In the last years has considerably increased the area of application of biometrics and it's expected that in the near future, we will use biometry many times in our dayly activities such as getting in the car, openning the door of our house, accessing to our bank acount, shoping by internet, accessing to our PDA, mobil phone, laptops, etc. Depending of where the biometrics is deployed, the applications can be categorized in the following five main groups: forensic, government, commercial, health-care and traveling and immigration. However, some applications are common to these groups such as physical access, PC/network access, time and attendance, etc.
Forensic
The use of biometric in the law enforcement and forensic is more known and from long date, it is used mainly for identification of criminals. In particular, the AFIS (automatic fingerprint identification system) has been used for this purpose. Lately the facial-scan technology (mug shots) is being also used for identification of suspects. Another possible application is the verification of persons of home arrest, a voice-scan is an attractive solution for this problem. The typical application are:
- Identification of criminals- collecting the evidence in the scene of crime (e.g., fingerprints) it is possible to compare with data of suspects or make a search in the database of criminals.
- Surveillance --using cameras one can monitor the very busy places such as stadiums, airports, meetings, etc. Looking in the crowds for suspect, based on the face recognition biometric, using a images (e.g., mug shots) database of wanted persons or criminals. Since the events of September 11, 2001, the interest in biometric surveillance has increased dramatically, especially for air travel applications. Currently there are many cameras monitoring crowds at airports for detecting wanted terrorists.
- Corrections -This refers to the treatment of offenders (criminals) through a system of penal incarceration, rehabilitation, probation, and parole, or the administrative system by which these are effectuated. Is this cases a biometric system can avoid the possibility of accidentally releasing the wrong prisoner, or to ensure that people leaving the facilities are really visitors and not inmates.
- Probation and home arrest - biometric can also be used for post-release programs (conditional released) to ensure the fulfilment of the probation, parole and home detention terms.
Government
There are many application of the biometry in the government sector. An AFIS is the primary system used for locating duplicates enrolls in benefits systems, electronic voting for local or national elections, driver's license emission, etc. The typical application are:
- National Identification Cards - the idea is to include digital biometric information in the national identification card. This is the most ambitious biometric program, since the identification must be performed in a large-scale database, containing hundred of millions samples, corresponding to the whole population of one country. This kind of cards can be used for multiple purposes such as controlling the collection of benefits, avoiding duplicates of voter registration and drivers license emission. All this applications are primarily based on finger-scan and AFIS technology, however it is possible that facial-scan and iris-scan technology could be used in the future.
- Voter ID and Elections - while the biometric national ID card is still in project, in many countries are already used the biometry for the control of voting and voter registration for the national or regional elections. During the registration of voter, the biometric data is captured and stored in the card and in the database for the later use during the voting. The purpose is to prevent the duplicate registration and voting.
- Driver's licenses - In many countries the driver license is also used as identification document, therefore it is important to prevent the duplicate emission of the driver license under different name. With the use of biometric this problem can be eliminated. however it is important that the data must be shared between state, because in some country such as United States, the license are controlled at the states as opposed to the federal level.
- Benefits Distribution (social service) - the use of biometry in benefits distribution prevents fraud and abuse of the government benefits programs. Ensuring that the legitimate recipients have a quick and convenient access to the benefits such as unemployment, health care and social security benefits.
- Employee authentication - The government use of biometric for PC, network, and data access is also important for security of building and protection of information. Below are more detailed this kind of applications also used in commercial sector.
- Military programs - the military has long been interested in biometrics and the technology has enjoyed extensive support from the national security community.
Commercial
Banking and financial services represent enormous growth areas for biometric technology, with many deployments currently functioning and pilot project announced frequently. Some applications in this sector are:
- Account access - The use of biometric for the access to the account in the bank allows to keep definitive and auditable records of account access by employees and customers. Using biometry the the customers can access accounts and employees can log into their workstations.
- ATMs - the use of biometric in the ATM transaction allows more security,
- Expanded Service Kiosks - A more receptive market for biometrics may be special purpose kiosks, using biometric verification to allow a greater variety of financial transaction than are currently available though standard ATMs.
- Online banking - Internet based account access is already widely used in many places, the inclusion of biometric will make more secure this type of transactions from home. Currently, there are many pilot programs using biometric in home banking.
- Telephony transaction - Voice-scan biometric can be used to make more secure the telephone-based transactions. In this type of application, when the costumer calls to make a transaction, a biometric system will authenticate the customer's identity based on his or her voice with no need of any additional device.
- PC/Network access - The use of biometric log-in to local PCs or remotely through network increase the security of the overall system keeping more protected the valuable information.
- Physical access - the biometric is widely used for controlling the access to building or restricted areas.
- E-commerce - biometric e-commerce is the use of biometrics to verify of identity of the individual conduction remote transaction for goods or services
- Time and attendance monitoring - In this sector the biometrics is used for controlling the presence of the individuals in a determine area. For example for controlling the time sheet of the employees or the presence of students at the classroom
Health Care
The applications in this sector includes the use of biometrics to identify or verify the identity of individuals interacting with a health-care entity or acting in the capacity of health-care employee or professional. The main aim of biometrics is to prevent fraud, protect the patient information and control the sell of pharmaceutical products. Some typical application are:
- PC/Network Access - the biometrics are used to control a secure access of the employees to the hospital network, primarily, in order to protect the patient information,
- Access to personal information - Using biometrics, the medical patient information maybe stored on smart card or secure networks, this will enable the access of the patients to their personal information.
- Patient identification - In case of emergency, when a patient does not have identification document and is unable no communicate, biometric identification may be a good alternative to identify.
Travel and Immigration
The application in this sector includes the use of biometrics to identify or verify the identity of individual interacting during the course of travel, with a travel or immigration entity or acting in the capacity of travel or immigration employee. Typical application are:
- Air travel - In many airport are already used a biometric system in order to reduce the inspection processing time for authorized travelers.
- Border crossing - The use of biometrics to control the travelers crossing the national or state border is increasing, specially in regions with high volume of travelers or illegal immigrants.
- Employee access - Several airport use biometric to control the physical access of employees to secure areas.
- Passports - Some country already issues passports with biometric information on a barcode or smart chips. The use of biometrics prevent the emission of multiple passports for the same person and also facilitates the identification at the airports and border controls.