Long-Awaited FAA Funding Bill Improves Pilot ID

Long-term FAA bill clears Congress, heads to president (Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association)

The bill establishes a timeline for issuing improved pilot certificates that are tamper resistant and can accommodate a photograph, digital photograph, biometric identifier, or other unique identifier.

See also: UPDATE: Pilot's Licenses don't have photos?
"Today, the only pilots pictured on FAA licenses are flight pioneers Wilbur and Orville Wright."

The above-linked post is from October-November 2010. The federal budget situation is really slowing down the adoption of new technologies that could deliver the same (or superior) services at a reduced (or acceptable) price.

What will they think of next?

First Candy & Soda, Now There's Pot Vending Machines (KION - Santa Cruz, CA)

"This is just part of the plan of where we want to be a year from now," said Scott McPhail.

By 2013, McPhail hopes you can get your medical marijuana the same way you buy a soda, right out of a machine.

The Economics and Politics of Biometric Time and Attendance in State Bureaucracies

All over the democratic world, elected officials are feeling the pressure from the electorate to cut costs while continuing to deliver high-quality services. Translating that pressure first into action, then into bottom-line results isn't easy, though.

Public and private sector organizations are adopting new identity management technologies that offer a significant return on investment (ROI). This story gives a detailed account of some of the issues and managerial challenges surrounding public sector adoption of cost-cutting technology.

Budget Chairman Wishes Prisons Kept Better Tabs (TheLedger.com)

From time to time some state agency, or some person at an agency, doesn't seem to take seriously what someone in the Legislature, maybe a chairman of a committee, wants the agency to do.

Agency officials blow off the concerns of some committee chairmen at their peril...

The fight goes back to a little-noticed requirement buried seemingly innocuously in the budget lawmakers passed in 2010.

"From the funds provided in specific appropriations 629 through 721, the Department of Corrections by January 1, 2011 shall implement an electronic time and attendance system in all four regions through a contract ….," the budget said.

January 1, 2011, came and went, with no such contract.

Some of the best reporting on biometrics and ID management issues is to be found in small local media outlets. This piece from the News Service of Florida and found at the Polk County Ledger is a great example. It's worth reading in its entirety.

Taiwan Airport eGates Update

Airport e-Gates stop 32 criminals and violators from leaving Taiwan (Taiwan News)

Taiwan's airport e-gates, or automated immigration gates, have prevented 32 criminals, tax evaders and violators of passport regulations from leaving the country since their launch earlier this year. Chen Chien-cheng, deputy commander of the National Immigration Agency's Border Affairs Corps, said Tuesday that the 32 transgressors included killers, tax evaders and people using expired or stolen passports.

The gates have been in use since January 1. Technologies like these gates open up possibilities for making future air travel more enjoyable than it is today.

German soccer fans angered by face-scan plan

"We have to go beyond the current discussions" (Reuters)

"Along with the help of personalised entrance tickets and face scanners, notorious rioters can be effectively kept out of the stadiums," said Caffier in a statement.

"We have to go beyond the current discussions," he said.

A study has been commissioned to determine the practical and legal feasibility of using the technology in stadiums, after which a pilot run of the scanners will be carried out.

In a country that has had a difficult relationship with surveillance in the past, any form of monitoring the population is met with suspicion.

"This idea is a disgrace to democracy and is reminiscent of Orwell's 1984," said Philipp Markhardt, spokesman for the national Pro-Fans association.

A note:

In the hardware world as it relates to facial recognition, there really isn't any such thing as a "face scanner." Facial recognition is something that happens when certain software is applied to images collected by ordinary cameras. You might use a flat-bed scanner to get an image into a computer, but it's still just a photo scanner, not a face scanner.


h/t @m2sys

Europe Moves to Protect Online Privacy

Should Personal Data Be Personal? (New York Times)

Mr. Schrems’s sentiment is emblematic of the discomfort sweeping through Europe about the ways in which Internet companies treat personal information. That discomfort has, in turn, prompted proposals for stricter regulation of online data across the continent. And Europe’s moves to protect Internet privacy — something Americans have not, as yet, actively agitated for — have given rise to a thorny question: How do the laws and mores of different nations manage, if at all, the multinational companies that now govern our digital lives?

It's a good article.


h/t @francesIDexpert

EPIC Fail

EPIC Calls for Moratorium on Facial Recognition Technology (EPIC.org)

The Electronic Privacy Information Center has published its comments to the United States Federal Trade Commission (FTC). "In the absence of guidelines and legal standards, EPIC recommends a moratorium on the commercial deployment of facial recognition techniques."

In the "absence of guidelines and legal standards," advocating for the development of guidelines and legal standards makes a lot more sense than a moratorium, and banning (however temporarily) a technology makes it impossible to gain the real-world experience necessary to develop informed, rational, reasonable and fair guidelines and standards.

Also, since biometric technologies including facial recognition, are useful in privacy protection, a moratorium on commercial facial recognition applications curtails an individual's right to make decisions about how to protect their own privacy in the most convenient and cost-effective way.

The EPIC document is long on risks and short on abuses. I noticed only two cases of abuse (one by Google and one by Facebook) cited in the entire 24 page document and a repetition of the Pitt-Patt red herring addressed here. Many, including EPIC, have found fault with what Google and Facebook have done with facial recognition technology. As EPIC notes, they acted in violation of their own privacy policies, i.e. they lied. What's facial recognition got to do with that?

Moratoriums and bans are seldom the best way to ameliorate a new technology's negative effects. EPIC fails to recommend an appropriate length of time for a moratorium and a moratorium without an end date is a ban. This is a disproportionate response to the risks EPIC cites in its comments. By advocating for such strong measures in response to the facts it cites, EPIC risks casting itself as a threat to individual rights (including the right to privacy) and courts skepticism of its motives.

For a couple of more balanced takes on the subject of facial recognition, see:
Face Recognition in the Era of the Cloud and Social Media: Is it Time to Hit the Panic Button?
by Joseph J. Atick and
Face Recognition: Improved Benefit? Or Erosion of Privacy? by Carl Gohringer

Germany: Biometrics Figure in € 31 Billion Defense Budget

Germany Defence Budget Estimated at Around USD 41 Billion (TransWorldNews)

With no exclusive organizations focused on fighting terrorism, Germany's homeland security expenditure is largely concerned with the security of its borders and the international threat of terrorism. Indeed, while Germany is expected to procure biometric identification systems to prevent illegal immigration by increased efficiency in border patrol, attractive opportunities are forecast to emerge in the areas of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), all-terrain vehicles, satellite radar systems and, if it were to pull out of its ongoing A400M development program, military transport aircraft.

The Brain and Recognition of Faces

Investigating the process of facial recognition in humans (health 24)

Dartmouth professor with colleagues at Birkbeck College in the University of London,are investigating the process of facial recognition, seeking to understand the complexity of what is actually taking place in the brain when one person looks at another.

His studies target people who display an inability to recognise faces, a condition long known as prosopagnosia. Duchaine is trying to understand the neural basis of the condition while also make inferences about what is going wrong in terms of information processing—where in the stages that our brains go through to recognise a face is the system breaking down. A paper published in Brain details the most recent experimental results.

Humans accomplish facial recognition very differently than the computer programs they have created to help with the task. But a better understanding of how humans do it should certainly help biometric algorithm developers advance facial recognition technology.

See also:
(Facial Recognition vs Human) & (Facial Recognition + Human)
Short BBC video on Prosopagnosia

Sierra Leone: Woman Arrested for Double Registration

Detecting the double registration attempt was easy (Awoko)

Barely two days after the first person was caught trying to register twice on the new biometric machines, another person (this time a woman) has also fallen foul of the law by attempting to register twice at Tassoh Island, Ward 348, in Constituency 97.

That's where it gets really interesting as making the arrest turned out to be quite difficult.

ID management is about people.

How The Gizmodo Crew Manages Their Passwords

A survey of Gizmodo writers and their relationships with the password. Only one writer mentions biometrics and sarcasm cannot be ruled out completely.

The only password manager I trust is the one on my encrypted biometric USB dongle. I then handcuff said dongle to my wrist for an extra layer of protection.

Also yesterday, formerly known as Groundhog Day Eve, was "Change Your Password Day."

USA: 53% Favor Fingerprinting Requirement For Food Stamp Applicants

53% Favor Fingerprinting Requirement For Food Stamp Applicants (Rasmussen Reports)

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo is aiming to end New York City’s policy of requiring food stamp applicants to be fingerprinted, a policy the city’s mayor, Michael Bloomberg, wants to keep in place. A new survey shows that a majority of Americans nationwide favor requiring food stamp applicants to be fingerprinted in order to be eligible.

The quote above, as it is displayed at rasmussenreports.com, embeds the following link: Bloomberg Says He Will Fight for Fingerprinting Rule (NY Times.com)

For poll questions/wording, click here.

Africa Biometrics News Round-up

Kenya: Criminal Investigation Department Forensic Project Stalls (Fixed Mobile Convergence)

Ghana: Biometric voter registration to Begin March 24, 2012 (Modern Ghana)

Sierra Leone: Biometric Voter Registration Creates Mixed Feelings Among Citizens (All Africa)

First Biometric Chat of 2012: Biometrics for Workforce Management - Feb 9, 11 AM EST

Topics: Advantages of using biometrics, ROI metrics, common misunderstandings of biometrics, future trends (M2SYS)

We took a temporary hiatus in January, but we are back in February with a fresh new subject to discuss on the monthly #biometricchat – biometrics in workforce management. Happy to announce that this month’s guest for the chat will be Scott Barker, a product marketing manager with Kronos, Inc. (@Kronosinc on Twitter) who will be answering questions about the applications of biometric employee identification in workforce management[...]

John at M2SYS has done a lot to foster dialogue among biometric service providers, potential customers, the public and public advocates. These biometric chats are an important (and fun) part of that.

Here are some instructions on how to participate.

It's very convenient to use tweetchat.com (http://tweetchat.com/room/biometricchat).

Mobile Biometrics ID Man Wanted for Child Molestation

Port St. Lucie fingerprint reader nabs child molest suspect (CBS 12)

On January 26, at approximately 9:00 p.m., an officer was conducting a traffic stop on a suspicious vehicle in a “hotspot” (area known for a high concentration of auto and residential burglaries). During the stop, the suspect had no identification and the name provided indicated no wants or warrants, yet the officer was suspect of the name given.

When the backup officer arrived on scene, the officer took the suspect's fingerprint using the Fingerprint Reader and within 30 seconds, the suspect was positively identified as Carlos Rodrigues and had an active warrant out of Rochester, New York for sodemy on a child under 12.

The arresting officer deserves a special note of gratitude. The nature of the alleged crime is horrible in the extreme.

Panama: Beefing up Border Biometrics

Electronic Immigration Control System in Panama (Press Release)

The solution includes data enrollment and issuing stations, as well as individual means to verify identity tied to Biometric Automatic Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS), allowing for better control at border points and increased efficiencies.

Oded Bashan, Chairman and CEO of OTI, stated, ""OTI's secure ID offerings provide a cost effective, secure and timely to-market solution that leverages and interfaces with legacy systems and records."

Facial Recognition Developer Donates ID Technology to Oakland PD

Cognitech Announces Donation of Software to the Oakland Police Department (Press Release)

Cognitech, Inc. has announced the recent donation of it's forensic video enhancement Tri-Suite 11 software system to the Oakland Police Department, at the request of the Oakland Law Enforcement, and in the interest of the City of Oakland, CA, community at large with the purpose of forensically enhancing and analyzing video footage from the Occupy Oakland protests in order to find the forensic truth in the recorded incidents/events footage.

and

CEO Dr. Lenny Rudin said, in regards to the donation, “It is our sincere hope that in donating our forensic video Tri-Suite software to the Oakland Police Department, we are helping to assist the entire community through the forensic video enhancement and 3D analysis of numerous videos that were recorded during the Occupy Oakland, CA protests. Pictures tell the truth and when enhancing these videos and photos forensically, unlawful acts will be seen and analyzed clearly and scientifically, no matter who committed them.”

San Jose Mercury News article on the events in Oakland

A judge on Tuesday issued stay-away orders barring 12 people from coming within 300 yards of Frank H. Ogawa Plaza as the city continues to deal with the fallout from Saturday's violent Occupy Oakland protest.

The orders -- the first to be handed down -- apply to the 12 protesters who were also the first to be formally charged with crimes in connection with the protest, in which more than 400 people were arrested in a series of daylong clashes with police. City officials said they would seek the stay-away orders on those who have repeatedly been arrested in Occupy protests in an effort to keep the demonstrations under control. Prosecutors said they are still reviewing arrest reports from Saturday and more people could be charged.

From last summer:
London Deploys Facial Recognition Tech Against Rioters

Biometrics Will Enable the Takeoffs of Tomorrow

Experts imagine future airport experiences to be faster, easier and even fun (China Daily)

Examining the ways air travel is likely to change by 2025. Of course, biometric ID management technologies will play a significant role in safety and convenience. The whole article is interesting but I've snipped out the bit about biometrics and security below.

The most difficult prediction to materialize is the scheme in which trusted travelers are exempted from security checks.

"Countries like Canada, Germany and South Korea already have trusted traveler programs, which now are mainly to do with the immigration and emigration," Thomas says.

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) says the current security-check system isn't effective, and wastes time and energy, investigating countless bags rather than high-risk passengers. "Today's checkpoint was designed four decades ago to stop hijackers carrying metal weapons," IATA's director general Giovanni Bisignani says.

"We need a process that responds to today's threats. It must amalgamate intelligence based on passenger information and new technology. That means moving from a system that looks for bad objects to one that can find bad people."

So, the future security check will be divided into three channels, according to a passenger's risk rate - no security for known travelers, normal security for ordinary people and enhanced security for people regarded as dangerous.

But it's still difficult, even though the biometric technology based already exists, Thomas says. And it involves governments and intelligence departments.

Also, according to the article, flying in the future will not involve checked baggage.

I've often wondered why UPS, FedEx or the postal service hasn't marketed a service designed to compete with airline baggage fees.

Irishman Wears Pig Head Costume to Protest Biometric System

Sligo man mounts protest against electronic ‘sign on’ (Sligo Weekender)

A Sligo man mounted a one-man pyjama protest outside the office of the Department of Social Protection in Cranmore on Friday.

Carrowmore native David Eakins, who was wore a pig’s head costume, was objecting to being forced to use the new biometric method to claim Job Seekers allowance.

Photo at the link.

Passwords: "Redundant and Bankrupt"

Today's Sydney Morning Herald has a wide-ranging article covering some recent facial recognition news.

Australian security expert James Turner, of IBRS, said the entire concept of a password, as in a series of characters that you type in via a keyboard, had "become redundant and bankrupt".

"It just doesn't work for the number of sites and resources that your typical person uses personally, and then you include corporate [resources] and it just becomes a nightmare."

See also:
More on the Awesomeness of Passwords