[Beowulf] Re: Secure authentication (Was: "hobbyists"es)

[Leif Nixon]

"malcolm croucher" <malcolm.croucher at gmail.com> writes:

> What about fingerprint readers ..... My brothers got one on his lap top ....
> very small , neat and it must work quite well becuase i have tried to use it
> but can never log on .

Lift his fingerprint from one of the keys on his keyboard, etch it
onto a PCB and use that as a matrix for a gelatin fake fingerprint.

Or, for some sensors, just print an image of the fingerprint, lick the
paper and press it to the sensor.

Fingerprint readers suck.

Anyway, deploying fancy biometrics stuff is normally only possible if
you have control over the users' client hardware. This is often not
the case in an academic setting, where you have lots of users working
in loose collaborations between sites and departments.

-- 
Leif Nixon                       -            Systems expert
------------------------------------------------------------
National Supercomputer Centre    -      Linkoping University
------------------------------------------------------------