ECG Authentication for Mobile Device

Abstract

Mobile devices users are storing more and more private and often highly sensitive information on their mobiles. Protective measures to ensure that users of mobile devices are appropriately safeguarded are thus imperative to protect users. Traditional mobile login methods, like numerical or graphical passwords, are vulnerable to passive attacks. It is common for criminal s to gain access to victims' personal information by watching victims enter their passwords into their cellphone screens from a short distance away. With this in mind, a Biometric authentication algorithm based on electrocardiogram or ECG is proposed. In this system the user will only need to touch the ECG electrodes of the mobile device to gain access. With this authentication mode no one will be able to see the biometric pattern that is used to unlock the de vices. This will increase the protection for the users. The algorithm was tested with ten subjects from MCRlab at the University of Ottawa at different days and conditions using a two electrode ECG phone case. Several tests were performed in order to reach the best setting for the algorithm to work properly. The final results show that the system has a 1.41% of chance to accept false users and 81.82% of accepting the right users. The algorithm was also tested with 73 subjects from Physionet database and the results were around the same, which confirms the consistency of the algorithm. This is the first approach on mobile authentication using ECG biometric signals and shows a promising future for this technology to be used in mobiles.