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Fingerprint ID - a cardless future? LIS 2000
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For me the star of this year's show was tucked away in a small booth - Micro Librarian - in a
remote part of the hall - visited only by school librarians. I was checking out the PC based system for the sake of completeness on the new product finder feature. One of the demo PCs had a
small device attached - something called Identikit. Looking a bit like an upside down CCD scanner, it has a small oval window and is connected via the USB port to the PC. This innocuous
looking device could well herald a revolution in identifying patrons - it reads fingerprints and calls up the patron details on screen ready for circulation to begin.
My first thought was - OK I've heard about fingerprint ID but can this be ready for serious use in a library? Well the
answer appears to be yes and this is the first (unless you know better) system to demonstrate it. Using it really is simple. Stage one is registering the user details like name
address etc. Stage two is to place the finger on the reader for a moment whilst the finger is scanned. This is done 4 times to get an average reading. This done, the fingerprint
is saved and added to the patron record with a couple of clicks. That is all there is to it. At the circulation desk the patron merely touches the scanner window, the print is
identified and the patron record retrieved and the item barcode is ready to be read. I tried to beat the machine by putting my finger on upside down, sideways etc. - it never
failed to read correctly. I was impressed.
In both academic and public libraries, this technology could solve many problems of lost tickets,
forged tickets, forgotten tickets and so on. Implications for access control and other places where a conventional barcode or magnetic ID are required can easily be imagined.
An interesting point is the data protection issue - the potential misuse of an individual’s fingerprint
pattern being stored is enormous. The system does not store the print - merely a key derived from it and the print cannot be derived from the key so making the system totally secure. The
UK’s Data Protection Agency has unofficially approved the technology from this point of view.
The technology is not expensive - about £295 ($442) for the scanner - but the key is in the
software developed by Micro Librarian Systems that decodes the bit map into a consistent key which is then looked up on the database. Up until now, fingerprint technology has been seen as a
security device for logging on to networks and similar functions. Identikit brings the concept into the customer ID world where price and speed are problems.
The system has been packaged and can be supplied on an OEM basis and in theory could be
added to any vendor’s system. Scalability to the larger library will need to be investigated, but the technology certainly deserves a close look. Currently, Identikit has been trialled successfully for
over 4 months at a UK school where it has been 100% successful. Micro Librarian are seeking to license the technology and would welcome approaches from any library systems vendor
If you are interested in knowing more, contact John O’Brien Micro Librarian Systems, Priory
house, Ellesmere Avenue, Marple, Stockport, United Kingdom SK6 7AN. Tel/Fax 0161-449-9357: email info@microlib.demon.co.uk. web: www.microlib.co.uk
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