Biometrics

I found great interest in Biometrics also and this what I’ve found so far.

According to www.biometricslibrary.com biometrics is, “a measurable, physical characteristic or personal behavioral trait used to recognize the identity, or verify the claimed identity, of an enrollee.” This type of technology has been available and used for more than a century. Fingerprints for example, have been used in law enforcement agencies for decades. “In 1893, the Home Ministry
Office, UK, accepted that no two individuals have the same fingerprints. Soon after this discovery, many major law enforcement departments embraced the idea of first ‘booking’ the fingerprints of criminals, so that their records are readily available and later using leftover fingerprint smudges (latents), they could determine the identity of criminals” (http://bias.csr.unibo.it/maltoni/handbook/chapter_1.pdf) It’s been only in recent years that biometrics technology has been taken to a whole new level, by experimenting with other physiological features such as; hand form, iris, retina, facial geometry, vein structure, odor, DNA, etc.
When people think about biometrics, they usually think of it as a Hollywood futuristic films, but the truth of the matter is that biometrics is becoming more affordable than ever. This means that more and more companies are investing money in order to keep up with security standards. Jon Surmacz says that “the worldwide biometrics technology market reached $118.8 million in 2000, and will increase over the next five years at a compound annual growth rate of 50 percent”.(http://www.darwinmag.com/read/machineshop/column.html?ArticleID=306) Furthermore, with the proliferation of the internet and with the widely daily usage of technology; such as computers and cellular phones, “personal identification has taken the form of secret passwords and PINs” (http://www.bromba.com/faq/Biometrie). Companies are now looking for more effective ways of confirming an individual’s identity since memory is not the most reliable method, due to the fact that people tend to forget passwords. Moreover, it’s said that an average person is required to remember about 20 to 30 passwords so this even makes matters worse, not to mention that they have to be changed every 3 months in order to fight against computer hackers. A solution to this could be biometrics technology. For example, a company could implement a system where employees could use fingerprint recognition devices in order to grant access to computers or networks. The device would most likely consist of a digital fingerprint reading device that would be attached to the computer or perhaps the keyboard. The user would then make a fingerprint impression on the device, the scanned sample would then be “verified” or “identified” depending of the system settings.
“In an identification , the recorded biometric feature is compared to all biometric data saved in a system. If there is a match, the identification is successful, and the corresponding user name or user ID may be processed subsequently. In a verification , the user enters her/his identity into the system (e.g., via a keypad or card), then a biometric feature is scanned. The biometric trait must only be compared to the one previously saved reference feature corresponding to the ID. If a match occurs, verification is successful.” (http://www.bromba.com/faq/biofaqe.htm#Biometrie)
This type of technology method is actually been used in many high-tech companies nowadays to control access to restricted areas in buildings rather than using traditional key and badge systems. Banks could also look into the technology to replace cards and PINs at ATMs. Biometrics could be a very efficient way of verifying an online purchases and payments, or it could even take over the job of time clocks in factories. Even though, it obvious that there are millions of reasons why biometrics should be implemented in many fields, factors such as; “performance over time, comfort, accuracy, availability and cost” (http://www.bromba.com/faq/Biometrie)Should be taken in consideration, because it could affect the functionality of the technology.








http://www.bromba.com/faq/biofaqe.htm#Biometrie

http://stat.tamu.edu/Biometrics/

http://biometrics.cse.msu.edu/whats_new.html

http://www.darwinmaßg.com/learn/curve/column.html?ArticleID=160

http://bias.csr.unibo.it/maltoni/handbook/

http://www.biometricslibrary.com/

http://filebox.vt.edu/users/teastman/pages/otherlinks.htm

http://www.darwinmag.com/read/machineshop/column.html?ArticleID=306