Report on a demonstrator for the fight against counterfeiting

This report has the objective to describe the demonstrator developed in the context of the project Goods Digital Identification against Fraud and Counterfeiting, which supports the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO). One of the goals of this project is to investigate and develop techniques to detect counterfeit products and electronic devices in particular. Because counterfeit electronic devices are usually built with different (e.g., cheaper) materials or different manufacturing processes than proper electronic devices, one of the main techniques is based on the capability to identify electronic devices on the basis of their physical properties. These physical properties can appear in the digital information generated by the mobile phone in its operation. For example, the Radio Frequency (RF) emissions from the communication systems of a mobile phone can be used to identify the phone and its model. In this report, we describe a demonstrator to identify mobile phones on the basis of the radio frequency emissions generated by the transmission components implemented for the GSM wireless standard. We demonstrate that we can distinguish mobile phones not only for different brands and models but also for phones of the same brand and model and different serial numbers. The demonstrator is designed and implemented using low cost systems and machine learning algorithms. In addition to the fight against counterfeitng, the identification of electronic devices and mobile phones in particular can be used to support forensics and criminal investigation. In this context, this work can also be used to support EUROPOL.