A palmprint cryptosystem

Abstract

Traditional cryptosystems are based on passwords, which can be cracked (simple ones) or forgotten (complex ones). This paper proposes a novel cryptosystem based on palmprints. This system directly uses the palmprint as a key to encrypt/decrypt information. The information of a palmprint is so complex that it is very difficult, if not impossible, to crack the system while it need not remember anything to use the system. In the encrypting phase, a 1024 bits binary string is extracted from the palmprints using differential operations. Then the string is translated to a 128 bits encrypting key using a Hash function, and at the same time, an error-correct-code (ECC) is generated. Some general encryption algorithms use the 128 bits encrypting key to encrypt the secret information. In decrypting phase, the 1024 bits binary string extracted from the input palmprint is first corrected using the ECC Then the corrected string is translated to a decrypting key using the same Hash function. Finally, the corresponding general decryption algorithms use decrypting key to decrypt the information. The experimental results show that the accuracy and security of this system can meet the requirement of most applications. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007.