| 摘要 |
Electronic delivery of counterfeit-resistant documents exchangeable for value, such as coupons, gift certificates, vouchers, admission tickets etc., directly to the person who ordered the documents over an open communications network such at the Internet. A first party orders a document from a second party, and the second party electronically delivers the ordered, counterfeit-resistant document to a device designated by the first party. For example, the document may be electronically ordered using a PC, and a printer coupled to the PC may print the document. In one embodiment, the first party transmits unsolicited offers over the open communications network. The document may be made counterfeit resistant by assigning unique information to each document of a given type, e.g., coupons, gift certificates, vouchers, admission tickets etc., and checking the uniqueness of a document and whether the unique information was previously read prior to allowing it to be exchanged for value. |
| 主权项 |
1. A computer system by which users of an open communications network can obtain counterfeit resistant documents from a supplier of the documents over the open communications network, and for validating such documents when presented for use, comprising:
a computer database storing information about counterfeit resistant documents; at least one computer programmed to provide unique information to a document ordered by a user via a user device coupled to the open communications network prior to, during or after ordering of the document by the user and to electronically transmit over the open communications network at least information relating to the document and the unique information to the user device in a form suitable for printing on a medium, and to store information relating the unique information and the document in a computer database; a reading device at a location and that reads at least the unique information from a document on a medium; and the at least one computer being in communication with the reading device and being further programmed to cause a determination, for each read document in real time, using at least from the information stored in the computer database and the unique information read by the reading device, of at least one of whether the document (a) is valid and (b) had been previously used, and also programmed to communicate the determination to the location of the reading device. |
