TECHNICAL FIELD

This patent application is directed to methods for product authentication, and more specifically, to methods for providing anti-counterfeiting authentication of products, credentials, and financial instruments.

BACKGROUND

The counterfeiting of products, credentials, and financial instruments, for example, is a worldwide problem having escalating health, economic, national security, and geo-political consequences. The integrity and security of an article is dependent on its unique identification at the article's point-of-use as the use of counterfeits can have extensive, expensive, and/or unresolvable consequences.

Counterfeit resistant and counterfeit detectable identification for identifying and tracing an article throughout its manufacturing processes, distribution, and product life cycle has become a necessity as it is being required by the increasingly competitive global manufacturing and distribution environment. An article's secure unique identification is frequently required by manufacturers' quality plans, industrial standards organizations, governmental regulatory agencies, and customers' specifications, for example. More specifically, secure unique identification is frequently required for patient prescriptions, patient specific biological replacement(s), critical part design revision identification, a product's unique assembly of multiple parts having a combined tolerance stack-up, certificate of origin, Department of Defense traceable components, data/communication systems, product recalls, an article's forensic identification, identification traceability/authorization required for a specific transaction, location identification, personal identification, device identification, access control means, etc.

In some cases, the delivery of a first article is accepted as the authentic critical article, even if it is a counterfeit. The undetected counterfeit article can then be used by the recipient as intended, thereby exposing its user to the risks and consequences of relying on the counterfeit article. The subsequent delivery of the actual authentic critical article can be incorrectly identified as a counterfeit copy. In some instances, the suspected counterfeit article is returned to the article's provider or regulatory and/or law enforcement agency for an investigative analysis to determine its authenticity. Meanwhile, the trust and credibility of the article's provider is immediately damaged.

Multiple technologies are readily available to capture and replicate an article's unique identification to facilitate counterfeiting. Continuous technological advancements are improving these technologies such that counterfeiters can cost effectively capture and replicate an article and counterfeit it's unique serialized numbering for the article's unique identification. Accordingly, there is a need for improved methods and devices for providing anti-counterfeiting authentication.

