Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors
T.A.W. applications
Endo Security
Building the future of credential security for every document, product, and place.
T.A.W. (Tape-based Authentication Wearable) is an optical authentication tape: a thin security tape made of birefringent film layered over a polarizer. During manufacturing, fibers in the tape settle into a random structure. When light passes through the tape, that structure produces a unique optical pattern.
A standard smartphone camera can read the pattern and convert it into a digital signature. The signature is checked against the one recorded when the tape was enrolled. Because the pattern comes from the physical structure of the tape, it cannot be copied.
T.A.W. requires no chip, battery, or biometric data. It can be applied to documents, products, and physical locations.
Endo Security is funded by the University of Michigan’s Innovation Partnerships.
- 01 · Layers Birefringent tape is bonded to polarizer film.
- 02 · Pattern Light passing through the tape produces a unique optical pattern.
- 03 · Capture A standard smartphone camera reads the pattern.
- 04 · Verification The pattern is converted to a signature and matched to the enrolled record.
Chief Research Officer · Endo Security
Xiao Zhang, Ph.D.
Dr. Zhang invented T.A.W. A professor at the University of Michigan, Dr. Zhang leads research in data science, machine learning, and wearable technology. T.A.W. is licensed to Endo. Patent pending, U.S. application filed November 10, 2025.
Applications
ENDO World
Block-level
environmental health
ENDO World combines federal environmental data, including public health, weather, noise, and heat, with biometric data from the user’s wearable.
Each city block is classified as hostile, moderate, or supportive to health.
Alerts appear on the user’s watch when conditions change, and the map suggests routes through supportive areas.
About ENDO World
ENDO World tracks the conditions that surround people and affect their health without them knowing it: air quality, heat, toxins, pollution, the average heart rate of an area, and more.
Its unit of intelligence is not the individual and not the whole city. It is the block and the neighborhood, the specific places where environmental conditions concentrate and human health responds.
The product is verified, anonymized, real-time data: biometric and environmental signals aggregated from wearables and public health sources. More than a tracker or an app, ENDO World is a living observation system that watches what environments do to human bodies over time, and makes that intelligence visible to the people and institutions who can act on it.
Hostile
Conditions working against health.
Moderate
Conditions to watch.
Supportive
Conditions working in favor of health.
Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors · Readings illustrative
Use Cases
How Endo Security and
ENDO World work together
ENDO World uses environmental and wearable data to assess conditions at the block level. Endo Security verifies where that data comes from and controls who can access it.
The examples below show both working together.
Combined use cases
Verified locations
How location data is verified before it is used.
- The location Buildings, entrances, and sensors are the physical places being measured.
- Endo Security T.A.W. is applied at each location. Each tape has a unique signature recorded at enrollment.
- Endo Security Data from a location with verified tape is accepted. Data without a matching signature is not.
- ENDO World ENDO World classifies conditions using only verified location data.
Clinic check-in and data sharing
Identity and permission are verified separately.
- Endo Security The patient’s T.A.W. credential is read at the entrance. Identity is confirmed first, then access permission.
- ENDO World The patient chooses which data to share from their watch, and for how long.
- ENDO World The clinician sees only the shared data, such as environmental exposure and heart rate.
- Endo Security Access expires automatically at the end of the approved period.
Public health research
Block-level data without personal identification.
- Endo Security T.A.W. verifies fixed locations across the neighborhood.
- ENDO World Only residents who opt in contribute data, and it is anonymized.
- ENDO World ENDO World classifies each block using verified, consented data.
- Endo Security The health department receives an aggregate report with time-limited access.
A connected and secure world.
Endo