News and insight into biometric identification and authentication

Bank biometrics take on the panic button

Friday, July 11, 2008

With the fast rising concerns over customer account security in banking, Siemens and AXSionics, a Swiss technology firm, have developed a new fingerprint scanner that links up with your bank account, according to an Economist article.

While fingerprint scanning as a means of access to one’s account is not new, this device carries a few other new features to help discourage thieves. Among the new features is the requirement that the finger used have blood pumping through it, to assuage any worries over a thief cutting off ones finger and using it to access an account.


Another feature is the designation of a panic finger. On the device a user may require any number of fingerprint readings be required prior to account access, however, they may also designate one of their fingers be used to simulate a transaction while secretly alerting the bank to the emergency.

As costs are still high with this new technology, analysts still believe that voice biometrics will find wide-spread use in banking before fingerprint readers do, however, they see this as a good solution for the more well-off bank customers with more to spend and more to protect.

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PhoneFactor Inc. continues to grow its financial services roster announcing additions to its most recent clientele: Heartland Financial USA, OceanFirst Bank, Northway Bank, and CUANY Credit Union. The PhoneFactor solutions have been utilized by financial institutions as a way to protect customers using e-banking from online fraud. Additionally the PhoneFactor technology can authenticate bank employees for remote logins.

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BPS, a Polish bank, has become the first European bank to offer the use of ATMs that accept biometrics in lieu of traditional PINs with the launch of ATMs that utilize finger-vein biometrics to authenticate an individual’s identity, according to an article from The Register.

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Digital Angel, a provider in the field of animal identification and emergency identification solutions, announced that the U.S. Department Agriculture has approved the Destron Fearing HD.Tag, a line of electronic identification tags using Half Duplex (HDX) technology.

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Credit and debit card manufactures are working on giving payment cards a face lift, literally. Talk of inserting a small LCD screen displaying passwords and account balances is in the works, according to a report on creditcards.com. For enhanced identity security, there is the possibility of a three-dimensional, 360-degree video of the card owner and a sample of the owner’s voice.

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Turkish Bank TEB has announced the debut of a new MasterCard payment card set to be officially issued to customers starting in July.

The bank will be the first to offer the product what it is calling “the next generation debit card” which contains a built in display for control and security.

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Bank of America will be testing NFC payments enabled through microSD cards, a spokesperson for the bank tells NFCNews.com. The program will begin in September and run through the end of the year in New York.

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