Why Biometric Authentication Is Needed To Protect Your Identity

Biometric authentication is primarily based on an physical traits or a characteristic of an individual such as fingerprints, retinal patterns, hand geometry, voice recognition or facial recognition, and offers assurance that a person is who they claim to be. Biometric authentication is usually warranted for high-risk systems where the cost of a breach would be greater than the cost of the security system. Biometric authentication validates the identity of a user who wishes to sign into a system by measuring unique characteristics of that user.

Biometrics are difficult to fabricate, which makes them much harder to share or steal than traditional authentication methods. Biometric authentication systems identify an individual based on a unique identifying characteristic, such as fingerprints, face, eye, and signature. The pricing for Biometric devices such as fingerprint scanners has decreased dramatically and the software has also improved. Biometric keyboards now incorporate fingerprint scanners and are compatible with Microsoft windows.

Biometric authentication is the science of measuring and recording fundamental human characteristics such as a fingerprint, voiceprint, or a retina scan for the express purposes of verifying or determining identity. Authentication based on fingerprint is one of the most common biometric techniques, where users scan in a copy of their fingerprint and a comparison is performed as to whether or not the input fingerprint matches that of a stored fingerprint. Authentication based on hand geometry records the physical characteristics of a user's hand and fingers with a scanner and is matched with a stored template. Authentication based on retinal scanning scans a user's retina using a low intensity light, creates a eye signature, matches it with a stored retinal template. Authentication based on iris scanning scans unique random patterns of the iris of the eye and authenticates users based on comparing the consistency of the acquired pattern with that of stored patterns. Authentication based on facial recognition scans the features of a users face and compares it to a stored static facial image. Authentication based on signature verification utilizes a pressure sensitive pen and a tablet to record a user's signature. Authentication based on voice recognition recognizing voice and speech characteristics that are imperceptible and hence not replicable.

Biometric authentication is continuing to be developed and soon will be able to be used by the home user or students. Biometric authentication is popular with users as an alternative to passwords or discrete hardware tokens since the user doesn't have to remember anything or carry anything with them. Biometric authentication has gained the reputation of being one of the most secure means of authenticating an individual, and has remarkable results with respect to identifying legitimate users.