Mission Impossible?

    When I was a kid in the 1960's I loved the TV series Mission: Impossible. Characters in the show regularly employed very realistic latex masks as disguises and a variety of low tech means to thwart high tech systems. So it is with interest that I note various news outlets reporting now that using fingerprint scans for id is not reliable. Up til now, fingerprints have been said to be a secure method of identification but now not so sure.......
    I also did a search on latex masks. One of the top results is a company that advertises that their latex masks are of the same quality as those in Hollywood movies. Not sure if that is Mission: Impossible quality but it does make me wonder about just how anonymous someone can be - for good or bad purposes. And it definitely brings up issues of someone actually impersonating another person.
   From The Washington Post -

Why fingerprints scans may not be the future of digital verification

By Andrea Peterson December 29, 2014

Fingerprint scanners are becoming increasingly mainstream -- they even come built-in many Apple devices.
But researchers are finding ways to spoof biometric ID methods, and they come with their own set of privacy and security drawbacks.
Biometrics researcher Jan Krisller demonstrated how he spoofed a politician’s fingerprint using just a high definition photo at a conference held by the Chaos Computer Club in Germany this weekend. Krisller, who also goes by "Starbug," and the group previously showed off a way to spoof Apple's Touch ID system by creating a fake finger modeled off a fingerprint left on a glass surface.
One key problem with biometrics is that they are permanent.
The much maligned password is less secure than using a unique biological marker to identify yourself, but it can be changed if it is leaked or compromised in some way. Your fingerprints, on the other hand, are yours forever.
And the immutable nature of the fingerprints becomes even more concerning when you consider how public they can be. You leave prints out in the world just going through your day -- and Krisller shows data needed to fake the prints can also be captured remotely without direct contact.
"Biometrics are not secrets," American Civil Liberties Union analyst Jay Stanley explained to The Washington Post earlier this year.
As fingerprint scanners become more and more common, they are also raising legal questions. At least one court has ruled that police could compel a suspect to give up his fingerprint, but not his passcode, in order to unlock and search his cellphone.


Andrea Peterson covers technology policy for The Washington Post, with an emphasis on cybersecurity, consumer privacy, transparency, surveillance and open government.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2014/12/29/why-fingerprints-scans-may-not-be-the-future-of-digital-verification/?hpid=z19