Wow, I didn't expect this post to have any traction. Many thanks for the diverse feedback. This is just a PoC of an idea I've created after reading https://new

Wow, I didn't expect this post to have any traction. Many thanks for the diverse feedback. This is just a PoC of an idea I've created after reading https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21417026 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21417026. But who knows, a human readable QR code alternative could born out of this. When I looked up for this idea, I have found out http://hrqr.org/ http://hrqr.org/ but didn't find it much readable. Thanks to the comments here I came across OCR-A, OCR-B, and MICR just now. From these I've found Westminster typeface: http://luc.devroye.org/fonts-48273.html http://luc.devroye.org/fonts-48273.html Do you guys think using a font inspired by Westminster be a better choice than the prototype we have now? In any case, the font should be resistant to malicious tampering such as creating an "o" from "c". Manual tampering could be also prevented with trailing checksum images that could be more information dense than the characters. Error correction concern is the most common among the comments here. Yes, HR code readers would need to have error correction implementations to be reliable. Since each 7x7 grid of 2^49 binary options could only encode one of the 85 valid characters, HR codes could be recognized with even large chunks missing. On the other hand, implementations would be much more complex than the QR code error correction algorithm. I reduced 3 corner blocks of QR codes to 1. This would make detection of HR codes much harder. OCR, image recognition from video feed and average phone camera and processor has advanced so much in the past years that I think these technical costs could be favored for a human readable QR code alternative. > If the app you are using to scan the QR code doesn't ask you for permission before opening the web page that's the problem with the app not the QR code... (wfdctrl's comment) You're right. If the protocol is not secure enough, then the layer above must be secured enough. But it's better to have the security at the protocol level. Here's the other reply of mine under this thread where I speculate about possible security issues with QR codes: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21424988 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21424988 I'm open for a better name than "HR code" by the way. It is too silly that makes it recognizable though.