Forget silly privacy worries - help biometrics firms make MILLIONS Tech firms are set to experience a biometric bonanza - as long as they can persuade ordinary folk to give up worrying about their privacy. That's the claim in a briefing note from “growth consulting firm” Frost & Sullivan, which suggested the number of smartphones equipped with biometric gubbins will soar from 43 million to …
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No, usernames are usernames. Biometrics are a set of intrusions too far. Just last week there was an article in El Reg about how fingerprints are so yesterday. All that was said of fingerprints suddenly becomes less so when some new biometric device becomes available. I honestly can't see biometrics becoming the norm this "growth" firm seems to wish.
And yet, you leave them on the handle of the shopping trolley, and the items you picked up and put back.
Like faces and ubiquitous cameras, they never were secret, but it is the combination of frequent reading and linking to other data for unknown purposes that is a concern.
Now, where's my shopping gloves and mask?
Physical attributes of a user that are unique to the individual (hence the bio) that can be measured by a system (hence the metric) to confirm their identify.
And as @ql notes an intrusion way too far.
Sign posts to watch for on the road to socialist hell:
Availability if not use of biometrics identifiers for access to any government sponsored site. "Available" means even if other credentials are used for access, the database of credentials available to those who govern will include biometrics. Already being done. Give it 10 years to be widely imposed.)
National legislation requiring the use of biometrics for access to any form of digital device; (give it 20 years, max.)
National legislation requiring the use of DNA as a mandatory biometric (depends on advances in gene sequencing that will hopefully prove impossible to achieve. Not to worry, those who govern will demand that it be available in the database used to identify you.)
The irony is, of course, that this will simply the widen the already existing digital divide between the citizens of developed countries that those who govern can enforce such procedures on, and the unwashed terrorists who have better sense than to go gently into that dark database.
Actually nothing to do with either
Data fetishists want data.
They will attach themselves to whatever government is gullible enough to believe the satisfying of their fetish will cure whatever "problem" they have.
In reality the satisfying of the fetish is what matters to them.
governments of democracies and regimes alike - rejoice! What you've been creaming about, but unable to come up with, due to the usual gov inefficiencies, shall be delivered to you, nearly free of charge. Courtesy of the good old capitalism bent on never ending "growth" and "progress" based on "new and revolutionary, 100% totally safe authentication!!!".
Fujitsu thinks facial recognition is better than fingerprints? Why do I find myself wondering if they have an extensive patent portfolio in facial recognition technology? If your fingerprint is compromised, at least you have nine others you can switch to. If your face is compromised, you're SOL.
Not that fingerprint readers are super secure or accurate, but facial recognition is no better. Nor any form of biometrics you're likely to put on a smartphone. The goal isn't perfect payment security, it is improved payment security to the point where the losses from fraud become "acceptable" in light of the cost of further fraud reduction.
By using one time tokens and authenticating with touch ID, Apple has raised the bar in two ways over current NFC mobile payments, as well as raised it over existing swipe only, swipe and signature, or swipe and PIN. Not sure about chip and PIN - does it only transmit one time tokens? If so Apple Pay is no better, but we won't have chip and PIN in the US anytime soon.
FYI: I have been a market analyst in the biometrics arena for more than a decade.
First, biometrics in and of themselves are no more or less dangerous or intrusive than other technologies. There is just a higher levee of concern because they seem so personal .
It is true that if someone has an actual image of your fingerprint or face or voice - all left by people casually all over the place on a daily basis. - they can possibly create a biometric from it. As a biometric is an algorhtymically derived representation based on this personal data. BUT BE CLEAR, a biometric is not the same thing as the actual image data of a face or fingerprint or the sound of one’s voice AND capturing the required high quality date required to create a usable biometric is not a trivial process.
Biometrics can be CANCELLED or REVOKED. Again, because the biometric is not the fingerprint (or face, or voice) data, it is the result of an algorithm applied to this data, if your biometric is compromised (which in and of itself is a questionable process) , you cancel the biometric and create a new one with a new algorithm.
Also, a biometric is not like a password or username. it is NOT an exact match, It is a statistical match against an initial biometric based on a high quality, enrolled image. If someone managed to gain access to a file which held a biometric template and tried to use it, any well engineered system would flag an exact match as an intrusion.
Finally, if someone went to all the trouble to use high quality lab equipment to "spoof" your fingerprint so they could, for example, log onto your stolen phone, it is more than likely that by the time they gained access to the phone, you would have reported it as stolen and locked access to it or wiped it clean remotely.
Biometrics should not arouse an hysteria response. They should be used responsibly and citizens/consumers should expect that they be used responsibly
I hadn't heard superglue and a laser printer described as "high quality lab equipment" before, but I guess that is true since a high quality lab will have them. But then so will the local low life.
I can change my password, but not my fingerprints.
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