Biometric authentication: the key to keeping businesses and users happy?

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Even when there isn't a scare about whether hardware tokens like RSA’s SecureID might have been compromised, two -factor authentication still means a physical device your users can lose as well as a password they can forget. Biometric authentication is more convenient - it's hard to leave your finger or voice at home. It’s also potentially more secure – employees are less likely to log someone else in with their own biometrics unless there's a serious threat to their safety, which is a different problem entirely.

Fingerprint-based biometric solutions are the most common form. Many business laptops and keyboards have a fingerprint reader built in that you can use for federated single sign-on to enterprise apps as well as just logging into Windows and saving passwords for websites. Fingerprints can be used as an additional security measure that doesn’t interrupt what the user is doing the way having to swipe a token or smartcard again does. If you want to make bankers re-authenticate to authorise a stock trade over a certain level, you need to do it quickly enough that the trading situation doesn’t change.

Other systems scan vein patterns in the finger (Hitachi) or the palm of the hand (Fujitsu). They can still recognise a user if they have a cut on their finger - dirt and antibacterial hand gel also cause problems for fingerprint readers in industrial locations - but you’ll need to buy, install and integrate them. Having users register a couple of fingers on each hand is usually enough to avoid the issue in a business environment.

Facial recognition and iris scans still tend to be either too unreliable or intrusive for general use and voice print recognition has some interesting applications, especially for customer-facing operations that have the scale to make the cost and complexity of implementation worthwhile. But the majority of biometrics in use today involves fingerprints for PCs and many other devices.

Every prescription written in the state of Ohio requires strong authentication and one of the popular methods is fingerprint recognition. That’s carried out on the PC but adding fingerprint authentication to printers means confidential documents won't be sitting waiting on the printer for anyone to pick up as they walk past, and swiping a finger is less irritating for the kind of senior staff who need to print such documents rather than having to remember a PIN or token. You'll need to integrate this with a document security system. As an example, Ricoh recently added a fingerprint option (for both new and already installed printers) that works with Equitrac document protection software and BioStore's identity management system.

Biometrics aren’t just useful for protecting confidential data. Construction firm Killby & Gayford is using custom fingerprint readers (built for personnel management software supplier Simeio by Psion) that also record a signature. That means the firm can accurately log hours worked by sub-contractors on building sites and automatically generate invoices, as well as proving that workers have read the safety rules for each site and simplify checking the roll call if there’s an emergency. Using the information to generate accurate invoices has avoided concerns about spying on staff by showing the system is useful to everyone. But, equally, productivity has improved too.

Convenience is a big part of the attraction for healthcare, along with security and compliance. “A doctor logs on and off 20 or 30 times a day,” points out David Ting, the chief technology officer (CTO) of Imprivata. “If I only need to log in occasionally, I’m prepared to put up with any login method. But if I have to do this repeatedly, give me something that is secure enough but at the same time make it easy for me.”

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