HID Global®, a worldwide leader in secure identity solutions, today announced that it has integrated the company’s Lumidigm® biometrics technology with its widely deployed OMNIKEY® contactless smart card readers to simplify identity validation for citizen ID and many financial, healthcare and other commercial applications.  With the Lumidigm® V-Series V371 fingerprint reader, program administrators can verify users’ identities by having them present a card, fingerprint or both to the reader. The solution is designed to streamline enrolment and transactions while preventing the use of fake fingerprints.

“As the first HID Global offering to integrate Lumidigm technology, the V371 reader brings the best available fingerprint biometric performance to contactless reader applications where knowing your customer is of utmost importance,” said Paul Butler, vice president and general manager of the biometrics business at HID Global.  “The V371 streamlines cardholder access and eliminates fraud from shared or stolen ID cards. Other anti-counterfeit methods have been used to combat card fraud, but only the V371 ensures authenticated users are the same people that were issued the cards.”

Originally designed for a national citizen ID programme, the V371 is a perfect tool for any identity verification application where individuals enrol their fingerprint information onto a contactless card.  Validation is accomplished by matching the individual’s fingerprint with his or her biometric data that was written to the card during enrolment.  Applications include:

-        Citizen ID:  Provides a simple way to prove the identity of citizens when crossing borders, voting, and receiving financial, healthcare and other government benefits through public distribution programmes.  A biometric national ID card is all that is required to validate a trusted identity, replacing the old process of using an ID book, passport and/or utility bills.  

-        Healthcare services: Includes validating identity for patient registration, e-prescribing and benefit eligibility.

-        Financial services and other commercial transactions: Solves challenges of authenticating high-value financial services transactions and account access.  It also can be used for gym membership, phone SIM card registration, customer loyalty programmes and more, enabling businesses to validate a person’s true identity prior to offering a service.  

Typically, card-and-fingerprint readers require two hands during use -- one to hold the card and the other to present a fingerprint for image capture.  The company’s Lumidigm V371 reader eliminates this inconvenience with a cradle that holds the card and also provides LED feedback during use to ensure proper card placement.  Performance is further improved with Lumidigm multispectral imaging technology, which ensures clear, clean fingerprint images even when skin features are absent or hard to distinguish due to age, dirt, finger pressure and/or skin or environmental conditions.  This technology also protects against fake fingerprints by using patented liveness detection capabilities that, similar to anti-virus software, can be regularly updated in the field as new threats are identified.