A document printing system may include a print engine, a controller and a communication port. The communication port can read a portable memory device, which stores an electronic secure file for authorizing the print engine. The portable memory device may store data such as the creation date for the electronic secure file. The portable memory may also store the device identification code and/or the vendor identification code. The electronic secure file may also store the creation date for the file itself, and the device identification code, the vendor identification code, or a balance amount. The system may authorize a print engine by comparing the data in the electronic secure file and data stored on the portable memory device. If the comparison of data finds a mismatch, the system may determine that the print engine is not authorized; or determine that the service is authorized if otherwise.

An information management control apparatus includes a storage unit, a transmission unit, and a permission unit. The storage unit stores a job including one of a pair of keys, with which both encryption and decryption are possible, and address information. The transmission unit encrypts a user ID of a login user by using the one of the keys and transmits the encrypted user ID through a communication unit in accordance with the address information, the user having been logged in in order to issue an instruction for executing the job. The permission unit permits execution of the job, in a case in which a user ID that has been encrypted by using the other of the keys and transmitted in response to the transmission is decrypted by using the one of the keys, if the user ID is the same as the user ID of the login user.

An information processing apparatus includes plural communication units, a determination unit, and a controller. The communication units are configured to conduct a wireless communication at different communication speeds. The determination unit is configured to determine a communication unit having a faster communication speed in order to transmit or receive an encrypted communication object. The controller is configured to perform a control to start a communication by the communication unit determined by the determination unit.

A device comprising: an input for receiving images captured by a camera, of an environment illuminated by light from a light source; an image processing module; and a verification module. The image processing module is configured to process one or more of the images to decode a timestamp modulated into the light, and to output an indication of the decoded timestamp. The verification module is arranged to receive the indication of the decoded timestamp output by the image processing module, and based thereon to perform an at least partially automated verification of a time at which the one or more images were captured.

Digital media can be automatically transferred between a digital capture device or storage device and one or more other devices with little or no user intervention. Media can be selected for automatic transfer based on one or more media-content or media-context characteristics.

A method embeds a watermark image into a host image with adaptive rectangular partition and Lower Upper (LU) decomposition such that a watermarked image is generated with improved computational complexity. The method divides a host image into an Red (R) component, a Green (G) component, and a Blue (B) component, and divides each component of the R, G, and B components into a plurality of MM size blocks, and partitions each of the plurality of MM size blocks into a plurality of non-overlapping blocks with adaptive rectangular partition. The method selects a plurality of embedding blocks from the plurality of MM size blocks for each component of the R, G, and B components of the host image to embed watermark information such that the watermarked image is generated.

An image forming apparatus includes a housing having a front section and a rear section, a user interface including a display and disposed at the front section and not at the rear section, a first port disposed at the front section within which the display is completely included, and a second port disposed at the rear section. The front and rear sections are defined by imaginarily dividing the housing in half and located opposite to each other in a front-rear direction. When a second USB device that is not a particular USB device is attached to the second port for a first USB device that is the particular USB device, cause the user interface to display a notification screen corresponding to that the second USB device is attached to the second port.

A data-bearing image (391) is created from a carrier image (371). The carrier image (371) is scaled to produce a scaled image. A clustered-dot halftone screen is applied to the scaled image to produce a halftone image. A resulting number of cells in the halftone image conforms to a cell count (372) that includes a horizontal cell value and a vertical cell value. Payload data is encoded into the halftone image to produce a data-bearing halftone image, including shifting pixel clusters within cells of the halftone image that include pixel clusters.

A method, system, and processor-executable software for processing images or video captured by a smartphone or other digital image capture device for subsequent validation and authentication captures not only the image, but also metadata relevant to the authenticity of validity of the image, such as position, time, camera movement and orientation, image parameters, and so forth. The image is watermarked and both the watermarked image and the metadata, as well as a symmetric key used in the watermarking, are digitally signed and transmitted or uploaded to a web server or authentication centric entity for authentication and storage. When a third party submits an image to the web server or authentication centric entity, the submitted image is compared with the stored watermarked image for authentication and validation of the submitted image, and the metadata is then retrieved to enable analysis of the contents of authenticated and validated image.

A method, system, and processor-executable software for processing images or video captured by a smartphone or other digital image capture device for subsequent validation and authentication captures not only the image, but also metadata relevant to the authenticity of validity of the image, such as position, time, camera movement and orientation, image parameters, and so forth. The image is watermarked and both the watermarked image and the metadata, as well as a symmetric key used in the watermarking, are digitally signed and transmitted or uploaded to a web server or authentication centric entity for authentication and storage. When a third party submits an image to the web server or authentication centric entity, the submitted image is compared with the stored watermarked image for authentication and validation of the submitted image, and the metadata is then retrieved to enable analysis of the contents of authenticated and validated image.