IfG.CC -
Institute for eGovernment

A new report released by Javelin Research showed while consumers still strongly prefer knowledge-based authentication methods for online banking and other sensitive applications, alternative factors, such as biometrics and one-time-passwords, are currying favor.

Based on a survey conducted across nearly 2,000 U.S.-based consumers, the 2010 Authentication Report showed for online banking, 64 percent of consumer perceived that challenge-response questions were effective, compared to 58 percent who believed biometrics to be effective and 42 percent who thought one-time passwords worked well.

Biometrics – the science of using unique physical and behavioral characteristics to identify a person – has proven to be invaluable to the warfighter’s toolbox, Myra S. Gray, director of the Army’s Biometrics Identity Management Agency, told American Forces Press Service.

Am vergangenen Freitag gab das U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) bekannt, dass nach Abschluss der Pilotphase biometrische Ausreiseprozeduren künftig "in den bestehenden Ausreiseprozess für internationale Besucher" integriert werden. Mit den gesammelten Daten sollen die US-Grenzen noch sicherer und die Ausreise einfacher werden, meint zumindest das DHS.

If the Desert Sands Unified School District board gives its OK at a meeting tonight, the district will become a test site for the Biometric Observation Security System, which would be installed on a few school buses as early as next month.

Students participating in the test would swipe a finger across a scanner on the bus every time they board and exit.

“There’s a lot of potential for misuse of this card,” said Pam Dixon, executive director of the World Privacy Forum, a nonprofit group concerned with technology’s impact on privacy.

Federal workers and privacy advocates are worried about a presidential directive requiring all federal employees and contractors to carry biometric smart cards to access federal buildings and computer systems.

The importance of effective base security has been appreciated since long before Greek soldiers hid inside the giant horse they left as a gift at the gates of Troy.

However, technology keeps changing the definition of effective.

After a suicide bomber infiltrated a high-security U.S. military installation in Mosul, Iraq, killing 13 soldiers and eight others in a dining hall, the deputy secretary of Defense ordered the development and deployment of a biometric base access control system.

Department of Licensing (DOL) spokesman Tony Sermonti explained that identity theft is "a hugely expensive crime."

To combat the ever increasing crime, the Department of Licensing started using a new tool, close to six months ago, called facial recognition technology. It's designed to unmask criminals who use a drivers license photo for any sort of fraudulent activity, such as using someone photo under a fake name.

A recent national emergency preparedness exercise successfully demonstrated an interoperable, electronic identity authentication system for government and private-sector personnel.

Known as Autumn Blend, the event was coordinated by the Homeland Security Department’s Federal Emergency Management Agency and Northrop Grumman. It included federal, state, local and private-sector emergency response and recovery officials.

"Next Generation Identification" heißt das geplante System. Es soll das FBI befähigen, Personen innerhalb und außerhalb der USA anhand von charakteristischen Körpererkennungsmerkmalen zu identifizieren. Im Jahre 2013 soll die "Next Generation"-Datenbank laut der FBI-Abteilungsleiterin für Biometrie, Kimberly Del Greco, dazu imstande sein, Anfragen anhand eines Datenmixes aus Finger- und Handballenabdrücken, Iris-und Gesichtserkennungsmerkmalen abzugleichen. Ein Sicherheitsbeamter am Flughafen soll in Sekundenschnelle erfahren können, ob die Person, deren Hände überprüft wurden, in der Liste der meistgesuchten Kriminellen und Terroristen auftaucht. An anderer Stelle des Berichts wird geäußert, man denke daran, künftig auch die Art und Weise, wie Menschen gehen und reden, als mögliches Identifizierungsmerkmal zu verwenden.

It said identification systems that rely on fingerprints, palm prints or voice recognition or the like are “inherently fallible” and urged government agencies to make sure that a system they invest in works as advertised.

The initiative will involve police, fire and emergency response agencies in the District of Columbia, Virginia, Maryland and Pennsylvania, Holcomb said at a forum on interoperability at the FOSE trade show in Washington.

Recently, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) began using a federal information sharing capability in Forsyth County that helps federal immigration officials use biometrics to identify aliens, both lawfully and unlawfully present in the United States, who are booked into local law enforcement’s custody for a crime. This capability is part of Secure Communities—ICE’s comprehensive strategy to improve and modernize the identification and removal of aliens convicted of a crime from the United States.

Previously, biometrics—fingerprints—taken of individuals charged with a crime and booked into custody were checked for criminal history information against the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS). Now, through enhanced information sharing between DOJ and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), biometrics submitted through the state to the FBI will be automatically checked against both the FBI criminal history records in IAFIS and the biometrics-based immigration records in DHS’s Automated Biometric Identification System (IDENT).

Federal immigration authorities have started sharing biometric information with authorities in Hall and Whitfield counties to help identify criminal immigrants.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), a division of the Homeland Security Department, began sharing the information, which includes fingerprint data, with the two North Georgia counties Wednesday.

The agency is trying to collect information to help the Office of Management and Budget finalize requirements for the federal identity card called for in Homeland Security Presidential Directive 12.

The devices -- which utilize Motorola's MC75 Enterprise Digital Assistant outfitted with a fingerprint scanner and idSoftware's PrintSearch Mobile software -- cost about $4,100 each were paid for out of the office's drug forfeiture fund.

Today, it surfaced that the Department of Homeland Security is planning to test GRI's tech at a border patrol station in Texas, where it will be used to monitor illegal immigrants. Rather than continue to rely on oft-unreliable fingerprints, the DHS is experimenting with the scanners to see whether they have a viable future for border security.