-Caveat Lector- http://news.openflows.org/article.pl?sid=01/09/19/1333240
Biometrics on the rise posted Wednesday September 19, @04:30AM NYT, September 19, 2001 Exploring Technology to Protect Passengers With Fingerprint or Retina Scans By BARNABY J. FEDER Governments and airlines seeking to reduce the threat of airplane hijackings by terrorists have a wide range of security technologies to choose from. Much of the spotlight will be on biometrics systems, which identify travelers by fingerprints, the patterns in their retinas, their voices or other individual characteristics. Privacy concerns have slowed the development of such technology, but investors apparently expect that to change: the stocks of the few publicly traded biometrics companies soared Monday while most of the stock market declined. "Our phone systems have been jammed since last Tuesday," said Joseph Atick, the chairman and chief executive of Visionics, which markets FaceIt, a system that profiles individuals based on 80 facial structures like distance between the eyes, cheekbone formation and the width of the nose bridge. In addition to calls from investors, Visionics has been receiving about 100 calls a day from potential customers, some as far away as Thailand, Mr. Atick said. Equipment suppliers and the consultants who meld security devices into multimillion-dollar systems say airports may also install improved versions of other types of security products, including such widely used equipment as closed circuit television systems and X-ray machines. "There is no single perfect technology," said Ralph S. Sheridan, the chief executive of American Science and Engineering, a vendor of X-ray machines that scrutinize luggage, trucks and other containers. "We have to throw up a gantlet." Investors clearly expect just such a broad investment, even though there is no information to suggest that explosives in luggage played any role in last week's disaster. American Science's shares closed yesterday at $9, up 57 percent this week. InVision Technologies, which has developed explosives detection equipment with support from the Federal Aviation Administration, was the leading gainer among all Nasdaq stocks on Monday, rising $5.14 to $8.25, before retreating yesterday to $7.35. The equipment now used to scan carry-on luggage and passengers in American airports costs roughly one-third as much as the more sophisticated systems that were developed for screening entry into high- security buildings, monitoring prisons or searching for drugs at immigration stations, Mr. Sheridan said. The only airport in which American Science's top systems are used to search luggage before it goes on aircraft is in Cairo, Mr. Sheridan said. Such systems not only detect plastic bombs but, when applied to passengers or crew members, can locate hazards like a plastic knife taped to a traveler's body. The leading advanced bomb detection system in American airports is InVision, a variation on the familiar CAT scanner used in hospitals, which provides clear images of a wide range of materials. InVision's system has been bought by the Federal Aviation Agency to examine selected checked baggage at more than 100 airports, but it was not designed to look for weapons on humans. Nor is the system fast enough to check carry-on bags as passengers enter the departure area. There may be less pressure to examine every bag, though, if biometrics progress to the point where security workers can be confident they know the identity of every traveler. This would require both equipment and a huge amount of data management. The biometrics options favored by the International Air Transport Association call for scanning a traveler's eyes, said William Gaillard, a spokesman for the trade group, which is based in Geneva. Eye scans look at either the distinctive patterns in the blood vessels of the retina at the back of the the eye or the unique features of the colored part of the eye, the iris. The association thinks eye-scanning is the most internationally acceptable form of biometrics, Mr. Gaillard said. A Muslim woman can be identified, for example, without touching her or asking her to drop her facial veil. Identix, which is based in Los Gatos, Calif., thinks fingerprinting will be favored because it is already integrated into a wide range of devices that control access to computers and high-security rooms. The facial structure approach used by Visionics may have the advantage, though, of being more easily linked to a database of potential terrorists. Video footage from any source could provide the data needed to create a profile that cameras at an airport could check for matches. The company says just 20 of the 80 relationships measured are enough to identify an individual with high probability, despite any effort to disguise the identity through plastic surgery, wigs or other methods. Installing such equipment at major airports would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, and that would be only part of the necessary investment. Biometrics systems would have to be integrated into government databases with constantly updated images of known or suspected terrorists, a major software and networking challenge. "Airports need to be as networked as the credit card business," Mr. Atick said. "We should have centralized boarding authorization just the way your payment at any store is authorized by VISA." ===== http://www.house.gov/international_relations/105th/ap/wsap212982.htm http://www.americanfreepress.net/09_26_01/U_S__Army_Officers_Say___Mossa/u_s__army_officers_say___mossa.html http://www.portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2001/09/26/wdrug26.xml http://menewsline.com/stories/2001/september/09_25_6.html http://www.knoxstudio.com/shns/story.cfm?pk=SIEGE-COLLEGES-09-27-01&cat=AN __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Listen to your Yahoo! Mail messages from any phone. http://phone.yahoo.com <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! 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