Do Biometric Devices Invade Our Privacy?

Biometric scanning is part of our brave new world of new technologies that are increasingly monitoring our lives. Biometric scanning is fast, safe, easy, secure, and expandable for future needs. Biometric scanning is used for two basic major purposes, identification and verification. Biometric scanning for verification, involves authentication of a person's identity from his previously enrolled pattern. Season-pass holders at major amusement parks are using biometric scanning to quickly pass through the gate. The biometric scanning is now used in schools used to identify adults who enter and exit the school and monitor personnel with the potential to come in contact with the children at the school, such as a delivery person.

Biometric scanning technology gives increased accuracy and reliable identification a user even under less than ideal conditions. Biometric identification systems optically scanning a body part, quantifying the measure, and then create a database that is stored for future reference. Biometric technology eliminates the need to decipher fingerprints and rely on potentially inaccurate data. Biometrics studies measurable biological characteristics, and in the computer security field uses biometrics for authentication techniques that rely on measurable physical characteristics. Biometrics advocates further enhance security by pairing up fingerprints identification with another biometric or other security method such as passwords, pin numbers or smart cards. A biometric template numerically compares the original scan the person submits against scans created during future visits. While some people might be concerned that personal information stored in a biometrics template might be misused, many will welcome the added security measure. A typical biometric system comprises a biometric sensor, an analysis unit, and an output component. A biometrics authentication device, which uses blood vessel images in a human body to perform authentication, performs verification according detected body temperature.

The biometric scanner captures biometric features of said person then sort-matching is performed by the host computer. An analog-to-digital converter in the scanner system processes the analog image information to generate a digital representation of the image. In the case of fingerprint identification, a scanner processor will read the output voltage and determines whether it is characteristic of a ridge or a valley, and then compare specific features of a fingerprint, generally known as minutiae. If the image is rejected, the scanner adjusts the exposure time and tries again.

A biometric scanner is one of the most versatile security devices as it frees you from having to remember an additional password with an added reliability in the uniqueness of the biometric scan. Although smaller fingerprint scanners have come down in cost, using the biometric scanner is an expensive proposition that can only be justified only when the systems and data protected have an exceptionally high value. Once the stuff science fiction movies, biometrics is definitely moving into the mainstream.