Biometrics firm eTrue has launched an online service that uses face and fingerprint recognition technology to let computer users gain access to corporate networks and the Internet.
The first customer for eTrue’s biometric authentication service is the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which will require employees to use biometrics to log on to the space agency’s computer network from home.
Southborough, Mass.-based eTrue, formerly called Miros Inc., offers its face and fingerprint recognition technology as an outsourced, online service. It provides client businesses with video cameras and fingerprint readers to be distributed to computer users on the network.
The company received $4.5 million in first-round venture funding in July. Additional customers are in the process of signing contracts with to use the service, eTrue said.
The service lets computer users bypass the bevy of online sign-on passwords, PINs and other security features typically used to gain access to corporate networks. Instead, the technology looks for authentication from something that, in theory, can’t be defrauded.
By using technology to recognize a user’s face or fingerprints, the service guarantees 100 percent user authentication, the company claims.
eTrue is targeting banks, brokerages, insurance companies, hospitals and government agencies as being prime candidates to employ the system — any business whose network gives users access to high value transactions or data.
“Unlike passwords, unregistered users will think twice before trying to logon, since they will have their biometric identities recorded,” the company states. Every time someone tries to access the network, the visits are logged for reports and future audits, the company says.
“With this launch, eTrue is bringing biometric logon to e-businesses over the Internet,” said David Teitelman, eTrue president and CEO. “With no PINs, passwords, cards, keys or tokens to lose or forget, there is nothing to hack or steal. Logon for users and network administrators will be greatly simplified.”
