Ask HN: What technology/APIs do banks use to read and process cheques?

[cmacnasty]

Hi guys,

I've done some assorted googling on terms like "bank image processing API", "image processing API", "bank cheque reader" and so on...

Unfortunately, I haven't found a satisfactory answer. Has anyone here developed using a tool like this, or know anything about it? I'd love to know how this works because: A. I think the technology is fascinating and has the potential to be utilized in a variety of applications B. I've recently gotten into bowling, and would love to build a simple app that lets you take pictures (or scan) your bowling score and do some fancy stuff with it (of all the uses, this is what I want to do... ;)

Thanks!

[tgflynn]

I don't know much about check processing but I used to work for the company that built the system the USPS uses to read addresses on envelopes (both machine printed and hand-written). Many years of research and development went into that system financed either directly by USPS funding to academia or through performance improvement contracts with industry. Over 10-20 years the systems went from being able to read only a fraction of the mail to the point where today they have practically replaced manual address keying.

There is probably a similar story behind check reading systems.

My impression is that although there are a number of commercially available OCR applications their performance is far from that of specialized proprietary systems such as those used by the USPS and banks.