as an user-assigned ID code, possibly information about product origin, product design details, such as colour, weight and rights proprietor, may also he burnt in, and this information may be duplicated on a database in hardware or in the Cloud. Additional information may be added into spare registers on the RFID chip, including purchaser information.

An ideal would be for a smartphone to be able to read the ID, whether directly through its camera or other sensor or via a wired or wirelessly connected RFID reader and write to the chip with supply chain step details, reporting the same hack to a central or Cloud database.

Claims (2)

1. SClaims: 1 A method for autheilticating proprietary 3D printifig products comprising assigning an ID to each item printed and incorporating said TD as a component in the printing operation.
2. 2 A method according to claim I, in which the TD comprises a security label which is incorporated in the product during the printing operation 3 A method according to claim 2, in which the security label comprises a bar code or a QRC label, a hologram or an alphanumeric label, and so located as to he visible for inspection.4 A method according to claim 2, in which the security label comprises a machine-readable ID such as an RFID label, which maybe passive, so that it can he interrogated by a reader powering it by induction, or active, with its own power supply.A method according to claim 4, in which the label is concealed from view in the product.6 A method according to any one of claims I to 5, in which the TD comprises information in regard to a licensor, a licensee, a product name or part number, one or more dates, such as a date relevant to Design Right or copyright protection, a patent number or a Registered Design number.7 A method according to any one of claims 1 to 6 for a limited number of products involves the assignment of a unique code to each.8 A method according to any one of claims 1 to 7, in which an ID is machine readable, in which it is also changeable, as by writing new data into a register of an RFID chip.9 A method according to any one of claims 1 to 8, in which the ID is produced by the printing process.A method according to claimlO, I which contrasting material is printed as an alphanumeric code a barcode, a QRC code or any other visually or machine readable.11 A method according to claim 10, in which the contrasting material is distributed between multiple layers to constitute a 3D code.12 A method according to aim I I, in which the contrasting material comprises material of a different colour or material which is differently responsive to electromagnetic radiation of a differeilt wavelength outwith the optical spectrum such as infra-red, ultra-violet or microwave, and which is thLIs not apparent unless appropriately illuminated.13 A method according to claim 11 or claim 12, in which the ID printing instruction is built into the print file for the product.14 A method according to claim 13, in which, for a multiple product licence, the file contalils a counter function that changes the ID code with each print so that all products have different TDs.A method according to claim 14, in which, when all the permitted products have been made, the file is rendered inoperable.16 A method according to any one of claims Ito 15, in which the ID can be be read and verified or otherwise by a suitably-apped smartphone or tablet computer