[ISN] Cry to beat iris scanners

From: InfoSec News (isn@private)
Date: Sun May 09 2004 - 23:46:34 PDT

  • Next message: InfoSec News: "RE: [ISN] [Vmyths.com ALERT] Hysteria over ''Sasser'' worm"

    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/05/07/watery_eyes_iris_scan/
    
    By Lucy Sherriff
    7th May 2004 
    
    An MP who volunteered to take part in the UK ID card trials says the
    iris scanner used is uncomfortable and made his eyes water.
    
    Poor chap, you're probably thinking, but not exactly a tragedy.  
    However, this isn't just a whinge. The water in his eyes actually
    stopped the scanner from working, and it seems long eyelashes and hard
    contact lenses could fox it too.
    
    So we're going to have a system that is derailed by a few tears and
    fluttering eyelashes?
    
    Roland Sables, the man in charge of the trial, said that he was
    expecting a failure rate of about seven per cent. Most of these
    failures, he argued, would be caused by problems with camera
    positioning, although others "are due to eye malformations, watery
    eyes and long eyelashes in a small percentage [of cases]".
    
    Sables said that so far the iris scanner had failed to match people
    with their details in just four per cent of cases. Scale that up to
    the UK population and you've got nearly 2.5m people who won't be
    correctly identified.
    
    Bob Russell, a member of the Home Affairs Select Committee, and the
    man with the rheumy eyes, speculated that the iris scanner could also
    cause problems for people who were particularly photo sensitive, or
    suffered from epilepsy.
    
    John Denham, the Home Affairs Select Committee chairman, who was also
    visiting the pilot registration centre, said that while the overall
    registration process was very simple, there were some technology
    issues that needed to be addressed.
    
    He pointed out that people with disabilities would have difficulty
    moving into the right position to be scanned. "Some of the crucial
    issues about the technology will be better informed at the end of the
    trial," he added.
    
    
    
    _________________________________________
    ISN mailing list
    Sponsored by: OSVDB.org
    



    This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Mon May 10 2004 - 01:37:43 PDT