onClick Biometrics in touch

Consumer biometrics getting notice

Consumer applications for biometrics are growing!

That better be true, or all the cell phones, flash drives, mice, and other peripherals with biometric capabilities they've been making for the past years (us included!) have all been for not.

1.4 million Californians better beware!

This just in!

California residents - a whooping 1.4 million of them - are being advised to stay on alert for any suspicious activity that may occur with their identity.

Yes that's right, another computer hacking leading to possible identity theft. And this is a big one too. A computer at UC Berkeley contained all the names, addresses, telephone and social security numbers of In Home Supportive Services was hacked back in August. And the FBI just today has released an advisory.

The worst part is, all these people are part of this service because they are low-income elderly and disabled citizens. Just what they need, ya know...

California warns on massive ID theft.

Australia and New Zealand want to avoid 'creepy' concerns

Once again, privacy concerns float to the service. This time in Australia, following their efforts to begin biometric identification. The desire to control, standardize, and manage the use of the biometrics is very pronounced in order to avoid 'scope creep', or the chance that the information on a citizen can be used in other ways not originally intended when first capturing the information.

biometrics: privacy concerns over scope creep.

smart cards good, national ID cards bad

The former US presidential advisor Richard Clarke expressed his concern this week that smart cards are necessary for improving security but not so much national ID cards. Mainly because the general public can accept smart cards, and better handling of personal data is priority one. It appears as though he would like smart cards to replace existing driver's licenses, bank cards, and methods for accessing accounts with confidential information.

Clarke: Using technology to secure IDs is vital.

Securing the truck it rode in on.

In their ongoing effort to secure everything that could be eye-candy to terrorists, now truck drivers of explosives and poisonous chemicals will be fingerprinted and go through background checks.

Wait a minute.

Background checks? Shouldn't that have ALWAYS been a procedure being enforced? Well, besides that, it seems that they are proceding at a decent pace for the fingerprinting part - following the same steps as US-VISIT's airport checks.

Federal security checks set for some truck drivers.

New Zealand knows what's up.

New Zealand press is voicing opinion and fact about Australia's biometric projects. Here's something about the 'privacy sacrifice' and the other an opinion on the large-scale deployment for personal identification. Both see the realities of biometrics as being beneficial, but require a necessary strict control over how they are used and collected.

Biometrics: 'the deal' at the heart of privacy sacrifice.
Biometrics code needed to keep big brother honest.

Identity management gets federated

Well, I had this nice little post all done up yesterday but TypePad lost it on me.
Anyways - it was about the benefits of a federated identity management system.

Extended Identity - Though federated identity management technologies promise improved access to networks and cost savings, issues of trust and interoperability slow adoption.

IBM is working it biometrics style.

The news about the new fingerprint-enabled ThinkPad has barely begun to get a crust around it when already the laptop has won Best in Show at the TECHXNY expo.

It won in the Best Security Solution category. Here's the press release.

Cell phones + biometrics = the new must-have.

Before long, when you show up at your cellular service provider's storefront asking for a phone upgrade, you're gonna get the choice of the cell phone with the tv, or the cell phone with the mp3 player. But they'll all have the fingerprint security.

Okay so, that's a wild guess. But an educated one. The way things are going, it's more like the cell phone will have the tv AND the mp3 player.

The cell phones that are available now with fingerprint security are being manufactured with sweep sensors by LG and Fujitsu.

But in a year, the sweep sensor will likely be replaced with Casio's optical LCD sensor. It actually embeds it right into the LCD display, so there's no extra room being taken up by a fingerprint sensor. Pretty good idea for devices that are supposed to be compact. Maybe this concept will eventually spread to PC use, and the biometric hardware won't even be needed.

Though you will need a fair amount of Windex.

Casio combines LCD, fingerprint sensor.

Visa-waiver countries in on the US-visit action

The US-VISIT program has been getting a whole new rash of coverage in the last few weeks since the inception. The first go around was only for select countries, but now the visa waiver countries have to be a part of it too, and so they are of course acting like it's a whole new deal. Which it is. To them. We already know what's going on.

But if you live in Andorra, Austria, Australia, Belgium, Brunei, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, San Marino, Singapore, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, or the United Kingdom, you might find this useful.

Q&A Fingerprinting foreigners.
As of September 30, most foreign travellers entering the US will be subject to the requirements of what is called the US-visit scheme.