Biometrics Security
Biometrics uses personal characteristics to identify users. When it comes to security, mapping unique patterns and traits in fingerprints, irises or voices is considered light years ahead of forcing employees to memorize combination of letters and numbers -- which are easily compromised and easily forgotten.
The technology works by taking measurements -- whether it is the weight and length of bones in the hand or the pattern of blood vessels inside the eye or the pattern of fingerprints -- and then storing the specifics, often called minutiae, in a database. When a user scans a hand or retina, the new mapping is compared with the stored data. Access is either granted or denied based on matching patterns that are unique to each individual. It's that ability to identify someone based on unique physical traits that is driving biometrics into the corporate enterprise. As more high-priced transactions are conducted over the Internet, businesses increasingly need ironclad authentication of someone's identity. Add to that the increasing amount of in"house security breaches and corporate espionage, and you'll find network and security administrators grappling for a better way to secure information from unauthorized eyes.
"Somebody who is doing stock trades online wants security that is amazingly accurate," says Michael Thieme, a senior consultant for International Biometric Group in Manhattan, an independent biometrics consulting and integration firm." A lot of recent security incidents are making people aware that they have a lot of data that just isn't as secure as they thought it would be. . . . If biometrics can even be a small part of that, it will be a tremendous market."
Costs are dropping
Until recen...
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...s fingerprint. That all amounts to an unlawful search."
And that is bound to make some users uneasy or even unwilling to hand over their fingerprints.
Grant Evans, vice president of Identix, calls it a small problem. "The fact is Big Brother has all the information he needs on you without your fingerprints," he says.
Gail Koehler, vice president of technology for Purdue Employees Credit Union in West Lafayette, Ind., was worried that members would be upset when she first deployed fingerprint scanners in her automated branch kiosks.
Koehler says 12,000 members have registered their fingerprints with the credit union. "We spent the majority of our marketing dollars preparing ourselves to convince members that this was secure and not an invasion of their privacy," she says. "It was wasted dollars. We've basically had no objections. Members prefer the security."
The reality is in 2013 most American lives are being logged at every step from being filmed as they buy a soda at 7-11 or doing your homework at the computer lab at a community college. And, although many have heard about this intrusion, many do not most know the extent of this information and its impact when it is combined in a profile. This profile is used in background checks for top security clearances that the Office of Personnel Management (2013) requires to obtain this credential. Today, all people that have top security clearances are at risk to be targeted in ways that are deviant and often passive. To understand the profile is used to supply background checks, a history of the former company ChoicePoint will be explained to show this security threat of this now defunct company has contributed to this risk.
What if the government were not allowed to ask you for information that is discoverable through computer matching? Should the government be allowed to use this technique to yield the same information? This ethical dilemma is covered in this paper. Relevant information will be used from the laws in the United States and the European Union to illustrate the different perspectives on the privacy of citizens and the approaches each government takes to it.
We now accept the sharing and digital storage of our personal information as a necessary evil. We continue to incorporate, into our lives, technology that uses this data. Microsoft and Google are envisioning and developing ways to commercialize the use of even more of our stored personal information.
By the 19th century, the criminology research scholars have had a keen interest in biometric identification, they hope to combine physical characteristics with criminal tendencies, which resulting in a series of measuring devices, and also collected a large amount of data. Since then, the concept of measuring a person's physical characteristics are finalized, fingerprints also become the identification of international methodological standards for public security agencies. People often debate whether fingerprints have absolutely unique, and also thought that the different countries have the different standard for identifying fingerprints. So far, it is still the most widely methods of public security organs, and the process is also automated.
Although people in society may have been wishing as a kid that they could go out and catch the bad guy with only a fingerprint and some DNA. It has been proven that this is not as simple as TV shows and/or movies make it out to be. From spending up to four years in college to obtain a certain degree to actually being able to make into this field to be one of the many humans who get to experience what it is like to be a part of catching the bad guy. It takes a lot of hard work, dedication and patience but once one is able to reach this goal it would be noticed that all the blood, sweat, and DNA was all worth it.
Forensic genetics has other applications . The " fingerprint " DNA represents a valuable tool for forensic science . As is the case with an ordinary fingerprint genetic fingerprint is unique to each individual (except identical twins ) . The determination involves the observation of specific DNA sequences which can be obtained from extremely small tissue samples , hair, blood or eventually left at the scene . As Fifty microliters of blood, semen or five microliters of ten roots of hairs are enough , and nozzles secretions and cells from the fetus . In addition to its use in the capture of criminals , especially rapists , the genetic fingerprints can be used to establish family relationships . People involved in the conservation of species use them to be sure that captive breeding is among individuals who do not belong to the same family .
The rapid growth in technology has been impressive over the past 20 years from television graphics and multi-purpose phones to world-wide connections. Unfortunately, the government is having trouble with this growth to protect the people from having their privacy violated due to the information being stored electronically. In “The Anonymity Experiment”, by Catherine Price, states how easily a person can be track and how personal can be lost. Also, in “Social Security and ID theft”, by Felipe Sorrells, states how social security numbers and personal identities can be stolen and how the government is trying to stop that theft. They both intertwine with technology and privacy though Price's article has a broad overview of that, while Sorrells's focus is mainly on social security number and identity thief part. Price and Sorrells shows that companies are taking too much advantage from the customer, the government, even though their trying, needs to start helping the people protect their privacy, and a balance between the amount of trust people should have giving out their sensitive records to which information is protected.
Biometrics is described as the use of human physical features to verify identity and has been in use since the beginning of recorded history. Only recently, biometrics has been used in today’s high-tech society for the prevention of identity theft. In this paper, we will be understanding biometrics, exploring the history of biometrics, examples of today’s current technology and where biometrics are expected to go in the future.
...initely at risk if anything more than the barest of features are implemented with the technology. It’s evident that the technology is not a necessity today, and that widespread usage may be something that’s quite a bit ahead in the future, if at all. Unfortunately, this is one technology that may initially find a better home in countries seeking to better track their citizens.
Judson, Olivia. (2008). Sticky fingers: fingerprints are one of the oldest biometric measures of identity. What do we actually know about them? Natural History. 117.10. p16.
"The Cost of ID Theft, Part 1: Beyond Dollars and Cents." Commerce Times: Business Means Business. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
Biometrics is a preset method to recognize a person based on a physiological or behavioral attribute. The present features are face recognition, fingerprints, handwriting, hand geometry, iris, vein, voice and retinal scan. In the early years of the 21st century, we find ourselves persistently moving further away from the stipulation of physical human interface playing a major part of basic everyday tasks. Striding ever closer to an programmed society, we interact more habitually with mechanical agents, unsigned users and the electronic information sources of the World Wide Web, than with our human counterpart. It is therefore possibly sardonic that identity has become such an important issue in the 21st century. Face recognition has been related as the divine Grail of biometric recognition systems, due to a number of noteworthy advantages over other methods of identification.
Biometric technology is used for the ways humans can be identified by unique aspects of their bodies, such as fingerprints, body odor, our voices and many more. If one was to think about privacy rights, he/she would be concerned about the widespread adoption of these systems, since such systems could easily be used to develop a record of known rebellious people and/or dangerous criminals, to be used for social control purposes. Although that may seem pretty good and a positive thing for the society, one should take into account of the defects and errors of technology. Of the many biometrics technologies that are being developed and are already developed, facial recognition is one of the most threatening because it can be deployed secretly; one may not know whether or when they can be caught in a surveillance camera for such facial recognition biometrics. Additionally, tests have found that the miscalculations for facial biometrics technologies are very high. As a result, according to Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, innocent people can be erroneously identified as dangerous criminals and actual dangerous criminals and/or suspected terrorists can fail to be detected overall, allowing for a huge injustice and unfairness. Privacy rights concerned with biometrics have sparked a concern and should be dealt with; otherwise, this is just one of the
Personal data is quickly becoming a commodity in today's high technology world. This information is used by banks, investment and brokerage companies, credit card merchants, government agencies (local, state and federal), and consumer product-based companies. Most people probably don't realize the amount of information that's shared between companies, or how often it's done. Many companies sell and share customer data to help sell products and find out what new products they should produce. Other uses include gathering information about inventory levels to help better determine what types of products are bought at which store, when and how often. This can be used for inventory and production, to make sure that the store (or stores for chains, like Safeway and Long's Drugs) can have the products available when they're needed.
Computers have also allowed the use of fingerprinting to expand. Agencies can now take someone’s fingerprints and send them through the computer and find out if they are linked to any other cases going on at the time, or any other cases in the past.