ITPRO

Printed from www.itpro.co.uk

Register to receive our regular email newsletter at http://www.itpro.co.uk/reg/register.

The newsletter contains links to our latest IT news, product reviews, features and how-to guides, plus special offers and competitions.

Skip to navigation

    Experts ponder future of workplace biometrics

Experts, academics and members of the public and private sector met in Westminster today to discuss the future of biometric technology.

By Asavin Wattanajantra, 25 Feb 2009 at 17:26

The use of biometrics in businesses could be commonplace in the near future, but it’s warned that it will take just ‘one big biometric fraud’ from blowing it all out of the water.

A cross-section of people including members of the Identity and Passport Service, biometric academic experts and businesses including Lockheed Martin met today to discuss the potential of workplace biometric technology.

Hugh Carr Archer, chief executive of biometric firm Aurora, mentioned an example of a company using facial biometrics that saved six per cent of its wage bill by making sure that employees were there when they claimed to be.

“Fred, for example, clocks on work [for Bill] when the foreman’s not looking, while Bill’s at home putting his feet up. The foreman creates three ghost workers because he can then get their pay packets," he said.

“You introduce a biometric such as face recognition for those clocking on in the workforce, and you get benefits.”

Systems such as the IRIS system in use at Heathrow can get people “fast-tracked” through queues more quickly. An example of a school using facial recognition technology to record attendance for sixth formers, was also cited as an example.

However, Archer recognised that there were huge security implications to discuss with the implementation of biometrics. He said that most observers were most interested in its privacy implications when it came to the school facial recognition scheme.

“[It's received] a lot of press attention from all the main daily newspapers, local radio and television," he said of the interest. "Most of the questions were about whether it was intrusive. So how do you think people are going to react about having their biometric data stored?”

Toby Stevens, director of the Enterprise Privacy Group, said that he did not think that biometrics necessarily infringed privacy, but that it had the incredible potential to do so.

"They are a lighting rod to privacy issues," he said. "This is because of personal sensitivities – my face, my fingers, my eyes, my voice – and they may carry information to you that I may not wish to convey.”

He said that businesses needed to prove that biometrics have no privacy issues in order to gain the trust of potential users.

Stevens believed businesses had to ask themselves whether it was the right technology to use, whether it was trying to identity or authenticate, and whether they should use biometric templates or images for systems.

“If we start now in the relatively youthful day of the technology in following principles, we can build an overall public trust in the ability for us to handle biometrics correctly," he said.

“Disregard them now at our peril because we will lose public trust. It only takes one massive fraud on the back of a biometric scheme, and that could blow it for every application out there.”

IT PRO has already published a short guide on biometric technologies that businesses could use.

Email to a friend

Print this page

< Previous   Scanners : News Next >

1 comments

You need to Login or Register to comment.

Iris scans

Biometrics should definitely be used in the workplace for added security. AOptix Technologies is launching iris biometric scanners for public use (http://www.aoptix.com/iris-recognition/airport-security), which may be something businesses should also consider.

By OlyFernando on Thursday Apr 14

0 people out of 0 found this comment useful.

Did you find it useful?

    You may also like...

 Sponsored Links

advertisement

    You may also like...

    Latest Scanners Analysis & Insight

The Intel/Apple Thunderbolt logo

What is Thunderbolt and why is it so exciting?

Thunderbolt is an incredibly impressive new cable and connector technology from Intel. Formerly known as Light Peak, the highly-anticipated technology has finally arrived and could be the biggest thing to happen to computers this year.

Read more

 
advertisement

    Register for IT PRO

You'll get exclusive member benefits including free whitepapers, downloads, Webinars and weekly newsletters full of the latest IT PRO news, reviews, insight and expertise.

Sponsored Links
Advertisement