Hardware That Recognizes You

Amit Upadhyay writes "Gizmodo is reporting about extra funding for smart guns at NJIT. Few have qualms about it, mostly on the line of: would optical sensor for finger prints work when the hand is soaked with blood? Would you get time to enter the override code in an emergency? But if we remove speculative emergency situations, the technology seems to be interesting. While checking out Fingkey Hamster what struck me was, this is one passkey I will not mind publishing on my webpage, and it can't be cracked, unless hardware tampering takes place. Kind of thing that you can put in all the car ignitions and lockers where password entry using keyboard can become too obtrusive."

Comments

The problem with biometrics

[Control Group]

The problem with biometric security is always the same: once it's hacked, you're Screwed(tm) (that's a security-industry technical term).

Given that nothing is unbreakable/unhackable/unspoofable, the real danger is putting into widespread use something that people believe to be unbreakable/unhackable/unspoofable. When you go to court because your gun was used in a shooting, everyone will "know" that you did it, since "no one else can fire the gun." Except we all know that no system is perfect, and someone else could have.

Just as bad is the case of identity theft; the more that biometrics become used to verify identity, the more vulnerable you are to having your identity easily stolen. After all, it's perfectly reliable, so there don't need to be any other checks. The fingerprint/retina scan/brainwave pattern says the person is you, therefore s/he is. Even worse, once your identity has been suborned in this fashion, you can't get it back, since you can't change it.

You can potentially address this by adding something like a PIN or password into the system, but that loses both the supposed benefits of the biometric identification and simply shifts the burden of security back where it's always been: remembering a unique piece of information that no one else has.

Re:The problem with biometrics

[merphle]

You can potentially address this by adding something like a PIN or password into the system, but that loses both the supposed benefits of the biometric identification and simply shifts the burden of security back where it's always been: remembering a unique piece of information that no one else has.

There are three forms of authentication.

• Something you have (ID card)
• Something you know (PIN)
• Something you are (Fingerprint)

From what I've read (Google the above terms, plus "authentication"), most people consider authentication based on any one of those insufficient. Authentication based on two of the above is generally sufficient, and based on all three is ideal.

Re:The problem with biometrics

[B'Trey]

Horsefeathers, poppycock and fiddlesticks. Claptrap, horse puckey and bullshit. If someone breaks into my house, I have no way of knowing whether he's merely threatening my property or is a threat to harm or kill me and my family as well. I have every right to assume that he's armed and dangerous, and will use a weapon if he perceives he's threatened. I'm goint to do my best to hit him before he know's he's been busted and to hit him hard enough that he can't hit back. If I have a gun to hand, I'm going to shoot and shoot to kill. If I don't have a gun to hand, I'm going to try to cave his head in with a baseball bat or whatever else I can find.

Of course, a great deal of it depends on the situation. If I'm not sure that I can get the drop on him, then I'll reevaluate the situation and determine what to do next. If he realizes he's been spotted and is running away, your viewpoint has some merit. He's demonstrated that he's no threat to me or mine. But breaking into my house is a violent act. He initiated the use of violence. I'm not going to be the tiniest bit concerned for the value of his life so long as I feel he's a threat to me or my family, and I'm going to assume he's a threat until he proves otherwise.

And when you're carjacked

[mdudzik]

You don't get thrown out into the cold night. At least not all of you.

Ring lock

[RandoX]

Another interesting option for firearms is a ring lock. It uses a magnetic ring to unlock the firearm, which keeps the weapon from being taken during a struggle and used against the owner. Since the decline in popularity in magnetic media, unpleasant side effects of wearing a magnetic ring seem to be less of an issue.

Sounds like a great idea for cops, though.

Smart Holsters!

[Zobeid]

A few years ago, a prototype of a smart holster was shown -- it wouldn't let you draw the gun from it unless it recognized your fingerprints. Although this wasn't perfect, it seemed very promising, and it seems like an idea that many people would find more acceptable than smart guns.

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0BTT/is _151_25/ai_70380673

Smart guns conjure up a lot of fears from gun owners. There's a fear that "smart" technology might be required on new guns. There's a fear that they might be too expensive, or unreliable (batteries gone dead), or that it might be possible to disable them remotely with something like EMP. Don't laugh, it's already possible to stop many motor vehicles this way.

Smart holsters could provide practically all of the same benefits without all the associated fear.

Re:Over-engineered solution to a non-problem

[doppleganger871]

Yep. I'm sure there will be pleanty of illegal guns all over the streets of NJ... just as there are today. All this shit they do to with LAWS is meaningless unless CRIMINALS all decide to OBEY the LAW and ONLY use APPROVED guns to commit CRIMES.

"Oh Fuck, I have to reboot my gun before I can defend myself!"

Bad, bad idea

[Kohath]

No serious gun owner would want this. No police officer would ever use this. When you need your gun to fire, it has to work. There's no room for error.

A lot of serious gun owners won't even use handguns with a safety. Because if the safety is on in the fraction of a second you it to work, you're dead.

As DNA put it:

[gidds]

(meaning the late and much-lamented Douglas Adams, not his or anyone else's deoxyribonucleic acid):

"The major difference between a thing that might go wrong and a thing that cannot possibly go wrong is that when a thing that cannot possibly go wrong goes wrong it usually turns out to be impossible to get at or repair."

He was talking about devices such as air-conditioning systems, but I think the principle applies here just as much.

Re: "..people *with* guns kill people..."

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Guns don't kill people, people *with* guns kill people
Maybe so but they make people pretty damned effective at it. As for the other choices, well, they are pretty poor

Take a look at the statistics for assault in great britain. Guns simply shift power. Instead of the biggest, strongest, most aggressive, longest armed person, survival goes to the fastest, most accurate, most cool-headed person.

As to your other points, knives are often the choice of a professional killer because they are quiet, concealable, and frightening. Bows can be fired bloody fast and guns require just as much skill to hit anything. Fists and bricks and chairs and everything else can be used to kill people, and often are. Why don't you look to why people are killing each other rather than what they are using?

California recently banned .50 caliber breech loading rifles. These rifles are very high power, long range, and effective. This will stop exactly zero crimes. Why? Because this type of gun has never been used in a violent crime in the U.S. The only crime it has been used in was vandalism (shooting signs). The reason for this is simple, people who own guns costing more than a thousand dollars, don't generally commit violent crimes. That is because violent crime is usually committed out of desperation by poor, angry, young people (usually men). I'm not stereotyping, those are the recorded statistics. Passing more laws that say people can't use things/have things/do things that enable them to break other laws don't work. If they are already desperate enough to break the law, they won't care if they are breaking two or three or four laws. That is just paperwork on how long the police can lock them up. These laws do, however, take rights away from non-criminals, important rights, like the ability to defend oneself.