Biometric Technology: Ready For Explosive Growth?

USA Today recently detailed how an employee at Pixar Animation Studios broke into the company's payroll database and sent out a company-wide e-mail with every employee's salary. The employee made the e-mail look as if it had been sent by the president of Pixar Animation, the USA Today article noted.

Such incidents are becoming more common in corporate America. However, the article failed to mention how biometric technology can protect against such incidents. This failure to mention biometrics is interesting as this technology continues to become more widely adopted. (Biometrics verify identity based on unique human characteristics, such as fingerprints, retinas, facial characteristics and hand geometry. These systems can be used to prevent unauthorized users from logging on to PCs and/or accessing programs and documents).

Biometrics: No Longer A "James Bond" Technology
Business Systems Magazine (BSM) interviewed principals from two biometrics manufacturers to determine how VARs can capitalize on this technology's growth. BSM spoke with Bill Spence, vice president of marketing for Recognition Systems, Inc. (RSI). RSI (Campbell, CA) manufactures hand geometry readers. BSM also spoke with Barry Wendt, CEO of SAC Technologies (Las Vegas, NV), which manufactures a fingerprint "identification" unit.

According to Spence, end-user perceptions of biometrics are slowly changing for the better. In the past, Spence says biometric technology used to have a "James Bond" mystique. "End users are realizing biometrics isn't just something in the movies. Increasingly, they're seeing it used in real-world applications like time and attendance and access control."

End-user perceptions are changing partially because biometrics has become more affordable and reliable, Spence and Wendt say. For example, SAC's fingerprint scanner cost $900 to manufacture two years ago. SAC anticipates introducing a product, with additional utility, that will sell for less than $200 this year. As perceptions have changed and biometric systems become more reliable, their adoption has increased.

Furthering Biometrics' Adoption
If biometrics is to continue to grow, the systems have to operate "transparently" to end users, according to Wendt. "While many people have become more comfortable with biometrics, many still have negative associations. For example, some people don't want their fingerprints stored in a biometric system because they associate fingerprints with criminal activity," he explains. "VARs may have to overcome those types of negative perceptions. If people aren't comfortable with biometrics, they won't use it, no matter how much the technology advances - that's the bottom line."

Biometric systems that offer ease of use can go a long way toward improving negative perceptions, Wendt adds. Biometric systems either identify people or verify them. For example, identification systems can search a database of 500 fingerprint templates and match a specific person's fingerprint template.

With verification systems, however, people first have to enter a PIN to let the system know who is trying to gain access. (This also can be accomplished by swiping an identification card or badge).

The swipe of an identification card or badge allows a verification system to "call up" the corresponding fingerprint template (which is stored in the system). The stored template is then compared against the fingerprint the person just presented to the system. The system then verifies whether the prints match.

However, with identification-based systems, end users don't have to remember a personal identification number, or swipe an ID card every time they use the system. And identification-based systems can easily detect and eliminate multiple identities (multiple aliases for one person).

VAR Action Points
When asked how resellers can capitalize on the growth of biometrics, Spence gives a simple answer: show the technology to end users. "Resellers new to biometrics are often reluctant to show it to customers," Spence explains. "Some resellers are reluctant to promote biometrics because they've always sold ID card- or badge-based solutions. So they often wait for the end user to ask about biometrics. Resellers have to take an active role in promoting the value of biometrics."

Wendt agrees resellers have to market the benefits of biometrics: the ability to increase security in access control applications, and the ability to eliminate buddy punching in time and attendance applications. He adds, "VARs have to get the message out that biometrics is not an invasive technology."