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Biometric Voice Recognition Credit Cards

Posted by timothy on from the all-others-pay-cash dept.

securitas writes "New Scientist's Celeste Biever reports on the latest in biometric security devices: voice recognition credit cards. The device is three times the size of a normal credit card, has a 'microphone, a loudspeaker, a battery and a voice-recognition chip' and is intended to help reduce credit card fraud. The owner speaks a password into the card and the card emits an authentication squawk. Bruce Schneier loves the concept of BeepCard's related sound authentication technology. Other articles at the Telegraph and The Register."

3 of 122 comments (clear)

  1. Re:3x the size!?! by FrYGuY101 · · Score: 3, Informative
    From the Article:
    They are not quite there yet: the card is the length and width of an ordinary credit card, but it is still about three times as thick. Alan Sege, Beepcard's CEO, says the company now plans to use smaller chips to slim it down to normal thickness
    That's pretty reasonable to me...
    --
    "If we let things terrify us, life will not be worth living."

    - Seneca
  2. How does it work? by Xeo+024 · · Score: 5, Informative
    Domain Dynamics is raising the level of security of smart cards by adding voice authenticators that prevent the card from being used by anyone except the approved cardholder.

    Smart cards are similar to credit cards and serve the same purpose, but they have a completely different data storage system. Instead of using a magnetic strip to store the user's information, smart cards feature an embedded 8-bit microprocessor with up to 16 kilobytes of programmable-only memory. Smart cards have only recently began to gain popularity in the United States, despite their widespread use in Europe for years.

    Domain Dynamics' new TESPAR voice authenticator stores three samples of the user's voice on a template within the Java-based smart card. When users want to make a transaction, they simply enter the card into a terminal at a store and give a speech sample. The card then matches the spoken voice to the recorded voice samples, a process that takes a fraction of the second. The company said that TESPAR is able to handle day-to-day variations in the user's voice and can ignore background noise.

    Read more here.

  3. Re:My voice is my password by bob|hm · · Score: 3, Informative

    Dude if you're going to quote it, get it right:

    My voice is my passport, verify me.

    Sneakers rocks.
    --Bob