JPS61264488A - Reader and writer for integrated circuit card - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To protect completely a reader/writer for integrated circuit IC cards and a contact part by deciding whether the position of a connector and the interval between terminals are correct or not. CONSTITUTION:Stop commands delivered to the 1st and 2nd counters 28 and 29 from an IC card reader/writer control part 11 are sent to deciding parts 31 and 32 respectively as the deciding command. The information on the length between the tip of an IC card 5 and the 1st terminal train of a connector 5a is set previously at the part 31. While the information on the interval between the 1st and 2nd terminal trains of the connector 5a is set previously at the part 32. Both parts 31 and 32 compare the set information with the count contents of both counters 28 and 29 according to the deciding command given from the part 11 and deliver the results of these decisions to the part 11.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Technical Field of the Invention] The present invention relates to an IC card reader/writer that reads and writes data to and from an IC card.

[Prior art and its problems] In recent years, the era has been called the cashless era, and various cards have been issued by credit card companies, etc., and by using these cards, it is possible to purchase products without handling cash. is now possible. Conventionally, the above-mentioned card is generally a magnetic card that uses magnetism to store predetermined information. However, the above-mentioned magnetic cards have the problem of having a small amount of information storage and not being highly secure.For this reason, recently, IC cards that can store a large amount of information (and are also highly secure) have been developed. It is starting to be used.

When using an IC card as a credit card, I
I that reads and writes data to the C card
A reader/writer dedicated to C cards is required. However, conventional IC card readers/writers do not know whether the card inserted into the card slot is an IC card or a magnetic card.
There is no art to determine whether it is a foreign object or some other foreign object. Therefore, if a conductive object such as a copper plate is inserted instead of an IC card, the voltage supply terminal and the ground terminal of the contact part will be short-circuited, and other terminals will also be short-circuited. There is a risk of destroying the reader circuit. In addition, if something with a rough or hard surface is inserted into the card slot, the plating on the tip of the contact pin may come off, resulting in high contact resistance, or it may scratch and damage the card connector, which can shorten the life of the card and the life of the reader. There is a problem that becomes shorter.

[Object of the invention] The present invention has been made in view of the above points.
Even if something other than a card is inserted, the circuit and contacts of the reader/writer can be reliably protected.
The purpose is to provide a C card reader/writer.

[Summary of the Invention] The present invention includes a judgment technique that determines whether or not the connector position and terminal spacing of the card are correct when the card is inserted into the card insertion slot, and only when the connector position and the terminal spacing are correct. The connector section is connected and subsequent processing operations are performed.

[Embodiment of the Invention] An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. 1st
The figure shows a schematic configuration of an IC card transport mechanism and a contact portion in the IC card reader/writer 1. As shown in FIG. In FIG. 1, reference numeral 2 denotes a case body, and a card insertion slot 3 is provided on the front side of the case body 2 (left end side in the figure). A pair of guide rollers 4a is provided near the card insertion slot 3.

4b is provided to take the IC card 5 inserted through the card insertion slot 3 into the case body 2. Further, a pair of guide rollers 6 a and 6 b are arranged at a predetermined interval between the guide rollers 4 a and 4 b.
The IC card 5 taken in from a, 4b is further run at a constant speed.

A photoreflector 7 and a contact 8 are arranged at a constant distance between the guide roller 4a and the guide roller 6b so as to be positioned below the IC card 5 which is driven to run. That is, the photoreflector 7
The photoreflector 7 and the contacts 8 are arranged so that when the rear end of the IC card 5 is detected, the connector of the card and the contacts 8 are positioned facing each other. The contact 8 is attached to a solenoid 9 and moved upward by the drive of the solenoid 9 so that the contact pin 8a is connected to the connector of the IC card 5.

Further, a stopper 10 is provided opposite to the contact 8 and in contact with the upper side of the IC card 5.

Next, the configuration of the electronic circuit in the IC card reader/writer 1 will be explained with reference to FIG. 2. In Figure 2,
Reference numeral 11 denotes a reader/writer control section, to which the contact 8 and solenoid 9 shown in FIG. 1 are connected, and the guide roller 4a is connected via a motor drive section 12.

A motor 13 for driving 6a is connected. Further, the reader/writer control section 11 is connected to a connection terminal 15 via an interface section 14 . A verification terminal (not shown) is connected to this connection terminal 15, and communication processing is performed between this verification terminal and a central computer of an information center (not shown). On the other hand, the photoreflector 7 is mainly composed of, for example, a light emitting diode 21 and a photosensor 22. The light emitting diode 21 is supplied with a voltage of +V via a resistor 23, and its light emitting output is irradiated onto the lower surface of the IC card 5 while it is running. Then, the reflected light from this IC card 5 is incident on the photosensor 22 . This photosensor 22 has a collector supplied with a voltage of +■, an emitter grounded via a resistor 24, and an emitter output is taken out as an output signal of the photoreflector 7. The output signal of the photoreflector 7 is sent to the data storage section 26 via the amplifier 25. This data recognition unit 26 is
The content of the input data is recognized and written into the data storage section 27, and the data content is determined and output to the reader/writer control section 11. In addition, the data storage section 27
The stored data is sent to the reader/writer control section 11.

A first counter 28 and a second counter 29 are further connected to the reader/writer control section 11 . The first counter 28 and the second counter 29 are supplied with clock pulses from an oscillator 30, and their counting operations are controlled according to start/stop commands from the reader/writer control section 11. In addition, the reader/writer control section 11
A stop command output from the first counter 28 and the second counter 29 is sent as a determination command to the determination section 31 and the determination section 32, respectively. The determination unit 31 has I
Length information from the tip of the C card 5 to the first terminal row of the connector 5a is set in advance, and the determination unit 32
The interval information between the first terminal row and the second terminal row is set in advance. The judgment sections 31 and 32 compare and judge the setting information and the count contents of the first counter 28 and the second counter 29 according to the judgment command from the reader/writer control section 11, and transmit the judgment results to the reader/writer control section. 1
Output to 1.

Next, the operation of the above embodiment will be explained according to the flowchart shown in FIG. When purchasing a product using an IC card, for example, the IC card reader/writer 1 shown in FIG.
Insert the IC card 5 shown in a), (b), etc. This I
The C card 5 has, for example, information in a specific position as shown in FIG. 4(a), (
As shown in b), a connector 5a is provided at the center left end of one side, and an information display section 5b for displaying the type of card, etc. is provided at the right end. FIG. 4(a) shows the information display section 5b.
When the data in the information display section 5b is displayed in barcodes, FIG. 4(b) shows an example in which the data in the information display section 5b is displayed in characters.

It is provided on the card surface in a constant positional relationship.

The IC card 5 is then inserted into the card slot 3 of the IC card reader/writer 1 with the connector 5a facing downward. In this case, the IC card 5 is attached to the photoreflector 7.
Insert up to the part. When the tip of the IC card 5 is inserted up to the photoreflector 7 part, the light emitting diode 2
The irradiated light from 1 is reflected by the IC card 5 and input to the photosensor 22. And this photo sensor 22
The output signal is amplified by the amplifier 25 and sent to the data recognition section 2.
Sent to 6. The data recognition section 26 first recognizes the presence or absence of a card from the signal sent via the amplifier 25 and outputs the recognition result to the reader/writer control section 11 . The output signal of the amplifier 25 corresponds to the reflected light from the IC card 5, so as shown in FIG. 5, the level is low when there is no card, and the level is high when the card is white. Then, the data recognition unit 26 detects the presence of a card as shown in step A1 in FIG. 3, and when the detection signal is sent to the reader/writer control unit 11, the reader/writer control unit 11 An operation command is sent to the motor drive section 12 to rotate the guide roller 4a16a by the motor 13, and a start command is sent to the first counter 28 as shown in step A3. Thus, the IC card 5 is driven to run at a constant speed by the guide rollers 4a and 4b, and is sent in the direction of the guide rollers 6a and 6b. At this time, the light projected by the light emitting diode 21 hits the bottom surface of the IC card 5 and is reflected, and the reflected light is converted into an electrical signal by the photosensor 22, amplified by the amplifier 25, and converted into data 1.
! It is sent to the intelligence department 26. data! i! After detecting the presence of the card, the 1m section 26 performs one barcode recognition operation on the display contents of the information display section 5b, for example, as shown in step A4 in FIG. In this bar code or character portion, the output signal of the amplifier 25 oscillates slightly as shown in FIG. Then, the data recognition unit 26
After the barcode recognition is performed, the recognition data is stored in the data storage section 27 as shown in step A5. After that, when the connector 5a of the IC card 5 reaches the photoreflector 7, since the connector 5a is plated with gold, it has a high light reflectance, and the output signal level of the amplifier 25 changes to the photoreflector 7, as shown in FIG. It is even higher than the white part. Then, the data recognition unit 26 recognizes the output signal level of the amplifier 25, and as shown in step A6, the connector 5a
When detecting the first terminal row part, that is, the first terminal row, and outputting the detection signal to the reader/writer control section 11,
The reader/writer control section 11 gives a stop command to the first counter 28 as shown in step A7, and also gives a count value judgment command to the judgment section 31 as shown in step 88. The determining unit 31 compares the preset information from the tip of the IC card 5 to the first terminal row of the connector 5a with the count value of the first counter 28, and performs step A.
As shown in 9, it is determined whether or not the first terminal row of the connector 5a is in the normal position, and the determination result is output to the reader/writer control section 11. The reader/writer control unit 11
If a YES judgment result is sent from the counter 28, the process proceeds to step A10, where the second counter 29 starts counting. In this state, the IC card 5 is further guided, and as shown in step A11, the second terminal row of the connector 5a is recognized by the data 1111 section 26, and the recognition result is sent to the reader/writer control section 11.
The reader/writer control section 11 gives a stop command to the second counter 29 as shown in step A12, and also gives a judgment command to the judgment section 32 as shown in step A13. In step A14, the determining unit 32 compares the preset interval information between the first terminal row and the second terminal row of the connector 5a with the count value of the second counter 29, and determines the second terminal row of the connector 5a. is in the normal position, and outputs the determination result to the reader/writer control unit 31. If it is determined in step A9 or step A14 that the position of the connector 5a is incorrect, the reader/writer control unit 11 proceeds to step A15, gives a motor reversal command to the motor drive unit 12 to reverse the motor 13, and guides the Rollers 4a, 4b.

6a and 6b return the card to the card insertion slot 3 and eject it to the outside. That is, unless the correct IC card 5 is inserted, the contact connection operation to the insertion power cord is prohibited, and the insertion power cord is ejected to the outside as it is.

However, if it is determined in step A14 that the position of the second row of connectors 5a is correct, the process proceeds to step A16, and the card-free position, that is, the card end is detected. And the card end detection signal is data! ! ! g1
When the information is sent from the section 26 to the reader/writer 1i1111 section 11, the reader/writer control section 11 sends a stop command to the motor drive section 32 as shown in step A17, and the motor 1
8 is stopped. At this time, since the connector 5a of the IC card 5 has been sent to the position corresponding to the contact 8, the reader/writer control unit 31 drives the solenoid 9 as shown in step A18 to send the contact 8 upward. The contact bin 8a is connected to the connector 5a of the IC card 5, and communication processing with respect to the information center is started via a verification terminal (not shown) as shown in step A19. This communication processing includes, for example, identity verification that verifies whether the user is the correct card user using the personal identification number PIN, card verification that determines whether the card being used is correct based on verification data stored in the card, card issuer, card holder verification, etc. Image matching to identify the type, etc. is performed.

[Effects of the Invention] As detailed above, according to the present invention, an IC card reader/writer detects the connector position of the inserted card and compares it with preset information to determine whether the connector is a regular connector. Based on this judgment result, it is determined whether the inserted power card is an IC card or not, and contact connection operation for the inserted power card is prohibited unless a regular IC card is inserted. So, if a non-regular IC card is inserted,
The circuit and contact portion of the reader/writer can be reliably protected.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

The drawings show one embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 1 is a schematic configuration diagram showing the card running mechanism part of an IC card reader/writer, FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an electronic circuit, and FIG. 3 is an operation diagram. Flowchart showing the contents, Fig. 4 (a), (b)
) is a diagram showing an example of the configuration of an IC card connector and an information display section, and FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an example of an output signal waveform of a photoreflector. 1... IC card reader/writer, 2... Case body, 3... Card insertion slot, 4a, 4b, 6a, 6b...
・Guide roller, 7... Photo reflector, 8...
Contact, 9... Solenoid, 10... Stopper, 11... Reader/writer control section, 12... Motor drive section, 13... Motor, 21... Light emitting diode, 22...・Photo sensor, 25...Amplifier, 26・
...Data recognition section, 27...Data storage section, 28...
・First counter 28.29...Second counter, 30・
...Oscillator, 31.32... Judgment section.

Claims (1)

[Claims] In an IC card reader/writer that reads/writes to/from an IC card by connecting a contact to a connector of an IC card inserted from a card insertion slot, there is provided a means for reading an external shape of a card inserted from a card insertion slot; means for measuring the connector position and the terminal spacing of the insertion force cord from the read information; and means for comparing the connector position and the terminal spacing measured by the means with a reference value to determine whether or not they are correct; An IC characterized by comprising means for connecting the contact to the connector of the insertion card only when it is determined by this means that the connector position and terminal spacing of the insertion power card are correct.
Card reader writer.