Contemporary Universal Personal Identifiers
Last week we talked about using potential future techniques for identifying an individual in a universally unique fashion basing a numerical hash key off of some sort of DNA identifier. While this is not a currently available technology there are a lot of biometric systems being used today.
Eye scans and skin prints of different kinds are used by different organizations for different purposes. There have been experiments of embedding magnetic or Radio Frequency identifiers under the skin in limited situations.
It seems to me that if prints or retina scans are accurate enough and secure enough that they would be preferred over other techniques in that they are very difficult to counterfeit. Moreover, invasive techniques, no matter how small, are going to be difficult to get societies to embrace.
Also, embedded items require some authority outside of the individual to designate a unique identifier. Physical characteristics that can’t be duplicated that follow a person wherever they go seems like a more secure universal indicator.
What are you seeing used in your systems, and what are the roadblocks to universal adoption? Get into the conversation below, or send your thoughts in email to btaylor@sswug.org.
Cheers,
Ben