NAV Tag

Revolutionizing toll payments with contactless nationwide AI-powered license plate recognition

Comment

NavTag is revolutionizing how tolls are paid throughout the United States with an innovative, License plate-based system. Our application eliminates using cash, RFID transponders, or any physical hardware while offering drivers a seamless and contactless solution. Registering your license plate and government ID opens you to 49 states' access to their toll systems.

NavTag's development leveraged multiple technologies to create a comprehensive automated toll payment ecosystem. We first started with license plate image processing, we utilized Python with OpenCV to implement real-time capture and preprocessing of license plate images, including motion detection within a 50cm range to trigger our recognition pipeline. The rest of our backend employed PyMongo as the MongoDB ORM, enabling efficient management of user profiles, validated license plate registrations, balances, and nationwide toll booth metadata through structured document storage.

We even implemented fraud detection into our app which combines Node.js WebSockets with mobile geolocation data to verify user coordinates within 2 kilometers of toll points in real-time, while AWS EC2 instances host our core infrastructure for scalable, secure cloud operations. For optical character recognition, we used PaddleOCR to provide us with superior accuracy in extracting license plate text across the states, outperforming traditional OCR solutions in our stress tests. On the other hand for our front end, Swift powered our mobile app with an intuitive UI

This weekend, our team went on an intensive learning journey, pushing our boundaries and expanding our skills. We learned new technologies, and new programming languages every member of this team personally challenged themselves to master new, unfamiliar tools one of us learned one of the following languages or libraries: Swift for iOS development, OpenCV for computer vision tasks, and WebSocket for real-time communication; significantly improving our technical skill

Looking ahead, NavTag is ambitiously planning to extend this technology further than just toll payments. We will be excited to deploy our solution in parking garages and revolutionize the parking experience with the same license plate-based system. We also plan on adding further value for our users by exploring the loan system within the app, enabling short-term borrowing for toll expenses or parking fees. As we continue to scale, API security is one of the most important things to work on, and we are considering advanced measures such as zero-trust architecture and role-based access controls. Rate limiting will also be introduced to handle fair usage and protect our infrastructure. These further developments will go on to enhance our existing service and open new opportunities within multiple industries, potentially establishing NavTag's position as a leader in intelligent, connected transport infrastructure.

Share this project:

Updates