News and insight into biometric identification and authentication

Gambia biometric system expected to enhance free and fair elections

Thursday, January 14, 2010

The Chairman of Gambia’s Independent Electoral Commission (IEC), Alhaji Mustapha L. Carayol, has announced the commission’s budget and subsequent intent to utilize a new biometric voter registration system to conduct free, fair and transparent election starting with the 2011 polls, according to a Freedom Newspaper article.

The move is coming following an informal audit of the voting system utilized in the last cycle of elections and deciding on implementation of a biometric solution for voter registration to improve the elections.


The IEC settled on Canadian company CODE Inc and Belgian company ZETES PASS following their presentations regarding costs and implementation details. With a new system in use, the IEC is confident that repeat registrations and missing registrations will be easily rid from the processes involved in voter registration.

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Luxand announced release of a free, downloadable version of its Blink! facial recognition software. The software provides as a biometric-based login service Windows 7 and Windows Vista operating systems via a user’s regular webcam. In addition to authenticating the individual accessing the computer, Blink! also takes and records a still image of each person trying to access the computer to help prevent unauthorized access, and touts the ability to correctly recognize stored faces despite poor lighting conditions or basic changes in a user’s look such as glasses or hair cuts.  

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SEPTA’s (Southeastern Pennsylvania Transit Authority) proposed smart card fare system has met some resistance from passenger advocates, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.

Essentially, the proposition entails railway passengers taking a free train into the Philadelphia’s Center City station and paying a roundtrip fare on ride home, reports The Inquirer.

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Ghana’s major electronic clearing and payment system could provide enough space and communication capabilities to enable adding new purposes for removing ghost payrollers, according to a Peace FM Online article.

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Apple is seeking more patents on embedded biometric authentication technology that would go beyond the standard fingerprint, voice recognition, face recognition and iris recognition modes and bring the potential for behavior or habit-based authentication to their devices, according to a TMCnet article. Some of the new patents Apple is seeking specifically call for authenticating a user via their unique typing patterns and detecting heartbeat patterns of the user through special sensors.

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SmartMetric, a developer of portable biometric solutions, has announced that its biometric activated data card can now be used to contain full medical history and health records on the individual. The card, called the SmartMetric Data Card, is a standard sized card that has the capability of holding multiple pages of data as well as being inaccessible without the holder first scanning his fingerprint on the card itself.

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India’s Social Welfare Department has implemented the Beggars Personal Management System to track beggars using biometrics. This effort is to fight recent large-scale deaths and mismanagement within colonies, according to a Deccan Herald article.

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