Money Pad- The Future Wallet 2011-12
1.Introduction
The 21st century will not be "cashless", as many now predict. However, it does seem clear that the currency of the 21st century will be "paperless". Paper currency and checks are gradually being supplanted by smartcards, digital cash and instant transfers of funds. The large paper bureaucracy of banks is quickly becoming redundant, burdensome, even antiquated. The evolution in digital money is happening so fast that banks cannot adopt quickly enough and will eventually collapse like top-heavy giants, blown over by the winds of financial change. Maybe, or may not be, but one trend is already clear. The wallet of the future mil holds less paper cash, coins and magnetic stripe cards. It mil hold instead Money Pad containing digital cash and other financial information, updated — perhaps automatically — by a PDA.with a satellite communication link.
As the new technologies develop into new ways of making payment, one concern naturally arises. Will this technology protect each individual's right to privacy whileproviding the sound money needed for the economic health of communities? The answer is simple — it depends on how the new technology is used. There is nothing inherent in the technology that makes it less protective of privacy and individual rights. Advancement's like Biometrics Technology has made individual privacy even more secure.
As developments in electronic money gather pace, protection of individual rights must be kept in focus. Because the record of most governments so far in these early stages of electronic commerce has been seen by many to be confrontational and not protective of individual rights, it is likely that the preservation of these rights is one reason that private currencies are likely to emerge on the Internet and to eventually play an important role in global commerce.
In order to protect the rights and properties of each individual we thought of providing a security system, which every human being can understand and feel free to use. Human beings feel secure when they have their own security arrangements to protect their rights and as well as wealth. Keeping this point of view in mind the Biometrics Technology is used to develop an e-cash handling system, which is similar to well-known credit cards and smart cards. The e-cash handling system is a device that facilitates secure currency transactions. We call it as Money Pad which recognizes Finger Prints of the user and decides weather the user is an authorized person or not. Every time the user wants to access the Money Pad he has to make an impression of his finger, which will be sensed and matched with the one in the hard disk. If the finger print matches with the user's he will be allowed to access and use the Pad otherwise the Money Pad is not accessible.
2. What is Biometrics
Biometric technologies are defined as automated methods of identifying or authenticating the identity of a living person based on unique physiological or behavioral characteristics. Biometrics can provide very secure and convenient authentication for an individual since they cannot be stolen or forgotten and are very difficult to forge.
A physiological characteristic is a relatively stable physical characteristic, such as an individual’s fingerprint, hand geometry, iris pattern, or blood vessel pattern on the back of the eye. This type of biometric measurement is usually unchanging and unalterable without significant duress to the individual.
A behavioral characteristic is more a reflection of an individual’s psychological makeup. A signature is the most common behavioral biometric used for identification. Because most behavioral characteristics vary over time, an identification system using these must allow updates to enrolled biometric reference.
3. Technical Details of the Paper
3.1 Basic of the Present System
Presently due to the usage of computers in almost all the fields the demand for the utilization of Electronic Money has been increased. Payments made today in nearly all of the deposit currencies in the world's banking systems are handled electronically through a series of interbank computer networks. Credit cards and smartcards are widely used to enter into these interbank computer networks in order to perform transactions. These are the popular medium widely existing as a recent medium of currency in the e-cash scenario. The mode of usage and the security provided by these currency mediums are as follows.
3.2 Credit Card
Credit cards are payment devices that allow the consumer to make purchases within certain guaranteed limits as defined by the issuer of the card. To use a credit card in most cases it is sufficient to present the merchant with the card number and the cardholder's name and expiration date of the card. These data can be conveniently transmitted over the Internet. Furthermore, credit cards process funds by electronic means. The user has to swap the card in the card reader machine then the machine asks for authentication information like secret password etc. Later the user is allowed to perform the transaction.
Disadvantages:
Ø Instant clearing of funds is not possible.
Ø User is always under the pressure of limits on purchase defined by the issuer of the card and also every transaction involves certain charges.
Ø Insecure transactions using fixed encryption.
Ø The card has to be renewed once it is expired.
3.3 Smartcard
A smartcard resembles a credit card except that it has a microchip embedded within it, which allows the smartcard to store information and sometimes to even perform simple calculations. Common smartcard chips typically holds about 8,000 bytes (characters) of information, which enables the smartcard to perform a variety of functions such as identification, storing bank account information and holding digital cash. Payment information in the form of currency value is stored on this chip and can be retrieved with specially designed card readers.
Disadvantages:
Ø Insecure transactions using fixed encryption.
Ø Risk of data loss due to chip failure.
3.4 Electronic Purses and Debit Cards
Despite the increasing flexibility, relationship-based cards are credit based and settlement occurs at the end of the billing cycle. There remains a need for a financial instrument to replace cash. To meet this need, banks, credit card companies, and even government institutions are racing to introduce "electronic purses," wallet-sized smart cards embedded with programmable microchips that store sums of money for people to use instead of cash for everything from buying food, to making photocopies, to paying subway fares.
3.4.1 The Electronic Purse Works in the Following Manner
After the purse is loaded with money, at an ATM or through the use of an inexpensive special telephone, it can be used to pay for, say, candy in a vending machine equipped with a card reader. The vending machine need only verify that a card is authentic and there is enough money available for a chocolate bar. In one second, the value of the purchase is deducted from the banker on the card and added to an e-cash box in the vending machine. The remaining balance on the card is displayed by the vending machine or can be checked at an ATM or with a balance-reading device. Electronic purses would virtually eliminate fumbling for change or small bills in a busy store or rush-hour toll booth, and waiting for a credit card purchase to be approved. This allows customers to pay for rides and calls with a prepaid card that "remembers" each transaction. And when the balance on an electronic purse is depleted, the purse can be recharged with more money. As for the vendor, the receipts can be collected periodically in person—or, more likely, by telephone and transferred to a bank account. While the technology has been avaikble for a decade, the cards have been rektively expensive, from $5 to $10. Today the cards cost $1, and special telephones that consumers could install at home to recharge the cards are projected to cost as little as $50. A simple card reader would cost a merchant less than $200.
3.5 Electronic Checks
Electronic checks are another form of electronic tokens. They are designed to accommodate the many individuals and entities that might prefer to pay on credit or through some mechanism other than cash. Buyers must register with a third-party account server before they are able to write electronic checks. The account server also acts as a billing service. The registration procedure can vary depending on the particular account server and may require a credit card or a bank account to back the checks. Onceregistered, a buyer can then contact sellers of goods and services. To complete a transaction, the buyer sends a check to the seller for a certain amount of money. These checks may be sent using e-mail or other transport methods. When deposited, the check authorizes the transfer of account balances from the account against which the check was drawn to the account to which the check was deposited. The e-check method was deliberately created to work in much the same way as a conventional paper check. An account holder will issue an electronic document that contains the name of the payer, the name of the financial institution, the payer's account number, the name of the payee and amount of the check. Most of the information is in encoded form. Like a paper check, an e-check will bear the digital equivalent of a signature: a computed number that authenticates the check as coming from the owner of the account. And, again like a paper check, an e-check will need to be endorsed by the payee, using another electronic signature, before the check can be paid. Properly signed and endorsed checks can be electronically exchanged between financial institutions through electronic clearinghouses, with the institutions using these endorsed checks as tender to settle accounts.
Advantages:
Ø They work in the same way as traditional checks, thus simplifying customer education.
Ø Electronic checks are well suited for clearing micro payments; their use of conventional cryptography makes it much faster than systems based on public-key cryptography e-cash).
Ø Electronic checks create float and the availability of float is an important requkement for commerce. The third-party accounting server can make money by charging the buyer or seller a transaction fee or a flat rate fee, or if can act as a bank and provide deposit accounts and make money on the deposit account pool.
Ø Financial risk is assumed by the accounting server and may result in easier acceptance. Reliability and scalability are provided by using multiple accounting servers. There can be an inter account server protocol to allow buyer and seller to "belong" to different domains, regions, or countries. You all must agree that the major issue of concern while doing paying is security. In the next section we will discuss one of the Electronic Payment Systems that is more secure as compared to the above discussed schemes.
3.6 New Approach
As this is an era of Internet everything is getting online like shopping, business, banking etc. In the recent trend even money is available online at any time in the form of digi-cash or cyber cash etc. These are the recent medium of exchange, which arenecessary for the existence of e-banking. As in future the world is going to be paper less cash the existence of e-cash will lead e-banking. In future internet is going to capture the whole world and the private currency will become the media of exchange in e-banks replacing the government currency. Keeping this point of view in mind and to overcome the above drawbacks of credit cards and smart cards here we present a medium of exchange to carry digital cash wherever man wants, which we name as "Money Pad".
4. Money Pad
Money pad is one such medium of exchange, which aims to provide secure means of currency exchange. It's a means that carries digital cash, as paper cash is going to extinct. "In order to use this money pad it is necessary to have at least one e-bank in every city".
Money pad is a biometric system similar to a credit card or a smart card just like a floppy disk. It consists of a touch sensor and magnetic disk as its peripherals. Touch sensor is used to record the fingerprint of the user. Magnetic disk, which has the read and write permission is used to hold the authentication details of the user, bank code as well as digi-cash. The bank code and account number of the owner of this money pad is present on the label.
4.1 Operation of Money Pad
Fig: 4.1 Money Pad
When a user wishes to have a Money Pad, he is supposed to visit a nearby bank which has a e-bank facility. It is necessary for the new user to create a account with some minimum balance. The authentication details alongwith his fingerprint is recorded and stored in the data base server. The user is provided with a account number and bank code along with his Money Pad. The Money Pad consists of stored information like account if number, bank code (from where he has purchased this money pad) and his fingerprint.
4.1.1Transaction using Money Pad
Whenever a user wants to use the Money Pad he has to place his finger on the touch sensor and then place it in a finger print reader. The reader will ask for bank code so that he can enter into his e-bank, then his account number so that he can enter into his account. After this the reader will access the fingerprint and matches with that present on the Money Pad as well as present in the data base server. If a match occurs the reader knows that he is anauthorised user and allows for further transactions. If not then the reader comes to know that the user is unauthorized and a provision can be made so that the digi-cash present in the Money Pad is e-mailed back to the authorised account holder using the user details present in the Money Pad. As the Money Pad has read and write facility it is used to down load digi-cash, carry on transaction and store the balance