Patent Publication Number: US-2013232020-A1

Title: Method for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission and device thereof

Description:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION 
     The present invention relates to financial communication technology, and more particularly to a method for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission and a device thereof, so as to limit the service spaces of electronic equipments such as POS machines. 
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     With the promotion and application of information technology, in our life and work, more and more electronic ways for currency settlement have been adopted. The electronic currency settlement way not only has advantages of convenience and speed, but also can reduce the cash pressure of the central bank. At present, the electronic settlement way has been applied to the settlement of various industries such as shopping in the department store and high-end consumption in exclusive shop, also applied to some entertainment venues such as karaoke parlors, bars, theatres and so on, and further applied to some special industries, such as gas stations, stops, toll stations, parks and so on. Because the electronic currency settlement is on the base of the electronic currency medium of bank such as debit cards, credit cards and so on, thus the POS machines and various new type portable electronic equipments with checkout function are needed. At present, the financial institutions such as UnionPay charge different service fees for the use of the electronic equipment such as POS machine in different industries, because of different industries having different profit rates produced in the consumption process, the industries with low profit rate such as department stores will be charged lower proportion for service fees, while some industries such as bars, karaoke parlors, restaurants and so on will be charged more serve fees. Thus, not a few users of the electronic equipments such as POS machines adopt a settlement terminal provided for the department stores and move it to other places such as bars, disco and so on for settlement, thereby achieving the purpose of paying fewer commission charges. However, the POS type electronic equipments provided by various manufacturers for the financial institutions such as UnionPay can not limit their service spaces. 
     Thus, it is necessary to provide a method for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission and a device thereof so as to prevent an electronic equipment, such as a POS machine and so on, from being moved and used illegally, thereby solving above defects. 
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     One object of the present invention is to provide a method for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission to overcome the disadvantages of the prior art. 
     Another object of the present invention is to provide a device for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission to overcome the disadvantages of the prior art. 
     To achieve above objects, the method for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission includes a fixed terminal arranged in an electronic equipment service area and a movable terminal arranged in the electronic equipment; the movable terminal accesses to and is registered with the fixed terminal to be bound with the fixed terminal; in-place confirming communication is carried out between the movable terminal and the fixed terminal regularly or irregularly; and the fixed terminal judges whether the movable terminal is located in a limited service area according to the communication transmission time during the in-place confirming communication with the movable terminal, the movable terminal is not located in the limited service area and stops working and/or sends an alarm if the difference between the communication transmission time and a preset time is larger than a setting range, and contrarily works normally. 
     In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, an initiating terminal of the in-place confirming communication is the movable terminal or the fixed terminal; the initiating terminal has a timer arranged therein to send an in-place confirming request periodically or at every time before starting up; the initiating terminal also has a clock arranged therein to record the communication transmission time of the in-place confirming communication; the communication transmission time can be determined by subtracting a constant confirmation processing time of a receiving terminal from a time difference of the procedure from the initiating terminal sending the in-place confirming request to receiving corresponding in-place response information; the constant confirmation processing time is larger than the maximum of the normal confirmation processing time of the receiving terminal; and after receiving the in-place confirming request, the receiving terminal starts an in-place confirming process and simultaneously starts to time until the time accumulated to the constant confirmation processing time and then makes an in-place confirming response. 
     Preferably, the communication between the fixed terminal and the movable terminal is built by a point-to-point direct physical connection way or wireless communication way, and the physical links of each communication are totally the same; the point-to-point direct physical connection way includes RS232 serial port line, RS485 serial port line, twisted pair of Ethernet or telephone line for dialing; and the wireless communication way includes 2.4 G wireless transmission, infrared transmission, Bluetooth transmission or near-field wireless data transmission. 
     Preferably, an encrypting communication way is adopted when carrying out the access and register and the in-place confirming communication between the fixed terminal and the movable terminal. 
     To achieve above objects, the device for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission provided by the present invention includes a fixed terminal with an anti-removing mechanism and arranged in an electronic equipment service area and a movable terminal arranged in the electronic equipment; fixed terminal includes a signal sending module, a signal receiving module, a comparator, a clock and a microcontroller therein; under the control of the microcontroller, the signal sending module sends a detection signal to the movable terminal of the electronic equipment; after receiving the detection signal, the movable terminal starts an in-place confirming process and simultaneously starts to time until the time accumulated to a preset constant confirmation processing time and then makes an in-place confirming response; the signal receiving module receives a response feedback signal from the movable terminal; the clock records the response time of the procedure from the signal sending module sending the detection signal to the signal receiving module receiving the feedback signal; the comparator compares the time difference, which is determined by subtracting the constant confirmation processing time of the movable terminal from the response time, with a preset time; the electronic equipment with the movable terminal is illegally relocated or subjected to communication retransmission if the difference between the time difference and the preset time is larger than a setting range and contrarily the movable terminal is in normal use. 
     Preferably, the anti-removing mechanism includes an acceleration transducer, which is arranged in the fixed terminal and will output a signal to the microcontroller of the fixed terminal so as to prohibit any communication between the fixed terminal and the movable terminal when the fixed terminal is removed. 
     Preferably, the anti-removing mechanism is a protective cover with a mechanical lock, and the protective cover further has a protective circuit which will output a signal to the microcontroller of the fixed terminal so as to prohibit any communication between the fixed terminal and the movable terminal when the protective cover is disassembled. 
     Preferably, the anti-removing mechanism is a GPS module, which is arranged in the fixed terminal and will output a signal to the microcontroller of the fixed terminal so as to prohibit any communication between the fixed terminal and the movable terminal when the fixed terminal is removed. 
     Preferably, the fixed terminal is arranged on the normal business communication channel of the electronic equipment and transparently transmits the normal business communication data of the electronic equipment without processing. 
     Preferably, the electronic equipment is a POS machine. 
     Compared with the prior art, the method for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission of the present invention utilizes the characteristic that the communication transmission time of two communication terminals is constant when their relative position is constant, thereby setting a movable terminal in the electronic equipment and simultaneously setting a fixed terminal in the service area of the electronic equipment, binding the movable terminal with the fixed terminal and then carrying out in-place confirming communication, and judging whether the electronic equipment is illegally relocated or subjected to communication retransmission according to the comparison between the communication transmission time of above communication process and the preset time. The present invention can effectively overcome the defect that the service area of the electronic equipment such as a POS machine can not be limited in the prior art, thereby bringing benefit to the stability of the consumer market and the development of the electronic currency trade. 
     The present invention will become more clear by means of the following description combining the accompanying drawings, which are used to illustrate embodiments of the present invention. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         FIG. 1  is a block schematic diagram of a device for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission according to a specific embodiment of the present invention; 
         FIG. 2  is a flow schematic diagram of a method for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission according to a specific embodiment of the present invention; 
         FIG. 3  is a schematic diagram illustrating in-place confirming communication procedure according to a method for avoiding illegal relocation of the present invention. 
     
    
    
     DESCRIPTION OF THE LABELS IN THE FIGURES 
     Electronic equipment  100 ; fixed terminal  200 ; signal sending module  210 ; signal receiving module  220 ; alarm module  230 ; comparator  240 ; clock  250 ,  320 ; microcontroller  260 ; timer  270 ; movable terminal  300 ; processor  310 ; communication module  330 ; anti-removing mechanism  400 . 
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF ILLUSTRATED EMBODIMENTS 
     The technical solutions of embodiments will be clear and completely described as follows by combining the figures of the embodiments of the present invention, and similar labels in the figures represent similar components. Obviously, the embodiments described as follows are merely parts of embodiments of the present invention, but not the all. Based on the embodiments of the present invention, other embodiments created by one of ordinary skill in the art without creative work, all belong to the scope of the present invention. 
     Firstly, please referring to  FIG. 1 , the device for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission provided by the present invention includes a fixed terminal  200  arranged in an electronic equipment service area  100  and a movable terminal  300  arranged in the electronic equipment  100 . The movable terminal  300  can access to the fixed terminal  200  and be registered with the fixed terminal  200  so as to be bound with the fixed terminal  200 , and an in-place confirming communication is carried out between the movable terminal  300  and the fixed terminal  200  regularly or irregularly. Preferably, an encrypting communication way is adopted when carrying out the access and register and the in-place confirming communication between the fixed terminal  200  and the movable terminal  300 . An initiating terminal of the in-place confirming communication can be the movable terminal  300  or the fixed terminal  200 , and this embodiment chooses the fixed terminal  200  as an initiating terminal of the in-place confirming communication and the movable terminal  300  accordingly as a receiving terminal to illustrate. 
     Referring to  FIG. 1  again and combining  FIG. 2 , in this embodiment, the fixed terminal includes a signal sending module  210 , a signal receiving module  220 , an alarm module  230 , a comparator  240 , a clock  250  and a microcontroller  260 , all of which are arranged therein; and the movable terminal  300  includes a processor  310 , a clock  320  and a communication module  330 , all of which are arranged in the movable terminal  300 . Under the control of the microcontroller  260 , the signal sending module  210  of the fixed terminal  200  sends a detection signal to the movable terminal  300  of the electronic equipment  100 , and the signal receiving module  220  receives a response feedback signal from the movable terminal  300 . The clock  250  of the fixed terminal  200  is used for recording the response time of the procedure from the signal sending module  210  sending the detection signal to the signal receiving module  220  receiving the feedback signal. The procedure from the fixed terminal  200  sending a detection signal to receiving a response feedback signal is in-place confirming communication, wherein, the detection signal sent by the fixed terminal  200  is an in-place confirming request which can be sent at every time before starting up and/or be sent periodically via a timer  270  arranged in the fixed terminal  200  (the initiating terminal), while the response feedback signal received by the fixed terminal  200  is the in-place response information returned from the movable terminal  300 . The actual communication transmission time of above-mentioned in-place communication process can be determined by subtracting the time used for carrying out confirmation processing by the movable terminal  300  from above-mentioned response time. After the movable terminal  300  receiving the in-place confirming request, its processor  310  begins to carry out the in-place communication processing and simultaneously its clock  320  starts to time, when the time is accumulated to a preset constant confirmation processing time (this constant confirmation processing time should be larger than the maximum value of the normal confirmation processing time of the movable terminal  300  so as to ensure that the movable terminal  300  can finish the in-place confirming processing within that time), it makes an in-place confirming response. The comparator  240  is used for comparing the communication transmission time of the above-mentioned in-place confirming communication with a preset time (the maximal communication transmission time needed when the movable terminal  300  makes a communication with the fixed terminal  200  within the legal communication ranges), if the difference between the time difference and the preset time is larger than a setting range, it means that the communication transmission distance between the fixed terminal  200  and the movable terminal  300  has been increased (the electronic equipment has been moved and used illegally), or the communication information therebetween has been retransmitted by a transfer station thereby increasing its communication transmission time, under such a situation, it can be judged that the electronic equipment  100  with the movable terminal  300  has been moved and used illegally or subjected to communication retransmission, thus, the use of the movable terminal  300  will be prohibited and simultaneously the alarm module  230  arranged in the fixed terminal  200  will be activated to produce an alarm, if above-mentioned situation has not happened, the movable terminal  300  will be in normal use. 
     Preferably, in this embodiment, the fixed terminal  200  has an anti-removing mechanism  400  which includes an acceleration transducer arranged in the terminal  200 . The acceleration transducer will output a signal to the microcontroller  260  of the fixed terminal  200  so as to prohibit any communication between the fixed terminal  200  and the movable terminal  300  when the fixed terminal  200  is removed. In another preferable embodiment, the anti-removing mechanism  400  can be a protective cover with a mechanical lock. The protective cover further has a protective circuit which will output a signal to the microcontroller  260  of the fixed terminal  200  so as to prohibit any communication between the fixed terminal  200  and the movable terminal  300  when the protective cover is disassembled. Additionally, the anti-removing mechanism  400  also can be a GPS module arranged in the fixed terminal  200 . The GPS module will output a signal to the microcontroller  260  of the fixed terminal  200  so as to prohibit any communication between the fixed terminal  200  and the movable terminal  300  when the fixed terminal  200  is removed. Above-mentioned various anti-removing mechanisms  400  are provided for ensuring that the position of the fixed terminal  200  will not be changed, thereby determining the rang of the service space of the movable terminal  300  of the electronic equipment  100  so as to further avoid a situation of producing illegal relocation. 
     Preferably, the communication between the fixed terminal  200  and the movable terminal  300  is built by a point-to-point direct physical connection way, the physical links of each communication are totally the same; the point-to-point direct physical connection way includes RS232 serial port line, RS485 serial port line, twisted pair of Ethernet or telephone line for dialing. Additionally, the communication between the fixed terminal  200  and the movable terminal  300  also can be built by wireless communication way, the wireless communication way includes 2.4 G wireless transmission, infrared transmission, Bluetooth transmission or near-field wireless data transmission. Preferably, the fixed terminal  200  is arranged on the normal business communication channel of the electronic equipment  100  and transparently transmits the normal business communication data of the electronic equipment  100  without processing. 
     Referring to  FIG. 2 , the method for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission of the present invention will be described as follows: when the movable terminal  300  is used for the first time, firstly, the movable terminal  300  needs to access to and be registered with the fixed terminal  200  so as to be bound with the fixed terminal  200 ; next, the movable terminal  300  makes in-place confirming communication with the fixed terminal  200  regularly or irregularly, in this procedure, the fixed terminal  200  sends an in-place confirming request to the movable terminal  300 , the movable terminal  300  makes an in-place confirming processing after receiving the request and makes an in-place response when the preset constant confirmation processing time is up; the fixed terminal  200  judges whether the movable terminal  300  is still in the limited service area according to the communication transmission time of the in-place confirming communication, if the difference between the communication transmission time and the preset time is larger than the setting range, judging that the movable terminal  300  is not in the limited service area, the movable terminal  300  will stop working and/or produce an alarm, and contrarily the movable terminal  300  still works normally. 
     The working principle of the present invention will be illustrated as follows by taking a specific in-place confirming communication process for example. 
     Referring to  FIG. 3  and combining  FIG. 1  and  FIG. 2 , in  FIG. 3 , the time showed by the time axis of left side where the fixed terminal  200  is located and the time showed by the time axis of right side where the movable terminal  300  is located are synchronous. The labels t 1 , t 2 , t 3  and t 4  showed in the time axis represent the moments of various actions produced by the fixed terminal  200  or the movable terminal  300 . A single communication process for in-place confirming begins from the moment t 1  and ends at the moment t 4 , and begins next in-place confirming communication process (from t 5  to t 8 ) after delaying for ΔT 1  (this delay time can be set and achieved by the timer  270 ). Specifically, each in-place confirming communication process will be described as follows: the fixed terminal  200  sending in-place confirming communication request to the movable terminal  300  at the moment t 1 , the movable terminal  300  receiving this request at the moment t 2  and then starting an in-place confirming process and simultaneously starting to time, when the time is accumulated to the moment t 3 , making an in-place confirming response and sending an in-place response information to the fixed terminal  200 , via communication transmission, the fixed terminal  200  receiving this in-place response information at the moment t 4 , so the time difference between the moments t 1  and t 4  is the response time T 1  of the in-place confirming process, and the time difference between the moments t 2  and t 3  is the constant confirmation processing time T 2  of the movable terminal  300 , which is predefined. The confirmation processing time needs to meet the need of being larger than the normal confirmation processing time so as to ensure that the movable terminal  300  can finish corresponding in-place confirming processing before the moment t 3 . In view of above analysis, it can be determined that the actual communication transmission time of the in-place confirming communication process is T=T 1 -T 2 , and because of T 1 =t 4 -t 1  and T 2 =t 3 -t 2 , it also can be obtained that T=(t 4 -t 3 )+(t 2 -t 1 ). Suppose that the preset time is T 0  (the maximum value of the communication transmission time needed in the in-place confirming communication between the movable terminal and the fixed terminal), in general, it can be judged that the movable terminal  300  is not in the limited service area when the actual communication transmission time T is larger than the preset time T 0 , but according to the practical situation, it needs to relax this condition of judgment to allow the existence of errors, thus, above condition of judgment is set to whether the difference between the communication transmission time T and the preset time T 0  is larger than the setting rang which can be set in accordance with specific conditions. 
     As described above, the method for preventing illegal relocation and communication retransmission of the present invention utilizes the characteristic that the communication transmission time of two communication terminals is constant when their relative position is constant, thereby setting a movable terminal  300  in the electronic equipment  100  and simultaneously setting a fixed terminal  200  in the service area of the electronic equipment  100 , binding the movable terminal  300  with the fixed terminal  200  and then carrying out in-place confirming communication, and judging whether the electronic equipment  100  has been illegally relocated or subjected to communication retransmission according to the comparison between the communication transmission time of above communication process and the preset time. The present invention can effectively overcome the defect that the service area of the electronic equipment  100  such as a POS machine can not be limited in the prior art, thereby bringing benefit to the stability of the consumer market and the development of the electronic currency trade. 
     In the above-mentioned embodiments of the present invention, the electronic equipment  100  is a POS machine, however, it should be understood that the electronic equipment  100  is not limited to be a POS machine, other electronic equipments, which need to limit their service space, all can use the device and method provided by the present invention to achieve the limitation of service space. 
     While the invention has been described in connection with what are presently considered to be the most practical and preferred embodiments, it is to be understood that the invention is not to be limited to the disclosed embodiments, but on the contrary, is intended to cover various modifications and equivalent arrangements included within the spirit and scope of the invention.