Image Compression Impact on Iris Recognition

Abstract

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) specifies iris biometric data to be recorded and stored in (raw) image form (ISO/IEC 19794-6), rather than in extracted templates (e.g., iris-codes). On the one hand, such deployments benefit from future improvements (e.g., in feature extraction stage) which can be easily incorporated (except sensor improvements), without reenrollment of registered users. On the other hand, since biometric templates may depend on patent-registered algorithms, databases of raw images enable more interoperability and vendor neutrality [121]. Furthermore, the application of low-powered mobile sensors for image acquisition, e.g., mobile phones, raises the need for reducing the amount of transmitted data. These facts motivate detailed investigations of the effect of image compression on iris biometrics in order to provide an efficient storage and rapid transmission of biometric records.