Method and system of identifying a user of a handheld device

Abstract

A system and method for identifying a user of a handheld device is herein disclosed. The device implementing the method and system may attempt to identify a user based on signals that are incidental to a user's handling of the device. The signals are generated by a variety of sensors dispersed along the periphery or within the housing. The sensors range may include touch sensors, inertial sensors, acoustic sensors, pulse oximiters, and a touchpad. Based on the sensors and corresponding signals, identification information is generated. The identification information is used to identify the user of the handheld device. The handheld device may implement various statistical learning and data mining techniques to increase the robustness of the system. The device may also authenticate the user based on the user drawing a circle, or other shape.

1 . A handheld electronic device, comprising:
 a housing;   a touch sensor system disposed along a periphery of the housing and responsive to a plurality of simultaneous points of contact between a user's hand and the handheld electronic device to generate observation signals indicative of the plurality of points of contact between the user's hand and the handheld electronic device;   a touch sensor processing module configured to receive the observation signals from the touch sensor system and determine a user's holding pattern;   an inertial sensor embedded in the housing and responsive to movement of the handheld electronic device by the user's hand to generate inertial signals;   a trajectory module configured to determine a trajectory for the movement of the handheld electronic device, based on the inertial signals from the inertial sensor, a starting position, and an end position, the starting position being a location where the handheld electronic device in a resting position is grabbed by a user, the end position being a location of the handheld electronic device being held;   a touchpad located along an external surface of the housing that is responsive to the user's finger movement along the external surface of the touchpad to generate touchpad signals;   a touchpad processing module configured to receive the touchpad signals and determines user finger movement data;   a user identification database storing data corresponding to attributes of a plurality of known users, wherein the attributes of the plurality of the known users are used to identify a user, and wherein the attributes include holding patterns of the plurality of known users, trajectories for the movement of the handheld electronic device of the plurality of known users, and user finger movement data of the plurality of known users; and   a user identification module configured to receive identification information of the user and identify the user based on the identification information and the attributes of the plurality of known users by accessing said used identification database, wherein the identification information includes the user's holding pattern, the user's trajectory for movement of the handheld electronic device, and the user's finger movement data, wherein the user identification module is configured to identify the user by detecting a trajectory that matches the user's trajectory for movement of the handheld electronic device from the trajectories for the movement of the handheld electronic device of the plurality of known users.   
     
     
         2 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 1  wherein the touch sensor system is further defined as an array of capacitive sensors integrated into and spatially separated from each other along an exterior surface of the housing. 
     
     
         3 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 1  wherein the inertial sensor is an accelerometer. 
     
     
         4 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 1  wherein the inertial sensor is a gyroscope. 
     
     
         5 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 1  wherein the user identification module is configured to implement machine learning to identify a user. 
     
     
         6 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 5  wherein the user identification module uses a k-means clustering algorithm to determine a user identification. 
     
     
         7 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 1  wherein the user identification module is configured to determine a plurality of preliminary user identifications, wherein each of the preliminary user identifications is based on one of the attributes. 
     
     
         8 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 7  wherein each of the preliminary user identifications has a corresponding confidence score, wherein the confidence score indicates a probability that the preliminary user identification is correct. 
     
     
         9 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 1  wherein the user identification module is configured to determine a plurality of user identifications, wherein each of the preliminary identifications has a list of possible users and wherein each entry in the list of possible users has a confidence score indicating a probability that the possible user is actually the user. 
     
     
         10 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 1  wherein the trajectory module is configured to determine a starting location of the handheld electronic device, wherein the user identification module further bases user identification on the starting location of the handheld electronic device. 
     
     
         11 . A handheld electronic device, comprising:
 a housing;   a sensor system disposed along a periphery of the housing and responsive to a plurality of simultaneous points of contact between a user's hand and the handheld electronic device to generate observation signals indicative of the plurality of points of contact between the user's hand and the handheld electronic device;   a user identification database storing data corresponding attributes of a plurality of known users, wherein the attributes of the plurality of known users are used to identify a user;   a user identification module configured to receive the observation signals from the sensor system and identify the user from the observation signals and the attributes of the plurality of users by accessing said user identification database;   an inertial sensor embedded in the housing and responsive to movement of the handheld electronic device by the user's hand to generate inertial signals; and   a trajectory module configured to receive the inertial signals from the inertial sensor and determine a trajectory for the movement of the handheld electronic device, wherein the user identification module is configured to receive the trajectory from the trajectory module and identify the user based in part from the trajectory.   
     
     
         12 - 22 . (canceled) 
     
     
         23 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 11  wherein the inertial sensor is an accelerometer. 
     
     
         24 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 11  wherein the inertial sensor is a gyroscope. 
     
     
         25 . The handheld device of  claim 11  wherein the trajectory module is configured to determine a starting location of the handheld electronic device and communicate said starting location of the user identification module. 
     
     
         26 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 25  wherein the user identification module further bases user identification on the starting location of the handheld electronic device. 
     
     
         27 - 28 . (canceled) 
     
     
         29 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 25  wherein the user identification module is configured to receive finger movement data corresponding to a first point of contact between one of the user's digits and the touchpad and use the said finger movement data corresponding to the first point of contact to identify the user. 
     
     
         30 - 46 . (canceled) 
     
     
         47 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 11  further comprising:
 a motion processing module configured to determine the trajectory of the handheld electronic device by employing dead reckoning, the motion processing module supplying signals indicative of the trajectory as additional observation signals to said user identification module. 
 
     
     
         48 . The handheld electronic device of  claim 1  wherein a cluster of locations is used as the starting position.