IBIA working to help Congress craft beneficial biometric legislation

Jul 1, 1999 12:00 PM, George Partington

The International Biometric Industry Association (IBIA), formed last yearto give the industry a voice in legislative matters, is fulfilling itscharter. The group is working to ensure a proposed law does not excludesome biometric technologies.

A house subcommittee is crafting a bill to regulate the use of biometricsas a means to authenticate documents in electronic commerce. It is calledthe Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act. It isdesignated H.R. 1714 and known as E-SIGN. The problem, according to RichardNorton, IBIA executive director, is "the bill had general language definingelectronic signature and digital signature, and nobody knows what thatmeans."

In testimony before the Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade andConsumer Protection of the Committee on Commerce of the U.S. House ofRepresentatives, John E. Siedlarz, vice chairman of the IBIA and presidentand CEO of IriScan Inc., urged Congress to adopt language that would namebiometrics explicitly. Siedlarz asked the bill's sponsors to amend aprovision that narrowly defines an "electronic signature" as a "signaturein electronic form." Instead, the IBIA recommends a definition that wouldspecifically authorize the use of biometrics as electronic signatures. Suchbiometric "signatures" include identifiers such as the iris, hand geometry,fingerprint, voice and face.

In practice, a biometric would be a part of a record that is stored in thedevice or stored in the system database. When a user attempts to authorizeor authenticate a document, the system would check a live read against thedatabase to see if the person is who they say they are.

A successful bill will revolutionize banking and insurance and otherindustries that are dependent on authenticated signatures for transactions,says Norton. "You can automate your documents and make sure they areauthenticated by the person they pertain to without having to worry aboutforgery or fraud."

In his testimony, Siedlarz referred to the pending legislation as "anessential step toward automating cumbersome processes that can otherwisehinder trade and stifle economic growth."

Siedlarz noted that only a limited range of signature-based technologieswould be accommodated as the bill stands. "IBIA recommends atechnology-neutral definition in place of constricted wording that wouldunnecessarily restrict the market for biometric products, create acompetitive advantage for a small group of solutions, and freeze optionsfor substituting newer technologies as they are perfected," Siedlarz said.

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