Glossary and acronyms
Glossary
Section titled “Glossary”authentication
Section titled “authentication”A process that inspects a document in a controlled environment and performs extensive tests on the document’s physical layout and security features. It then reports the results, which reflect the differences between what is known about a given document type and an actual document of that type being examined. Despite this advanced authentication technology, however, the quality of the end result is still dependent the interpretation of the test results by the operator or application.
barcode
Section titled “barcode”An optical, machine-readable representation of data that typically describes the object that carries the barcode. AssureID supports the PDF-417 stacked barcode used for RealID-compliant driver’s licenses and state-issued identification cards that meet the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA) standard.
biometrics
Section titled “biometrics”The currently standardized biometrics used for document identification are facial recognition, fingerprint recognition, and iris recognition. The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) defines the biometric file formats and communication protocols used for passports. Note that only the digital image (usually in JPEG or JPEG2000 format) of each biometric feature is actually stored in the chip. The comparison of biometric features is performed outside the passport chip by electronic border control systems (e-borders).
biometric passport
Section titled “biometric passport”Also known as an e-passport, ePassport, or a digital passport, a combined paper and electronic passport that contains biometric information which can be used to authenticate an individual’s identity. See contactless chip.
capture
Section titled “capture”The scanning or reading of an image that is used to authenticate a document. AssureID requires at least one image to be captured using a white light source of the front side of the document. GBG strongly recommends capturing both sides of a two-sided document for optimal verification results.
classification
Section titled “classification”Classification is the identification of a document type based on its presentation and orientation. The presentation indicates the front or back side of a document. The orientation indicates whether the top edge of the document is at the top of the captured image.
contactless chip
Section titled “contactless chip”A microprocessor chip and antenna (for power to both the chip and for communication) that is embedded in either the front or back cover, or on the center page of the passport. Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) is used to authenticate the data stored electronically in the passport chip, making it expensive and difficult to forge when all security mechanisms are fully and correctly implemented.
crosschecking
Section titled “crosschecking”A crosscheck verifies that the data that is listed in multiple data sources (Visual Inspection Zone, MRZ, barcode, magnetic stripe, or contactless chip) is the same. If a data source is unable to be read, the test will not include that source. This process includes a method for allowing common misreads and transliterations, such as an accented or unaccented version of the same character. A document can fail based on the collective frequency of failed crosschecks, which would not cause a document to fail as individual tests.
document types
Section titled “document types”AssureID supports generic and non-generic document types. The generic type is an ICAO identification card, the non-generic type is an ID1 non-ICAO identification card.
extraction
Section titled “extraction”Extraction is the process of accessing and obtaining information that is read from text fields, image fields (such as a photograph), or contained in a 1D- or 2D-barcode, a magnetic stripe, or contactless chip.
An area of a document from which AssureID extracts (accesses, reads, and obtains) biographic and data contained in OCR-readable text, a 1D barcode, 2D barcode, magnetic stripe, or contactless chip.
generic type
Section titled “generic type”Generic types are those which AssureID can partially but not fully identify. For example, AssureID can identify an ICAO Passport and run certain tests on it without knowing the exact type.
glare metrics
Section titled “glare metrics”Glare metrics describe the amount of glare on the image and is a measure of light uniformity across the document. GBG recommends a score of 50 or greater to be considered an image with no glare or an acceptable level of glare.
International Civil Aviation Organization
Section titled “International Civil Aviation Organization”The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) is a specialized agency of the United Nations which defines standards for international travel documents, international passports, and IDs, to ensure document standardization for the layout and location of biographic data and images.
issuer
Section titled “issuer”The issuer is the government jurisdiction (country, state, or province) that issued the document.
light sources
Section titled “light sources”AssureID supports the following light source types:
visible (white), near-infrared, and ultraviolet.
laser perforation
Section titled “laser perforation”A type of document manufacturing technique that uses special laser technology to create minute holes right through a document’s substrate (front and back). The holes are arranged to form an image that becomes clearly visible to the naked eye when the document is held up to the light. It cannot be copied or mechanically reproduced.
localization
Section titled “localization”AssureID supports 12 languages for localized strings in the AssureID Document Library for standard fields, standard authentications, document issuers, and document classes. Note that localization is not the same as translation.
nationality
Section titled “nationality”Nationality is the legal relationship between an individual person and a state. Nationality affords the state jurisdiction over the person and affords the person the protection of the state. These rights and duties vary from state to state. Nationality differs technically and legally from citizenship, which is a different legal relationship between a person and a country. Passports are issued to nationals of a state, rather than only to citizens, because the passport is the travel document used to enter the country. Also used synonymously with ethnicity or national origin.
native fields
Section titled “native fields”Some documents (such as passports) contain information in two or more languages, typically one that uses a Latin-based alphabet and another that uses a non-Latin alphabet. AssureID returns the Latin version as the normal field and the secondary language version as the native field.
near-infrared
Section titled “near-infrared”Near-infrared (NIR) is the region closest in wave- length to the radiation detectable by the human eye. NIR is sometimes called reflected infrared.
non-image data
Section titled “non-image data”Non-image data includes binary data such as magnetic stripe and machine-readable zone (MRZ) barcode, or contactless chip information.
machine-readable zone
Section titled “machine-readable zone”The machine-readable zone (MRZ) is an area of a document, such as a passport and some IDs, that contains encoded information, including the type of passport, passport ID, issuing country, name, nationality, and expiration date. It is typically located at the bottom of the identity page of a passport.
optical character recognition
Section titled “optical character recognition”Optical character recognition (OCR) is a common method of digitizing printed texts so that they can be electronically edited, searched, and stored as machine-encoded text.
Public Key Infrastructure
Section titled “Public Key Infrastructure”Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) is used to authenticate the data stored electronically in the passport chip, making it expensive and difficult to forge when all security mechanisms are fully and correctly implemented.
series
Section titled “series”The series is a label that identifies the version of a document when the format or design changed. It may or may not correspond to the date of issue.
sharpness metrics
Section titled “sharpness metrics”Sharpness metrics describe the sharpness of the image and is a measure of edge contrast across the document. A score of 0 means that the image is very blurry (not sharp) and a score of 100 means that the image is very sharp. By default, GBG recommends a sharpness grade of at least 50 or greater to be considered an image with an acceptable level of sharpness.
The document size represents the physical size of a document; for example, ID1 is a credit-card sized document such as a driver’s license and ID3 is a passport.
Visual Inspection Zone
Section titled “Visual Inspection Zone”The Visual Inspection Zone (VIZ and VZ2) is a field that is scanned and read using optical character recognition (OCR).
Acronyms
Section titled “Acronyms”| Acronym | Description |
|---|---|
| AAMVA | American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators |
| CRL | Certificate Revocation List |
| CSCA | Country Signing Certificate Authority |
| DSC | Document Signer Certificate |
| eMRTD | electronic Machine-Readable Travel Documents |
| ICAO | International Civil Aviation Organization |
| MRZ | Machine-Readable Zone |
| NIR | Near-infrared |
| OCR | Optical Character Recognition |
| PKI | Public Key Infrastructure |
| SOD | Document Security Object |
| SOAP | Simple Object Access Protocol |
| VIZ | Visual Inspection Zone |
| XACML | eXtensible Access Control Markup Language |