Biometric checks must improve
Karen Dearne
October 15, 2002

THE accuracy of biometric systems needs to improve if widespread acceptance is to be achieved, the Biometrics Institute Conference has been warned.

ANZ Bank fraud risk head Lawrence Cox said a 1.6 per cent false acceptance rate "on 80 million cheques issued across Australia in 2001 would mean more than one million cheques being issued and accepted falsely".

"In 2001, we identified that 12,500 cheques had been falsely issued, so there's a big difference there," he said. "How much is that in dollar terms? "Likewise, the false rejection rate is a concern. I don't want to be called to my managing director's office and asked why someone is locked up in an overseas country because their cheque or smartcard has been refused."

There was potential to use biometrics to improve customer service and the security of systems, but the error rate would need to be cut before there was widespread acceptance, Mr Cox said.

The conference, held in Sydney last Friday, canvassed the latest developments in iris, facial, fingerprint, handwriting and voice recognition systems. Many of these technologies are being deployed in security environments such as airports for passenger control and customs, as well as the financial sector and government agencies.

Sebastien Eid, area manager of fingerprint technology leader Sagem, said biometric systems were being used at airports for various purposes. "Iris recognition is very good at one-to-one recognition, for example, and will become very convenient as cameras get smaller and better," Mr Eid said.

"Facial recognition is being used by the Department of Defense in the US for crowd surveillance and interceptions, and fingerprints are used for background checking of individuals."

Argus Solutions chief executive Bruce Lyman said there was great scope for various biometrics to sit side by side. He warned against going overboard, as there were many situations in which biometric authentication would be overkill. "Identification in its own right has no merit," he said. "Identification for doing something has every merit." Mr Lyman said resistance to biometric roll-outs had largely evaporated. "Five years ago, we had to explain what biometrics was," he said. "Now our biggest difficulty is not in initial acceptance of the concept, but in educating folk who are confronting this technology for the first time."

VeCommerce government services manager Clive Summerfield said people would use biometrics if a real benefit was delivered. "In speech-recognition, I was always told that no-one would ever speak to a computer," he said. "Yet at the Commonwealth Bank, more than 40 per cent of the calls to Commonwealth Securities are answered by a computer and people talk to it. "It all comes down to the value proposition."