Parents give a hand at childcare center

May 1, 1998 12:00 PM, AC&SSI Staff

Lotus Development Corp., Cambridge, Mass., has an employee-friendly reputation. More than eight years ago, the Lotus Childcare Center was opened to care for employees' children and infants through pre-school, as well as children of parents not working for Lotus. At any given time, 68 children enjoy the center's many activities.

To gain entrance to the center, Lotus employees use their proximity cards, which Lotus calls "passcards." "However," says Judy Kilgore, the center's director, "our non-Lotus parents felt like only the Lotus parents counted. Plus, we needed a safe, reliable way to let them in."

To meet these objectives, the center installed a HandKey biometric hand geometry reader from Recognition Systems Inc., Campbell, Calif. When a parent's hand is placed within the reader, the HandKey looks at the three-dimensional size and shape of that hand. Checking more than 90 different hand measurements, including length, width, thickness and surface areas in less than a second, the HandKey verifies if the hand belongs to a parent enrolled in the program. If confirmed, the stand-alone system allows entrance to the center. "The hand reader works well, providing an extra barrier of protection for our children," says Kilgore.

IriScan's System 2100 is a Windows NT-based distributed-processing network with a host computer and enrollment imager (or reader). The basic system can connect up to 256 remote readers. The host computer allows enrolling and subsequent downloading of IrisCode files to the appropriate readers in the networked system. A loss of an entry point will not affectthe operations of the remaining entry points on the network, according to the Mt. Laurel, N.J.-based company. New features include password-protected user files and expanded file management capabilities. "Capture frame" enrollment isolates a single in-focus frame for processing and IrisCode generation. The system also includes multiple access levels by location, time, day of week, and temporary restrictions on access without deleting enrolled biometric templates. IriScan technology relies on processing images of the iris of the eye.

A user's fingerprint can be used as the ID credential for logging on to a computer running Windows 95 or 98 with SecureStart/98 from I/O Software, Riverside, Calif. The product includes the Puppy Secure Logon System software and a Sony Fingerprint Identification Unit. I/O Software says SecureStart/98 will work with other biometric devices yet to be announced.

No proprietary software is needed to run BioWare biometric identification system software on a modular, scaleable client/server, according to maker Unisys Corp., Bluebell, Pa. BioWare is composed of the following subsystems: host, search engine, enrollment workstation, fraud investigation workstation and administration workstation. A centralized host maintains the database and manages the identification requests. At the central site, all required system components are interconnected via a local-area network that also links remote workstations using standard communications.

Your face is your PC access credential with TrueFace PC, a face recognition system from Miros Inc., Wellesley, Mass., that uses a video camera to compare a previously stored image to a live video image of the user logging on to the computer. The software employs a graphic user interface and runs on the Windows operating system.

Control, monitor and audit PC and network access with a fingerprint identification unit from SAC Technologies Inc., Edina, Minn. Called SACcat, the device is used to limit to authorized users the ability to log on to PCs and local and remote networks. A screen-saver lockout secures a workstation when a user is away from his or her desk. The unit, similar in size and appearance to a PC mouse, uses high-resolution optics (more than 1,000 dpi) and patented imaging algorithms for accurate reads, says the company. SAC Technologies also produces Sac-Remote, which uses the fingerprint-identification-based technology for physical access control. Sac-Remote includes an LCD display, keypad, microphone, speaker, programmable I/O interfaces, network interfaces and a card-reader interface.

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