SmartMetric Reader Opens Biometric Market
January 21st, 2013 | Author: Stefanie Hoffman
Noise around unsafe passwords is reaching a critical mass. Brute-force password tools are available for download. Organizations, such as Anonymous, and other hacker collectives won’t surrender the notoriety they get by hacking into corporate databases and posting passwords on public online white boards.
Going forward, all that FUD will open a gap for risky passwords solutions supplanted with enhanced identity and authentication solutions.
This trend has spurred the development of a new technology from identity firm SmartMetric Inc.: a biometric fingerprint reader that fits inside devices as small as credit cards.
The technology leverages users’ fingerprints, in lieu of passwords or PINs, to protect transactions on the 1.5 billion global EMV banking cards issued. The solution is one of the manifestations of a ten-year research and development endeavor to create secure alternatives tovulnerable password technology.
The fingerprint technology will manifest in products geared for financial and online transaction sectors, which could pave the way for the channel to introduce biometric solutions in vertical markets reliant on security or tapped to adhere to mounting compliance regulations.
Biometrics haven’t gained the widespread adoption experienced by identity and authentication solutions — for a lot of reasons. As Channelnomics has pointed out, multi-factor authentication solutions, which incorporate biometrics, have been perceived as cumbersome and complicated, requiring too many moving parts.
However, the market is forecast to grow. A Reportlinker research report estimates the biometric solutions market is slated to grow at a CAGR of 21 percent between 2012 and 2014.
The most salient target markets are point-of-sale, ATMs, border security divisions, military contractors and government sectors that require official clearance and top security systems to guard classified and highly sensitive information.
Other reports have projected steady growth of biometrics in public sector arenas as more organizations forego passwords and static mechanisms for more robust security defenses. But with a rash of password hacks gracing headlines, it’s possible biometric solutions — such as the fingerprint credit card reader — could trickle into enterprise market segments, as well as retail, health care and other verticals, ultimately opening new avenues for solution providers to deepen industry ties while expanding compliance and other security portfolios.
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