Pictet Bank, one of the largest Swiss banks, is using biometrics to identify it’s customers to give more security. Oki Electric Industry is installing their iris scanning cameras. The system itself was developed by Inetrflex SA, Ingersoll Rand Security Technologies, headquartered in Lonay, Switzerland.

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Leave it to Japan to be the first country to have this cool gadget, and thank them for using it on food so we can talk about it here. McDonald’s is now placing codes on the packaging of many foods so that eaters can scan the package with their cell phones and find out the nutritional information.

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As if its insanely coordinated logistics system, biometric payment system, and (potential) RFID* shelving weren’t eerie enough, America’s largest retailer is taking consumer voyeurism one step further with the use of infrared technology. In an apparent attempt to avoid the taboo “RFID” flavor of intrusion, Wal-Mart is hoping to sneak an IR system into its stores to gauge the effectiveness (and elicit more advertising dollars, of course) of its various promotions. Dubbed Prism, the arguably dodgy system was crafted by Coca-Cola, Kelloggs, Kroger, Procter & Gamble, Walgreens, and Disney in order to “track shoppers’ movements around the store” and correlate them with actual sales in order to judge display effectiveness. The consortium of firms has coaxed the corporate giant to install a trial system in ten of its SuperCenters, with a much broader rollout expected to follow soon; so when making that mad dash to the Tickle Me Elmo eXtreme (or bathroom supplies) section, just remember that Big Brother could be keenly watching.

original article

When a parent arrives to pick up her child at one of three grade schools in the Freehold Borough School District, she’ll need to look into a camera that will take a digital image of her iris. That photo will establish positive identification to gain entrance into the school.

Funding for the project, more than $369,000, was made possibly by a school safety grant through the National Institute of Justice, a research branch of the U.S. Department of Justice. …

The platform provides entry-access controls, visitor management, and the capability to scan a driver’s license from any state and automatically import the information into the database. “The file size created when the camera takes a picture of the iris to match it against records in the database is about 512 kilobytes,” said Raymond Bolling, co-founder of Eyemetric Identity Systems, a spin off of New Jersey Business Systems Inc., which specializes in biometric identification.

Original Article

A Computing & Information Science Professor from Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada, has developed an-eye tracking device that is set to revolutionise current billboard and screen advertising sales models, and has the potential to pave the way for a future where personalised ads are pitched direct to individuals.

The portable device, dubbed the eyebox2, can be attached to public area advertisements and uses a camera that monitors eye movements in real time to automatically detect when people are looking at it from up to 10 meters away and at a horizontal range of 2-3 meters.

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Biometrics are the rage today. You can use your fingerprints to secure your data, to enter your home and, of course, to access your computer. There are fingerprint readers on mice, keyboards and you can buy them as stand-alone devices too.

But fingerprint scanners are just not ‘in’ anymore. The trend is pointing towards iris or retinal scanners. A Korean company called Qritek have created an affordable iris scanner, and have decided to stuff it in a mouse.

Original Article