Forwarded From: Aleph One <aleph1t_private> http://www.wired.com/news/news/business/story/11937.html Biometrics Standards in Works by Joe Nickell 5:01am 28.Apr.98.PDT A group of high-tech heavyweights, including Microsoft Corp., Novell Inc., IBM, and Compaq Computer Corp., are teaming up to develop standards for hardware and software that will recognize everything from your face to your fingertips -- and allow you to forget all those passwords. Dubbed the BioAPI Consortium, the group announced itself on Monday with hopes of setting the stage for the mainstream deployment of fingerprint scanners, face recognition software, and other biometric security technologies. "People forget passwords, or they write them down, which is obviously a potential breach of security," explained Scott Chase, director of business development at Identicator Technologies, a small San Francisco-based company that specializes in fingerprint identification hardware and software. "The idea here is to replace passwords with biometrics." Identicator has developed proprietary products for such clients as the Georgia's drivers license bureau, the US Treasury, and the US Department of Defense. But, like others in the emerging industry, Identicator has had trouble bringing its technology to a large market because of the lack of agreement among software, hardware, and operating system developers on how biometrics technologies should be designed. "We find that it's pretty critical to have an industry standard for this new technology," said Brant Jones, manager of product marketing at Compaq. "Users want to be able to buy products from various vendors and have those products be compatible." While none of the Consortium's members are spouting specifics about their plans for future deployment of biometric technologies, all agree that the field represents the future of workplace and perhaps homespace user identification. "The major implication by us participating is that we're trying to bring the technologies to the mainstream," said Compaq's Jones. "The market has some potential for major growth." -o- Subscribe: mail majordomot_private with "subscribe isn". Today's ISN Sponsor: Dimensional Communications (www.dim.com)
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