JP2012040834A - Printing medium enabling determination of authenticity, method for manufacturing the same, and method for determining authenticity of the printing medium - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To surely determine authenticity concerning various printing media with easy processing without being influenced by environment.SOLUTION: Surface temperature of the printing medium 1 having an intrinsic ink distribution pattern 3 formed on base material 2 is measured, the image of the ink distribution pattern 3 is read on the basis of the measured surface temperature, and the read image data are registered as intrinsic information of the respective printing media 1. When determining authenticity, the surface temperature of a determination object is measured, the image of the ink distribution pattern 3 is read on the basis of the measured surface temperature, and the read image data are collated with the registered image data. If they agree with each other, the printing medium is determined as a genuine one, and if they do not agree with each other, it is determined as a forged one.

Description

  The present invention relates to a technique for determining whether a print medium is genuine or counterfeit.

  Conventionally, inventions described in the following patent documents are known as techniques for determining genuine products and counterfeit products for printing media such as paper and cards. The invention of this document utilizes paper fingerprint information, which is a unique pattern due to unevenness or overlap of fibers on the paper surface, and unique information on printing paper due to irregular scattering of toner generated during printing. In the present invention, paper fingerprint information and unique information are read by a scanner, the read image data is divided into a plurality of areas, and the distribution of gradation values of all the pixels in each divided area is obtained. Then, it is determined from the obtained dispersion value whether the area is suitable for collation, and paper fingerprint information and unique information of the determined area are registered and collated to determine authenticity.

JP 2009-75751 A

  However, in the conventional method described above, it is necessary to convert the image data read by the scanner, adjust the brightness, or remove information unnecessary for the determination, and image processing for authenticity determination is very difficult. It is complicated. In addition, there is a possibility that printing or handwritten characters on paper may be confused with unique information due to scattering of toner, and erroneous recognition occurs due to changes in the brightness of the environment or the influence of the printing paper itself.

  The present invention has been made to solve such a problem, and the object of the present invention is to make sure that authenticity of various printing media is ensured by simple processing and without being influenced by the environment. It is to be able to do.

  In order to achieve the above object, the present invention provides a print medium capable of determining authenticity, and a unique ink distribution pattern capable of identifying each print medium is formed on a substrate. It is characterized by.

  In addition, the present invention provides a method of manufacturing a print medium capable of determining authenticity, in which ink is applied on a substrate to form a unique ink distribution pattern that can identify each print medium. It is characterized by.

  Furthermore, the present invention provides a method for determining the authenticity of a print medium, and measures the surface temperature of a print medium having a unique ink distribution pattern formed on a substrate, and based on the measured surface temperature. Read the ink distribution pattern image on the substrate, register the read ink distribution pattern image as unique information of each print medium, measure the surface temperature of the print medium to be judged, and based on the measured surface temperature The ink distribution pattern image on the material is read, and the read ink distribution pattern image is compared with the registered ink distribution pattern image.

  In the present invention, the material of the substrate is not particularly limited, and paper, resin film, etc. can be used. It is preferable to use a thermal recording material typified by, for example, thermal paper, a thermal coating film, or a rewrit coating film as the base material because it can be printed on the base material with a thermal head at the same time as authenticity of the printing medium .

  In the present invention, various forms of the ink distribution pattern are conceivable. For example, the ink distribution pattern is a pattern in which irregularities are formed by applying repellent ink to the base layer on which the ink is applied on the base material, or ink having different specific heat is inherent on the base material. Those composed of mixed ink mixed at a blending ratio of the above and those composed by separately dispersing and coating inks having different specific heats on the above-mentioned base material can be employed. In addition, if the color of the ink distribution pattern is the same or similar to the color of the base material, or a transparent color, the design of the print medium is not affected, and anti-counterfeit processing is performed. This is preferable because it becomes difficult to understand.

  According to the present invention, it is only necessary to form an ink distribution pattern using repelling combination inks or inks having different specific heats, and a print medium capable of determining authenticity can be manufactured easily and inexpensively. In addition, the image data of the ink distribution pattern is not read by the scanner, but is read based on the surface temperature of the printing medium, so it is not affected by the brightness of the environment, and genuine and counterfeit products are reliably determined. Can do. The ink distribution pattern is unique information that can identify the print medium, and even if the same ink is used, the same pattern cannot be reproduced. For this reason, it is impossible to duplicate a genuine product, and a high anti-counterfeit effect can be obtained. Furthermore, since the printing medium capable of determining authenticity is obtained by applying ink on a base material, it is difficult to recognize that anti-counterfeiting has been performed, and at the same time, imparts design to the printing medium itself. be able to.

It is a top view which shows the example of 1 structure of the printing medium in which authenticity determination is possible. It is the sectional view on the AA line shown in FIG. It is a flowchart figure which shows the authenticity determination method of a printing medium. It is a graph which shows the relationship between heating time and temperature. It is a schematic diagram which shows the image data of the read ink distribution pattern. It is a schematic diagram which shows a mode at the time of collating the image data of an ink distribution pattern. It is sectional drawing which shows the other structural example of the printing medium in which authenticity determination is possible. It is a top view which shows the further another structural example of the printing medium which can authenticate.

  Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings attached to the application.

<Printing media, manufacturing method>
As shown in FIG. 1, the print medium 1 capable of determining authenticity according to the present embodiment is provided with a true / false determining unit on a card-sized substrate 2 in order to distinguish genuine products from counterfeit products. . This authenticity determination unit applies a unique ink distribution pattern 3 to which randomness is imparted so that individual inks 1, 1,... It is comprised by forming.

  The material of the base material 2 is not particularly limited, and in the case of only reading use, for example, paper such as plain paper and high-quality paper, and resin films such as PET, PETG, and PVC can be used.

  Regarding the types of ink, in the present embodiment, two types of inks that are repelled are used. That is, first, underprint printing is performed on the entire surface of the base material 2 with an oxidation polymerization type ink or an ultraviolet curable ink which is a general ink for printing. After the underprinted general ink is cured to form the undercoat layer 4, a repelling ink having no affinity for the general ink is overprinted. For example, when a water-repellent transparent ink made of wax, silicone-containing ink or the like is applied over the entire surface of the underlayer 4, a top coat layer 5 having a random pattern is formed on the underlayer 4 as shown in FIG. A unique pseudo-embossing that is formed and has irregularities is applied.

<Authentication method>
The print medium 1 of the present embodiment is configured as described above, and the authenticity determination is performed as follows.

(1) Measurement of surface temperature of genuine product First, the surface temperature of the printing medium (genuine product) 1 on which the unique ink distribution pattern 3 is formed is measured (step 110 in FIG. 3). As the temperature measuring means, for example, a thermal head of a reader (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2004-13654) manufactured by Cyber Imaging Co., Ltd. can be used. This thermal head measures temperature individually for each of a plurality of minute heating elements constituting the thermal head while instantaneously heating the measurement object at a low temperature. Using the thermal head having such a function, the surface temperature of the print medium 1 is measured while heating the surface on which the ink distribution pattern 3 is formed.

(2) Reading of genuine ink distribution pattern image Next, the image of the ink distribution pattern 3 formed on the substrate 2 is read from the surface temperature measured in step 110 (step 120). As the image reading means, the above reading device can be used. In this reading device, based on the real-time temperature change measured by the thermal head, the curve that changes at a high temperature from the change in temperature with respect to the heating time as shown in FIG. It is detected that the curve transitioned by is a convex portion in contact with the minute heating element. Thereby, the uneven | corrugated shape of the whole surface of the printing medium 1 can be recognized, and the image data of the ink distribution pattern 3 formed in the printing medium 1 like FIG. 5 can be read.

(3) Registration of genuine ink distribution pattern image The image of the ink distribution pattern 3 read in step 120 is registered as unique information of the printing medium (genuine product) 1 (step 130). The image data of the ink distribution pattern 3 read by the reading device is unique information for identifying the individual print media 1, 1,. Therefore, for example, a unique identification ID is assigned to the image data of the ink distribution pattern 3, and this is stored and registered in a memory such as a personal computer connected to the reading device.

  According to the above-described reading apparatus, image data can be read by either a monochrome binary image or a 256 gradation image. However, in consideration of the accuracy at the time of collation described later, the latter 256 gradation image is read and registered. It is preferable to leave. In the present invention, the reading device is set to 12 dots / mm. When an image is read with 256 gradations for each dot, unique unique information can be read. For example, when a certain ink is solidly printed, if it is detected at a low gradation such as 2 gradations, the same result is detected, but if it is 256 gradations, a slightly different specific heat of the ink distribution pattern 3 is detected. Since detection is performed for each dot, the position of the subtle difference in the ink distribution pattern 3 may be different for each printing medium 1, 1,.

(4) Measurement of surface temperature of determination object When performing authenticity determination, as shown in FIG. 6, first, the surface temperature of the print medium 1A as the determination object is measured (step 140). The temperature measurement is performed by the same method as in step 110 using the above-described thermal head of the reading device manufactured by Cyber Imaging Corporation.

(5) Reading the ink distribution pattern image of the determination target Next, the image of the ink distribution pattern 3A is read for the printing medium 1A from the surface temperature measured in step 140 (step 150). Image reading is performed by the same method as step 120 using the above-described reading device.

(6) Collation of ink distribution pattern image Finally, the image data of the ink distribution pattern 3A read in step 150 is collated with the image data of the genuine ink distribution pattern 3 registered in step 130 (step 160). As a result of the collation, if the image data of the ink distribution patterns 3 and 3A completely match (Yes in Step 170), it is determined that the print medium 1A to be determined is “genuine product”. On the other hand, if the two image data are different (No in step 170), it is determined that the print medium 1A to be determined is a “counterfeit product” that is not a genuine product.

  As described above, the printing medium 1 according to the present invention is one in which the ink distribution pattern 3 is formed using two different types of ink, and can be manufactured easily and inexpensively. In addition, since the image data of the ink distribution pattern 3 of the printing medium 1 is not read by a scanner but is read from the surface temperature difference of the printing medium 1 by a thermal head, the reading accuracy is not affected by the influence of the brightness of the environment and the like. A true / false determination function can be provided. Moreover, the ink distribution pattern 3 is unique identification information that is different for each print medium 1, and even if the same ink is used for replication, the same pattern cannot be reproduced. For this reason, it is impossible to forge a genuine product, and a high forgery prevention effect can be obtained. Furthermore, it is difficult to recognize that anti-counterfeiting has been applied to the general ink used for normal printing, and it is difficult to recognize that anti-counterfeiting has been applied. Can be granted.

  In the authenticity determination method described above, it is also possible to select the reading accuracy by the reading device (setting of a threshold value). For example, if it is sufficient to read only the presence / absence of the ink distribution pattern 3, reading with two gradations can be performed. In addition, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, and 128 gradations can be selected depending on the required reading accuracy.

<Other embodiments>
The above-described embodiment is merely an example, and various modifications as described below are possible for the present invention.

  For example, for the base material 2, paper or a resin film is used for read-only in the above-described embodiment, but the base material 2 to be used is not limited to this. If it is a use which performs not only reading but also printing, a thermal recording material represented by thermal paper, thermal coated paper, or rewrit coated film can be used as the substrate 2. In this case, as shown in FIG. 7, a leuco dye type or transparent cloudy type thermal coloring layer 6 is applied and formed on a substrate 2 made of paper or a resin film, and a repelling ink is formed on the thermal coloring layer 6. Ink distribution pattern 3 is provided by the combination. According to such a structure, there is an advantage that printing can be performed on the thermosensitive coloring layer 6 with the same thermal head simultaneously with the authenticity determination of the printing medium 1. In addition, since the thermosensitive coloring layer 6 is in the lower layer of the ink distribution pattern 3, the information printed on the thermosensitive coloring layer 6 is not confused with the unique information by the ink distribution pattern 3, and misrecognition does not occur.

  In addition, the ink distribution pattern 3 is provided on the entire surface of the base material 2 in the above-described embodiment, but instead, the ink distribution pattern 3 is provided on a part of the base material 2 as shown in FIG. May be. According to such a structure, the forgery prevention process by the ink distribution pattern 3 can be made inconspicuous.

  Further, regarding the type of ink, in the above-described embodiment, two types of inks that are repelled are used, but instead, inks having different specific heats can be used. For example, two or more ink compositions may be mixed to produce a mixed ink having a specific specific heat, and this mixed ink may be applied onto the substrate 2 to form the ink distribution pattern 3.

Here, the following combinations of inks having different specific heats are conceivable.
A. Resin used for general ink (oxidation polymerization type ink, UV curable ink) ・ Natural resin (Rosin, Shellac, Gilsonite, etc.)
・ Synthetic resin (acrylic resin, phenolic resin, alkyd resin, etc.)
B. Pigments (color pigments, extender pigments, special pigments such as fluorescent and phosphorescent pigments, etc.)
In particular, extender pigments such as metal powders such as titanium oxide, barium sulfate, calcium carbonate, silica, and talc contribute to the difference in specific heat.

  That is, an ink having a specific specific heat may be generated by using the A resin alone, the A resin combination, or the A resin and B pigment combinations (a plurality of A and B can be selected). Moreover, even if it is the same combination, it can be set as the ink of different specific heat by changing a compounding ratio. .. Is used for each printing medium 1, 1,..., And the ink distribution pattern 3 having a specific specific heat is formed by applying and drying the ink.

  Further, two or more kinds of inks may be separately applied on the substrate 2. The ink can be produced and used in combination with the resin A and the pigment B. As a result, inks having different specific heats are dispersed and arranged on the substrate 2 to form a unique ink distribution pattern 3.

  In this way, even by using inks having different specific heats, it is possible to form different unique ink distribution patterns 3 for each printing medium 1 and to have a reliable authenticity determination function as in the above-described embodiment. Can be made.

  Furthermore, the color of the ink constituting the ink distribution pattern 3 may be set to the same color or a similar color as the color of the substrate 2 or may be set to a transparent color. As a result, the printing of the ink distribution pattern 3 becomes less conspicuous, so that the design of the printing medium 1 (product) is not affected, and it is difficult to understand that further anti-counterfeiting processing has been performed. .

  Specifically, for example, an ink distribution pattern 3 in which a barcode or a two-dimensional code is printed with white ink is provided on the surface of the white substrate 2. In this case, it is not possible to read with a general bar code verifier and it is difficult to understand that printing is performed visually. However, according to the present invention, it is possible to read both the optical reading information recorded by a bar code or the like and the unique information for authenticity determination. The optical reading information and the unique information can be read with different gradations.

  The present invention can be used as a print medium serving as an identification card such as a passport, a driver's license, a credit card, or the like.

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Print medium 2 Base material 3 Ink distribution pattern 4 Underlayer 5 Topcoat layer 6 Thermosensitive coloring layer

Claims (8)

  A print medium capable of authenticating authenticity, wherein a unique ink distribution pattern capable of identifying each print medium is formed on a substrate.   2. The printing medium according to claim 1, wherein the base material is a thermal recording material represented by thermal paper, a thermal coating film, or a rewrit coating film.   The printing medium according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the ink distribution pattern is formed by applying a repelling ink to an undercoat layer on which the ink is applied on the base material to form irregularities. A print medium capable of authenticating.   3. The printing medium according to claim 1, wherein the ink distribution pattern is composed of a mixed ink obtained by mixing inks having different specific heats at a specific blending ratio on the base material. Print media that can be falsely determined.   3. The print medium according to claim 1, wherein the ink distribution pattern is configured by separately dispersing and coating inks having different specific heats on the substrate. Print media.   6. The authenticity determination according to claim 1, wherein the color of the ink distribution pattern is the same color as or similar to the color of the substrate, or a transparent color. Possible print media.   A method for producing a print medium capable of authenticity determination, characterized in that an ink is applied on a substrate to form a unique ink distribution pattern that can identify each print medium. Measure the surface temperature of the printing medium on which a unique ink distribution pattern is formed on the substrate, read the ink distribution pattern image on the substrate based on the measured surface temperature, and read the read ink distribution pattern image on each printing medium Registered as specific information for
Measure the surface temperature of the print medium to be judged, read the ink distribution pattern image on the substrate based on the measured surface temperature, match the read ink distribution pattern image with the registered ink distribution pattern image above A method for determining the authenticity of a print medium, wherein a genuine product is determined if it is different, and a counterfeit product is determined if they are different.

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