Creating safe and trusted social networks with biometric user authentication

Abstract

Many people are concerned about engaging in social networks or allowing their children to do so, because the anonymity and perceived lack of security puts them at risk of identity theft and of online contacts who misrepresent themselves, such as sexual predators and stalkers. Current password-based authentication neither adequately protects users' accounts from being compromised, nor helps people to trust that people they contact really are who they say they are. Strong multimodal biometric authentication, which can conclusively link a real person to a digital identity, prevents unauthorized account access and ensures that only the person who created the account can use it. At the same time, it offers an extra level of trust in the identity of other members, and provides a deterrent against potentially criminal abuse of social networks. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2010.