eGov-Feb-2011-[36-37]-Technology Biometrics

technology

Biometrics

How multispectral imaging makes citizen ID management possible When designed properly with a reliable technology, identity management projects deliver reliable performance with enhanced security and convenience and a meaningful ROI

By Sujan TV Parthasaradhi

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hen reviewing biometrics based citizen ID projects, great attention must be given to the importance of standards, interoperability, security and/or regulatory compliance goals. However, to be successful, it is also important that the biometric system performs reliably and successfully — under conditions that are representative of the target applications. That’s not easy when one remembers that large-scale, biometrics-based citizen ID projects must manage the availability of services across various sectors, including education, healthcare, pension providers, rural banking and others where people come from different backgrounds, types of jobs and diverse environments.

Hope and vision are not enough. Several prestigious biometric pilots and projects, both national and international, failed to start or were later abandoned because they were not appropriately evaluated before deployment. Decision makers, giving priority to laboratory findings, forgot that there can be dynamic biometric reading differences between a doctor, a construction worker, a young person and a pensioner. The impacts of critical processes such as image acquisition, real world

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performance, ease of duplication and interoperability on the total system performance were never properly explored.

For instance, one requirement of citizen ID technology is that it be reliable and successful when used by the general citizenry. Thus, it is extremely important to understand the environmental and user challenges faced in the target deployment. Since the strongest predictor of biometric system performance is image quality measurement, has this been studied in the target environment with a representative population?

Bottom line: Can the solution read their fingers?

Biometrics

Several prestigious biometric pilots and projects, both national and international, failed to start or were later abandoned because they were not appropriately evaluated before deployment Here’s why that is so important. The most commonly known fingerprint performance metrics are false reject rate (FRR) and false accept rate (FAR). Often, that’s all that studied. For those who are enrolled, can they get in or not? And, can others get in without being enrolled?

As importantly, though, are two other important criteria — FTE (failure to enroll) and FTA (failure to acquire) — which come to the forefront throughout rural India. FTE refers to those people who could not be enrolled and hence cannot use the system at all (and, by the way, do not show up in FRR and FAR statistics).

FTA refers occasions when a sensor cannot acquire an adequate image from an enrolled user. In non-ideal, real world conditions such as Indian rural environments, the FTE can easily exceed 10 or 20 percent with traditional fingerprint optical sensors. The FTA is often in the 5 to 10 percent point range. This means that there are large portions of the intended users who simply cannot use the system at all plus many who cannot use it reliably.

What’s the problem? Conventional optical fingerprint technologies depend on the condition of the fingerprint skin surface and its contact with the fingerprint sensor platen. And this creates a big problem for citizen ID projects in India. According to UN statistics, approximately 70 percent of the Indian population resides in rural areas. Real world conditions like dirt, dryness and humidity are prevalent with a rural user population. In addition, dry folds, wrinkles and problematic skin conditions are very common for senior citizens. Any one of these conditions leads to poor-quality data capture with conventional optical sensors, resulting in the failure-to-acquire and failureto-enroll problems.

Multispectral technology to get over image capturing obstacles Multispectral imaging is a sophisticated technology developed to overcome the fingerprint capture problems that conventional imaging systems have in less-than-ideal conditions.

This more effective technology uses multiple spectrums of light and advanced polarization

techniques to extract unique fingerprint characteristics from both the surface and subsurface of the skin. The nature of human skin physiology is such that this subsurface information is both relevant to fingerprint capture and unaffected by surface wear and other environmental factors.

The fingerprint ridges that we see on the surface of the finger have their foundation beneath the surface of the skin, in the capillary beds and other sub-dermal structures. The fingerprint ridges we see on our fingertips are merely an echo of the foundational “inner fingerprint.”

Unlike the surface fingerprint characteristics that can be obscured by moisture, dirt or wear, the “inner fingerprint” lies undisturbed and unaltered beneath the surface. When surface fingerprint information is combined with subsurface fingerprint information and reassembled in an intelligent and integrated manner, the results are more consistent, more inclusive and more tamper-resistant.

Conventional optical fingerprint technologies depend on the condition of the fingerprint skin surface and its contact with the fingerprint sensor platen. And this creates a big problem for citizen ID projects in India Multispectral imaging technology can also detect living flesh from non-living flesh or other organic or synthetic materials used to duplicate fingerprints. ‘Liveness’ detection is built from cutting-edge machine learning algorithms.

Using these algorithms and the wealth of information available from multispectral fingerprint images, ‘liveness’ detection capabilities can be updated if new “spoofs” are identified.

Success stories in India and around the World Multispectral imaging has already demon-

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strated usability and scalability in successful civil and commercial applications involving millions of users across the world. For example, more than 400 thousand people pass through multispectral imaging sensors every day at the Hong Kong/Macau border crossings. The US government uses the technology in its Transportation Worker Identity Credential (TWIC). After an extensive industry-wide evaluation of biometrics technology and devices, CareFusion selected multispectral imaging fingerprint sensors and software for integration into their latest generation of drug dispensing cabinets. Multispectral imaging based sensors are also used by the US military.

Here in India, Analogics Tech India provides reliable fingerprint biometric solutions and leverages multispectral imaging for prestigious customers including TCS, Bartronics, ESSL, WIPRO, AGS and others. Analogics’ multispectral imaging sensor- based handheld readers are used in financial inclusion or rural banking applications where banking services, such as new savings accounts, funds transfers, deposits, cash withdrawals, and loan applications, are taken to the poor and needy in remote rural areas where citizens have no access to traditional banks. The Bank of India, Karnataka Bank, State Bank of Hyderabad and State Bank of Bikaner and Jaipur are all leveraging the technology.

Multispectral imaging sensors are also used in biometric ATMs and handhelds that act like micro ATMs. These sensors are also used in rural employment guarantee programs where fingerprint-based biometric cards are used by beneficiaries to withdraw their weekly wages. Multispectral imaging based handhelds are being used in the pilot of public distribution system projects, where the biometric is used to collect rations.

For a country such as India, in which the government is looking to provide services to the citizens of an entire sub-continent and commercial entities want to reach out to those who have been excluded because of limited technology, multispectral imaging-based biometrics is turning visions into realities.

the author is the Director of Biometric Applications in Lumidigm (India), a biometric company dedicated to enabling convenient, secure, and reliable identification and verification

February 2011 / www.egovonline.net / egov

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