A brief study on BIOMETRICS

By:Ankita Sharma C.S.E 3rd year

IntroductionBiometrics is the Identification or Verification of human identity through the measurement of repeatable physiological and behavioural characteristics.

Physical Biometrics Finger printing Face recognition Iris scan Hand geometry

Behavioral biometrics Voice recognisation Handwriting

Characteristics of Biometrics Universality : Every person should have the characteristic. People who are mute or without a fingerprint will need to be accommodated in some

way. Uniqueness : Generally, no two people have identical characteristics. However, identical twins are hard to distinguish. Permanence: The characteristics should not vary with time. A person's face, for example, may change with age. Collectability : The characteristics must be easily collectible and measurable.

 Performance: The method must deliver

accurate results under varied environmental circumstances. Acceptability : The general public must accept the sample collection routines. Nonintrusive methods are more acceptable. Circumvention : The technology should be difficult to deceive

Working Principle Biometric devices consist of a reader or

scanning device software that converts the gathered information into digital form, and a database that stores the biometric data with comparison with existing records.

Modes Enrolment Mode: A sample of the biometric

trait is captured, processed by a computer, and stored for later comparison. Verification Mode: In this mode biometric system authenticates a persons claimed identity from their previously enrolled pattern.

FingerprintingFor fingerprint Recognition look at: Friction ridges. Core Crossover Delta Island Ridge Ending Pore

Face recognisation It involves recognizing people by there: Facial features. Face geometry .

Principle: Analysis of unique shape, pattern and positioning of facial features.

Iris recognisation It is the coloured area of the eye that

surrounds the pupil. It is protected internal organ whose random texture is stable throughout life. The iris patterns are obtained through a video-based image acquisition system

Voice recognisation Voice recognition is not the same as speech

recognition, it is speaker recognition. Considered both physiological and behavioural . Popular and low-cost, but less accurate and sometimes lengthy enrolment.

Signature verification Static/Off-line: the conventional way. Dynamic/On-line: using electronically

instrumented device. Principle: The movement of the pen during the signing process rather than the static image of the signature. Many aspects of the signature in motion can be studied, such as pen pressure, the sound the pen makes.

Advantages Biometric identification can provide extremely

accurate, secured access to information; finger prints, retinal and iris scans produce absolutely unique datasets when done properly. Current methods like password verification have many problems (people write them down, they forget them, they make up easy-to-hack passwords) Automated biometric identification can be done very rapidly and uniformly, with a minimum of training . Your identity can be verified without resort to documents that may be stolen, lost or altered.

Disadvantages The finger print of those people working in Chemical

industries are often affected. Therefore these companies should not use the finger print mode of authentication. It is found that with age, the voice of a person differs. Also when the person has flu or throat infection the voice changes or if there are too much noise in the environment this method may not authenticate correctly. Therefore this method of verification is not workable all the time For people affected with diabetes, the eyes get affected resulting in differences. Biometrics is an expensive security solution.

Biometrics securitySecurity personnel look for biometric data that does not change over the course of your life that is, they look for physical characteristics that stay constant and that are difficult to fake or change on purpose.

Applications Prevent unauthorized access to ATMs ,

cellular phones, smart cards, desktop PCs, workstations, computer networks. E-commerce, E-banking. Airport security. In automobiles biometrics can replace keys with keyless entry devices.

Conclusion Biometrics is an emerging area with many

opportunities of growth. Possibly in the near future we will not have to remember passwords or PINs. Keys in our bags and pockets will be thing of past.