WHY BIOMETRICS

JENNY, a marketing professional works in one of the multinational companies in Makati while her husband, JOHNNY, is a professional photographer who flies around the world taking pictures for travel magazines.

A week after JOHNNY arrived from one of his trips abroad, he left home supposedly to meet colleagues who are also into photography. He brought with him his two SLRs, various lenses and his laptop. That was the last time JENNY saw him as he never returned home after the meeting. Those whom JOHNNY met meanwhile attested that he was still in good spirits right after the meeting took place.

According to JENNY, her husband is the responsible type who would never fail to text and call her from time to time. Even when abroad, JOHNNY would supposedly keep in touch regularly so it was impossible that he would just leave or disappear without notice. She likewise discounts the possibility of her husband eloping with someone as it was not JOHNNY’s cup of tea. As JENNY had access to all of JOHNNY’s social networking accounts and emails, she went on to attempt to open them but failed as even the passwords have been changed. For the next two days after his disappearance, his cellular phone was still open as JENNY constantly texted and called him but to no avail.

Ten days afterwhich, JENNY’s nephew in New York chanced upon JOHNNY’s username logged-in to the latter’s favorite online gamesite. The nephew who had no knowledge of JOHNNY’s disappearance tried to chat with him but did not receive any reply. This matter, he brought to the attention of JENNY.

JENNY said:
• JOHNNY’s laptop had Facial Recognition Log-on.
• While JOHNNY uses the facial recognition feature, the same will work in lieu of a password and vice-versa.
• Once the laptop is open, and consequently goes online, it automatically connects to his favorite gamesite
Let us discuss on the theory that somebody else was already in possession of JOHNNY’s laptop.
The person who logged into the gamesite does not actually need JOHNNY’s laptop to access it. All he needs is to know JOHNNY’s username and password and he can access it using any computer. Nonetheless, on the premise that he used the same missing laptop in going online, he should have accessed the laptop first, that is breach its security settings. And since JOHNNY did not set the facial recognition feature “and” the password, but facial recognition “or” password, it was less burdensome for whoever was holding the laptop other than JOHNNY to open it.

Logic would dictate that any ordinary thief who succeeds in stealing a laptop would always attempt to access it. However, in the event he fails, he would simply discard it by selling or maybe changing the harddrive and have the settings reconfigured. In the case above, it seems that the one in possession of the laptop went through the troubles of cracking the password, not only of the laptop but his other accounts as well. It seems then that the one who got the laptop and the other valuables may be more interested in the contents and the information that may be acquired from them.

Poor JOHNNY. He did not maximize the full use of the security features of his computer. The facial recognition “and” password would have done the trick for him.

In recent years, the need to secure data and information, while striking a balance with privacy has seen the rise of the science of biometrics. Technology has realized that the human body’s unique identifiers such as fingerprints, retinas, voice, veins and possibly DNA, may be incorporated into machines to serve as a powerful tool to safeguard against theft and other types of breaches on security. In the methods of facial recognition, new trends being developed include skin lines and texture analysis whereas mobile technology is gearing towards voice recognition processes as built-in standards for every mobile phone to be manufactured. More than this, unlike in the past when biometrics technology would be very costly such that you only see it in science fiction movies, it has become affordable that they are already incorporated in mid-end types of computers and other similar products.

Not that we’re pointing blame to JOHNNY for not being proactive now that we are not even sure if he is okay or not, but the fact is we can all learn from his story in order to create for us a more secure environment. We just hope that we get to receive more encouraging news about him in the days to come.