Model for adaptable context-based biometric authentication for mobile devices

Abstract

It becomes possible to take advantage of seamless biometric authentication on mobile devices due to increasing quality and quantity of built-in sensors, increasing processing power of the devices, and wireless connectivity. However, practical effectiveness of the biometric authentication application depends on user’s environment conditions that can decrease the accuracy of biometrics recognition or make the acquisition process undesirable for mobile user in a given moment, i.e., effectiveness depends on usage context. In this paper, context-based biometric authentication model for mobile devices is proposed. It enables determining the most accurate authentication method at the moment along with the most accurate form of interacting with a user w.r.t. authentication process. The generic model designed and verified with proof-of-concept implementation constitutes a foundation for building further adaptable and extensible multi-factor context-dependent systems for mobile authentication.