Patent ID: 7440596

Claim:
An image verification method comprising: sensing a first fingerprint using a fingerprint sensing means; storing image data of the first fingerprint sensed by the fingerprint sensing means as a first image data using an image data storing means; comparing a second image data of a second fingerprint sensed by the fingerprint sensing means with the first image data using a residual fingerprint judging means, wherein the fingerprint judging means judges whether the second image data is a residual fingerprint; and verifying the second image data image data using a verification means, when the residual fingerprint judging means judges that the second image data is not a residual fingerprint; wherein the residual fingerprint judging means judges that the second fingerprint is a residual fingerprint when the first image data and said second image data match, and judges that the second fingerprint is not a residual fingerprint when said first image data and said second image data do not match, and wherein the residual fingerprint judging means performs the steps comprising extracting a part of the second image data as a verification data; dividing the verification data into a plurality of blocks of predetermined sizes, producing a plurality of verification results, each verification result corresponding to a block from the plurality of blocks, and comprising points indicating locations relative to the first image data that match the corresponding block according to a pattern matching process, superimposing the plurality of verification results by moving each verification result based on the positional relationship of the corresponding block relative to the plurality of blocks, and judging whether or not the fingerprint is a residual fingerprint based on the degree of the overlap of the points in the verification results.