Biometrics Security Essays - Biometrics, Cryptography, Security

Biometrics Security Biometrics uses personal characteristics to identify users. When it comes to security, mapping unique patterns and traits in fingerprints, irises or voices is considered light years ahead of forcing employees to memorize combinations of letters and numbers -- which are easily compromised and easily forgotten. The technology works by taking measurements -- whether it is the weight and length of bones in the hand or the pattern of blood vessels inside the eye or the pattern of fingerprints -- and then storing the specifics, often called minutiae, in a database. When a user scans a hand or retina, the new mapping is compared with the stored data. Access is either granted or denied based on matching patterns that are unique to each individual. It's that ability to identify someone based on unique physical traits that is driving biometrics into the corporate enterprise. As more high-priced transactions are conducted over the Internet, businesses increasingly need ironclad authentication of someone's identity. Add to that the increasing amount of inhouse security breaches and corporate espionage, and you'll find network and security administrators grappling for a better way to secure information from unauthorized eyes. Somebody who is doing stock trades online wants security that is amazingly accurate, says Michael Thieme, a senior consultant for International Biometric Group in Manhattan, an independent biometrics consulting and integration firm. A lot of recent security incidents are making people aware that they have a lot of data that just isn't as secure as they thought it would be. . . . If biometrics can even be a small part of that, it will be a tremendous market. Costs are dropping Until recently, the problem with biometrics has been its staggering cost. But prices have dropped by 80% to 90% in the past two to three years. A boom in research and development largely driven by an increasing need for accurate forensics has produced quality improvements and price reductions. A stand-alone fingerprint reader might have cost anywhere from $2,000 to $3,000 two years ago, but now it can sell for less than $100. Analysts say fingerprint scanning is the top biometric in terms of mind and market share, with hand geometry coming in second, followed by face and iris scanning. There's a growing crop of biometrics vendors expanding the market and pushing what was once technology solely aimed at forensics and government security into the enterprise market. Companies such as Identix of Sunnyvale, Calif., Veridicom of Santa Clara and Key Tronic in Spokane, Wash., are taking biometrics corporate. And they're catching the eye of industry giants like Compaq, which is embedding fingerprint scanners into keyboards and laptops. When we first started working with Identix, going back about six years, it cost several thousand dollars for a fingerprint reader the size of a small telephone, says Joel Lisker, senior vice president of security and risk management at MasterCard International in Purchase, N.Y. The current model is embedded in the keyboard, and it's in the $5 to $10 range. MasterCard, which issues employee identification cards with smart chips embedded in them, is testing different biometric methods for everything from building access to network access. Lisker says repeat visitors to the company's headquarters were the first guinea pigs, having their images and fingerprints stored electronically for a digital match every time they returned. The credit card company also is looking into voice recognition, and earlier this year began a pilot project using fingerprints to authenticate users for network access. Lisker says the trial, involving five or six employees, is going well, and he expects to broaden it to 100 users by year-end. Eventually, I expect their employee cards will gain them access to the building, the network, specified applications, and will even be used as an electronic purse at our cafeteria and store, he says. The employee cards will be smart cards with fingerprint minutiae stored on them. We're looking at this in lieu of personal identification numbers, which are readily compromised, Lisker says. Freeing up the help desk The city of Oceanside, Calif., is well beyond the initial testing phase when it comes to using fingerprinting to authenticate users. With 90% deployment, Michael Sherwood, director of the city's IT department, says

The Color essays

The Color essays The Color Purple, by Alice Walker, is a very intense book to read. By intense, I mean it is a book touching very difficult and hard aspects of life of a poor, black oppressed woman in the early twentieth century. Walker does social criticism in her novel, mostly criticizing the way black women were treated in the early twentieth century. Walker uses the life experiences of Celie to illustrate her social criticism. The Color Purple is not written in the style of most novels. The author does not tell us everything about the characters, the setting, and why the characters behave the way they do. The novel is written in a series of letters, not dated. There are large gaps between some letters, but this is not revealed by the author; we have to figure it out ourselves. The letters are written in what Walker calls black folk language, which also reduces the easiness of the reading. When the novel opens, Celie is a young black girl living in Georgia in the early years of the twentieth century. She in an uneducated girl, and writes her letters in common language. Celie is entering her adolescence believing she was raped by her father and that he killed both of their children. She writes to God, because she has no one else to write to. She feels that what happened to her is so terrible that she can only talk about it to someone she feels loves her. She knows her sister Nettie loves her, but she is too young to understand. Celie believe only to God may she talk honestly and openly about her suffering. Celie is not, however, at this point, complaining to God, she is simply Celie was born into a poor family; her mother was sick most of the time, mentally and physically; there were too many children in the family; and Celie was abused by the man she believed was her father. Celie feels used and abused, but does not understand why. So many bad things have hap ...

Character education parents as partners Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Character education parents as partners - Essay Example The school is influential but parents are even more so. Indeed, when considering any, and all, of social, moral, behavioral and academic development, the researchers determine that parental influence is profound. Indeed, it exceeds the weight of the school's influence. As a testament to the incontrovertibility of this particular fact, it is readily admitted by schools, in addition to which, federal, state and local documents routinely begin by acknowledging that parents have the greatest influence on children's character development. Following the identification of the seminal role which parents play in character development within the context of early childhood education, the researchers embark upon a more detailed analysis of the complexities of character education. In brief, and as may be deduced from Berkowitz and Bier's (2005) discursive analysis, character education my be defined as a comprehensive school-based approach to the fostering of students' moral development. It is interesting to note here that even as they outline the centrality of parents to character development and quite effectively maintain that their influence far outweighs that of the school, the researchers define character development as a school-based approach. Rather than imply that the researchers are contradicting themselves, this is indicative of the complexity of the concept of character. Teachers recognize the complexity of character development in early childhood education and, accordingly, tend to welcome parental involvement. Certainly, the researchers do not claim that all educators immediately recognize the advantages, even imperatives, of parental involvement. They do argue, however, that it is quite possible to persuade educators of the complexity of character development, hence the importance of parental involvement, through simple exercises. One would be to ask educators to name their moral hero and then write down a list of his/her characteristics. The length and diversity of the lists subsequently generated evidence the complexity of character. Alternatively, educators could be asked to draw a composite picture of their favorite student. The richness and complexity of the resultant picture, once again, evidences the complexity of the concept of character. In other words, establishing the imperatives of parental involvement as a result of the complexity of character, is not a difficult task. Following the above stated, the researchers embark upon a more detailed analysis of the imperatives of parental involvement in early childhood education. Berkowitz and Bier (2005) are hardly alone in their insistence of the benefits of parental involvement as Henderson and Berla (1994) make the same point. Henderson and Berla (1994) identify parental involvement as the single most important predicator of student success in school. A host of researchers concur and list the benefits of parental involvement as all of improved academic performance, reduced absenteeism rates, greater academic motivation, improved behavior and lower dropout rates (Colker, n.d.; Henderson & Mapp, 2002; Jordan, Orozco, & Averett, 2001). Parents influence their child(ren)'s school outcomes through direct school involvement and, indeed, through a myriad of other ways and means which