Identity Management with Biometrics

Lisa Bock

• Publisher: Packt Publishing
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781839213212
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Computer Science
• Subtopic: Cyber Security
• Index: Computer Science

Work with common biometrics such as face, fingerprint, and iris recognition for business and personal use to ensure secure identification and authentication for fintech, homes, and computer systemsKey Features• Explore the next iteration of identity protection and overcome real-world challenges• Understand different biometric use cases to deploy a large-scale biometric system• Curated by renowned security ambassador and experienced author Lisa BockBook DescriptionBiometric technologies provide a variety of robust and convenient methods to securely identify and authenticate an individual. Unlike a password or smart card, biometrics can identify an attribute that is not only unique to an individual, but also eliminates any possibility of duplication. Identity Management with Biometrics is a solid introduction for anyone who wants to explore biometric techniques, such as fingerprint, iris, voice, palm print, and facial recognition.Starting with an overview of biometrics, you'll learn the various uses and applications of biometrics in fintech, buildings, border control, and many other fields. You'll understand the characteristics of an optimal biometric system and then review different types of errors and discover the benefits of multi-factor authentication. You'll also get to grips with analyzing a biometric system for usability and accuracy and understand the process of implementation, testing, and deployment, along with addressing privacy concerns. The book outlines the importance of protecting biometric data by using encryption and shows you which factors to consider and how to analyze them before investing in biometric technologies.By the end of this book, you'll be well-versed with a variety of recognition processes and be able to make the right decisions when implementing biometric technologies. What you will learn• Review the advantages and disadvantages of biometric technology• Understand the characteristics of an optimal biometric system• Discover the uses of biometrics and where they are used• Compare different types of errors and see how to tune your system• Understand the benefits of multi-factor authentication• Work with commonly used biometrics such as face, fingerprint, and iris• Analyze a biometric system for usability and accuracy• Address privacy concerns and get a glimpse of the future of biometricsWho this book is forIdentity Management with Biometrics is for IT managers, security professionals, students, teachers, and anyone involved in selecting, purchasing, integrating, or securing a biometric system. This book will help you understand how to select the right biometric system for your organization and walk you through the steps for implementing identity management and authentication. A basic understanding of biometric authentication techniques, such as fingerprint and facial recognition, and the importance of providing a secure method of authenticating an individual will help you make the most of the book.

Section 1 –Understanding Biometric Authentication

In this section, we’ll learn the various uses of and locations where biometrics are employed, and explore their use on mobile devices. We’ll also review the characteristics of an optimal biometric, compare advantages and modalities, and learn about the different types of errors.

This part of the book comprises the following chapters:

• Chapter 1, Exploring Biometric Technology
• Chapter 2, Biometric and Mobile Devices
• Chapter 3, Recognizing Biometric Characteristics
• Chapter 4, Comparing Advantages and Modalities

Chapter 1: Exploring Biometric Technology

Companies today are designing devices and computer systems to provide password-free authentication by using biometrics, which are the behavioral or physiological characteristics that are unique to an individual. Devices now include fingerprint technology, facial and voice recognition, and other methods such as haptics to provide authorized access to a device. Today, many organizations are adopting the use of biometrics to enable their employees to enter buildings, access cloud resources, and log in to phones and computers. As a result, IT managers may have to face the prospect of deploying a large-scale biometric system.

But just what is meant by biometrics, and why is the global market share of biometrics expected to double in the next five years? This chapter will answer these and other questions. It will cover the basics of biometric technology and terminology and compare various methods. We’ll see how, in addition to providing authentication, we can also use biometrics to identify an individual.

We’ll take a look at early biometric use in identifying prisoners and criminals. We'll then travel through the evolution of modern biometric history from 1924, through a discussion on digital signal processing to today’s sophisticated systems. We’ll compare physiological versus behavioral biometrics and some common biometrics in each category. You’ll learn how physiological biometrics are attributes that can be measured, such as a face and fingerprint. You’ll understand how behavioral biometrics are the way we do things now, such as signature or gait recognition. By the end of this chapter, you’ll fully appreciate how biometrics provides a solid method of providing identification and authentication because of the unique characteristics we all possess.

In this chapter, we’re going to cover the following main topics:

• Describing biometric technology
• Appreciating modern biometrics
• Comparing biometric categories

Describing biometric technology

Today, when you use your mobile device, you may need to use your fingerprint or face to gain access to the device. More and more companies are adopting biometric technology to provide password-free authentication for mobile devices, Internet of Things (IoT) devices, and computer systems. In addition, the use of biometrics in financial technology (fintech) has accelerated as a method for securing financial transactions.

For many of us, using biometrics has become commonplace, as biometric authentication is being used to sign in to websites along with applications on your mobile device. Today, many other biometric techniques are being explored and developed to automatically recognize and authenticate an individual.

Because of the widespread use of biometrics, in this section, we’ll take a look at the definition of biometrics and compare how using biometrics can provide identification and authentication. Let’s begin by exploring what defines biometrics.

Defining biometrics

Biometrics are the behavioral or physiological characteristics that are unique to an individual, and include fingerprints, iris patterns, and voice recognition.

A biometric system recognizes patterns and then determines whether the specific physiological or behavioral characteristic is unique to the individual. It’s important to note that a biometric system must first have a database of enrolled individuals from which to compare. Enrollment can be either of the following options:

• Voluntary, where an individual willingly provides their biometric identifier to the system, along with some personal information.
• Completed by someone who populates the database with information, for example, enrolling with a database of police mug shots.

The use of the term biometrics can be broken down into two components, bio, or life, and metrics, or method to measure. The term biometrics has been in use for many years in a number of different scientific communities, for various statistical and mathematical analyses. Scientific communities and how they use biometrics include the following:

• Forestry to quantify vegetation
• Agriculture for predicting crops
• Medicine to measure the effectiveness of a treatment

The term biometrics has been in use for many years. However, the popularity of the term increased significantly from the 1950s to 2020, mainly because of the expanded use of biometrics for recognition and verification in modern-day applications.

Today, there are many technologies in use that we can use to validate and authenticate an individual. Each technology has a specific method of extracting the unique identifiable attributes of an individual. In the following section, let’s see how we can use biometrics to identify an individual.

Providing identification

We can use biometrics to identify an individual, as it answers the question who are you? and are used in a number of different applications. To identify an individual, the system first takes a biometric in which to compare, and then searches a biometric template database to attempt to correctly identify the person. Biometric identification is a one-to-many comparison, as shown in the following diagram:

Figure 1.1 – Biometric identification, a one-to-many comparison

Applications for biometric identification have many uses that include identifying criminals involved in a crime or recognizing a friend while face tagging on social media. Let’s start with how law enforcement uses biometrics to apprehend criminals.

Recognizing criminals

Law enforcement has long used biometrics, mainly fingerprints, to solve crimes. Other forms are used as well, as biometric techniques are used in forensic identification. Many individuals with a criminal past are in repositories such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI’s) Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS). IAFIS is a powerful system that contains a vast number of records and includes fingerprints, faces, scars, and tattoos and helps law enforcement identify criminals. There are also other large biometric databases, including the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) system, that can be used to identify a person of interest.

Tagging faces

The social media giant Facebook has been using facial recognition for over a decade. Since 2010, Facebook has used the technology to suggest a tag on a face that looked similar and then used the data obtained to suggest more tags it perceived as a match. Facebook improved the technology over time, mainly because of the vast amount of data available from tagged faces in every possible setting, angle, and lighting variable. The science has evolved to become Deep Face, a nine-layer, Deep Convolutional Neural Network (DCNN) that provides approximately 97.35 percent accuracy in matching and identifying an individual.

There are many other uses for biometric identification. Uses include providing proof of citizenship, such as an image on a passport, a photo ID on a driver’s license, or in forensics, where biometrics are used to identify someone who may have been a victim of a crime.

We can see how biometrics can be used to recognize an individual. Next, let’s see how we can use biometrics to provide validation when a user claims an identity.

Verifying authentication

Authentication is showing something to be true or proving your identity, as it answers the question, who do you claim to be? Authentication can be achieved in one of three ways:

• What...