Lightning in a Bottle

Some schools are now using “biometric scanning” systems for student identification. A biometric is a measure of a personal physical characteristic, such as a fingerprint, retinal pattern, face, voice, or whatever else some creative engineer comes up with.

Fingerprint scanning seems to be the most widely used. (The top-of-the-line HP iPaq handheld computer has a thumbprint scanner built into it for keeping files secure.) Wired has an article at www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,60342,00.html that looks at schools’ use of fingerprint scanners for cafeteria purchases, checking out library books and other such activities. Some find it an obvious, simple solution to lost ID cards, while others find it a bit creepy, in a Big-Brother-is-watching-you kind of way.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 10th, 2003 at 9:05 am and is filed under Technology Trends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.