Are you dislike carrying a jangling bunch of keys like a jailer wherever you go outside? Imagine how calm it would be when you could lock your door a couple of seconds by simple looking at the camera. Iris scanning technology could make this luxury possible very soon. Although, it has already used in military bases and airports. And, peoples introduce themselves very quickly, because a reliable identification of everyone is much important at these places. Iris scanning is the most accurate technology among all types of biometrics. In biometrics, peoples identify the person by checking based on the sophisticated measurements of body parts. Iris is also much effective form of identification than fingerprinting that can wear out in time and DNA profiling that cannot perform instantly. To know more about what are iris scans, and how does it work? Take a closer look!
What makes an iris scan unique?
An iris is the ring of muscle that has colour pigment. It functions is to open and shut the eye pupil like a camera shutter. The great thing is that you can determine the colour pattern of someone irises genetically when they are in the womb. However, it does not fully form until two years old. The colour of iris depends on a pigment known as melanin. It means more melanin production results in the browner eyes and less melanin production results in the bluer eyes. In certainty, the pattern and the colour of people eyes are very composite and unique. We talk about the iris patterns of every people, whether they have green eyes, grey eyes, blue eyes, brown eyes, or they are genetically identical twins. Besides this, the iris patterns of the two eyes of a person are also quite different from one another have.
How does iris scanning work in practice?
Iris scanning works by identifying the unique pattern of an individual eye. After that, you can positively identify specifically that person. It means an iris-scanning system has two different stages. The first stage is enrollment. It examines your iris pattern to recognize you next time when you use this system the first time. The second stage is the verification or recognition that requires to check you on subsequent occasions.
- Enrollment
At first, the eyes scanned pattern of a particular person has to identify in a couple of minutes. This one-off step is known as enrollment. In this step, the enrolling person needs to stand in front of a camera so that it can easily focus his eye. And then camera digitally photographs his both the eyes one by one with both ordinary lights as well as invisible infrared.
An infrared is a part of electromagnetic light having a longer wavelength than ordinary red light. It uses in a night vision camera. In recognition of iris patterns, infrared light helps to identify the unique traits of people dark-coloured eyes. However, you cannot see these pattern clearly in ordinary light.
Once the digital photographs are obtained, it is analyzed by the computer. The analyzers remove all the unnecessary details, such as eyelashes during the analysis. They identified over 240 unique features of eyes. That is why iris scanning considers as about five times more efficient than the fingerprint systems. These 240 features are unique and vary from person to person. After that, the computer records a 512-digit number code, known as an IrisCode®. It also records the name of the person and other important details along with the IrisCode® in a computer database.
- Verification
Once a person has enrolled in the system, now it is usual to check his identification. Next time he needs to stand in front of an iris scanner at the working area, home, mall and other high profile areas. The scanner will scan his eyes to take the images. Now the iris scanning system will quickly process the photograph and extract the IrisCode®. After getting the IrisCode®, the system will compare them against the millions of peoples enrolled in this database. If the code match to any of the enrolled people, the person will positively be identified by the computer. If it will not, it either means the person is not who he claim to be, or he is unknown to the system.
Advantages and disadvantages of iris scanning
One of the most numerous advantages of the iris scanning system is reliability and accuracy. It has ported, this system is at least ten times more accurate than the fingerprinting. According to Britain National Physical Laboratory studied in 2003, the iris scanning system claimed to produce only 1 in 1 to 2 million of false matches as compared to the fingerprinting system that gives approximately 1 in 100,000 false reports.
SRI, who is the developer of this technology, claims that the system can be 1,000 times more accurate than others. Another reason for the drawback of fingerprinting is that the fingerprints are susceptible to damage and continually exposed. On the other hand, the iris of the eyes is naturally protected by the transparent front coating known as the cornea. Thus, the iris pattern seems to remain unchanged for decades the person is not alive.
Iris scanning process is much safer and hygienic performing at some distance from the person’s eye. Whereas, the fingerprint scanning need direct contact of the person’s hand and does not provide a spotlessly clean fingerprint.
Among all the drawbacks of iris scanning, one common disadvantage is the higher initial cost. Another fact is that this technology is still relatively less familiar technology. Additionally, some trials of this system have found a greater rate of false matches of the iris photographs than they formerly claimed.
Furthermore, as we already mentioned, it does not fully develop until the two years of age. Therefore, iris scanning works remarkably less accurate with very young aged children, such as ages from 1 to 4 years than with adults. However, it can work with every people of all ages. According to the Civil liberties campaigners, there is also voice privacy concerns. It means in future iris scanning technology will be too advanced. it will allow the people to track a person at a distance of some meters without their cooperation or knowledge.