News and insight into biometric identification and authentication

Credit cards moving towards biometrics

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Due to rising fears of identity theft stemming from credit card misuse coupled with a recent study by technology company Unisys that resulted with over 70% of respondents saying they would be willing to give financial and government institutions biometric information for better identity protection, many credit card companies seem to be looking more intently at biometrics as a viable solution, according to a Creditcards.com article.

Multiple modes of biometrics have been discussed as possibilities to add onto credit card authentication procedures to better protect users at every possible interaction with their card accounts.


Among the different technologies being pushed are fingerprint, electronic signature and voice biometrics. Specifically, fingerprint and electronic signature biometrics could be used for in-person transactions to replace standard signatures currently required with the electronic signature checking for matching characteristics such as shape, size, speed, stroke order, timing and pressure used to write the signature.

Voice biometrics, however, could be used for over the phone transactions by checking a vocal sample given over the phone against a stored one.

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