Identity Theft: Why More Tech Use Biometric Technology to Protect their Customer

Technology may be advancing at a fast rate but that doesn’t mean that hackers are lagging. If anything, they’re always a step behind the latest security measures. This would explain the multiple data breaches that big companies such as Facebook and Yahoo faced in the past.

No matter how secure you think your network is, there is always that one loophole that criminals go through to compromise everything. This is why more tech organizations are employing biometric technology to protect their data.

Biometric technology uses human characteristics such as fingerprints, iris patterns, facial features, voice frequency, and even hand vein patterns to identify a person. Of course, we’re not yet at that stage where companies are collecting DNA samples to authenticate people but it won’t be long before these methods will become the norm for highly confidential transactions.

For tech companies, fingerprints and facial patterns are often enough. They have proven to be highly secure compared to other methods of authentication. Here are more reasons why biometric technology is slowly being adopted by these companies:

1. It’s Easy to Maintain

It can be a huge undertaking to have all customers switch to biometric identification. Depending on what characteristics are collected, it may take months or a year to get everyone on board. However, once it’s fully implemented, verifying for future transactions becomes easy. Companies can enjoy peace of mind knowing that their customers are getting things done without compromising their information. 

On the customer’s part, they become more receptive to adapting to the technology knowing that the benefits outweigh the obstacles. It saves them from the hassle of memorizing passwords, and they get to enjoy the same peace of mind that companies have due to the increased security.

2. Existing Identification Methods Are Weak

The old method of maintaining usernames and passwords simply just won’t do anymore. Fraudsters can simply hack into a system and get the whole companies’ database of customer credentials and use that information as they please. 

Even if an organization has high security, it cannot protect its vulnerable customers from phishing scams. These fake websites, emails, and notifications can look so legitimate to the user’s eye that it’s easy to steal their usernames and passwords and get into their accounts.

With biometrics, the chances of getting hacked are low since data used to verify the person cannot be replicated. The most sophisticated biometrics don’t just look at the fingerprints, it can even detect heat and pulse to further ensure that the right person is authenticating themselves.

3. Biometrics As An Added Security Layer

Biometric authentification helps combat fraud but it doesn’t have to be the only form of verification that companies use. The best ones use several methods to ensure that the right person is accessing their data.

For example, we now have multi-factor authentication which asks for biometric data along with a real-time code, and an answer to a security question. When people get used to biometrics, they have the tendency to become complacent with their data. But the multi-layered verification can serve as a good reminder that you can never be too secure.

4. Biometrics Is Useful to Many Industries

Tech companies aren’t the only ones reaping the benefits of biometric technology. So are other industries such as healthcare, law enforcement, finance, and education. These institutions are just as vulnerable to data hacks with losses that can amount to millions, if not, billions. 

Because there is a common interest for better security, we can expect that more people invest their time, resources, and money to ensure that we have robust biometric security. We may be enjoying better data protection with our current biometric technology but there is still lots of room for improvement. 

What do you think of the use of your biometric characteristics to protect your identity? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

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