Security key entry using ancillary input device
View Patent ↗A physical, non-human readable representation of a digital key may be in a physical key article. The key article may enable a person to generate a signal representing the digital key from a user interface device in communication with a computer by physical manipulation of the key article. Access to digital content via the computer may be unlocked in response to receiving the signal. In addition, a key may be represented by a pattern of unreadable errors in a computer-readable medium.
1. A method, comprising:
encoding portions of a digital key in at least two non-contiguous, non-writable sectors of a recording medium;
writing mask data to the recording medium utilizing a computer to mask the portions of the digital key in the non-writable sectors by placing other data in writable sectors;
verifying the written mask data utilizing a computer to identify non-verified sectors having data that does not match the mask data; and
reconstructing the digital key by extracting the portions of the digital key from the non-verified sectors.
2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the digital key is a fixed character string operative as a security key capable of unlocking access to a digital resource secured thereby.
3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the security key is utilized to unlock access to the digital resource.
4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the recording medium is a write-once medium.
5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the recording medium is a rewritable medium.
6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the digital key is not human-readable.
7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the recording medium is not human-readable.
8. A method, comprising
encoding a digital key as data in at least one non-writable sector of a computer-writable recording medium;
writing mask data to the recording medium utilizing a computer to mask the digital key by placing other data in writable sectors;
verifying the written mask data utilizing the computer to identify at least one non-verified sector having data that does not match the mask data; and
reading the digital key data from the at least one non-verified sector.
9. The method of claim 8 , wherein the at least one non-writable portion of the computer-writable recording medium comprises at least two non-contiguous portions of the recording medium.
10. The apparatus of claim 8 , wherein the at least one non-writable portion comprises two non-contiguous portions.
11. The method of claim 8 , wherein the recording medium is further configured to generate write errors preventing further recording of data.
12. The method of claim 8 , wherein the recording medium is a rewritable medium.
13. The method of claim 8 , wherein the mask data enables an input device to identify defined sectors having write errors.
14. The method of claim 8 , wherein the digital key is non-human-readable.
15. The apparatus of claim 8 , wherein the recording medium is a write-once medium.
16. A method, comprising:
configuring a physical, non-human readable representation of digital key by encoding portions of the digital key in at least two non-contiguous sectors of a computer-readable recording medium, wherein the non-contiguous sectors are non-writable sectors separated by writable sectors having other data written therein;
reading the recording medium utilizing a computer;
identifying sectors containing the digital key; and
reconstructing the digital key from data contained within the at least two non-contiguous sectors.
17. The method of claim 16 , wherein the computer-readable recording medium is computer-writable.
18. The method of claim 16 , wherein the physical, non-human readable representation comprises an optical code configured to be detected by an optical mouse.
19. The method of claim 16 , wherein the physical, non-human readable representation comprises a keyboard mask.
20. The method of claim 16 , wherein the configuring comprises providing the physical, non-human readable representation imprinted on a tangible medium.