Continuous user identity verification for trusted operators in control rooms

Abstract

Human operators in control rooms are often responsible of issuing critical commands, and in charge of managing sensitive data. Insiders must be prevented to operate on the system: they may benefit of their position in the control room to fool colleagues, and gain access to machines or accounts. This paper proposes an authentication system for deterring and detecting malicious access to the workstations of control rooms. Specifically tailored for the operators in the control room of the crisis management system Secure!, the solution aims to guarantee authentication and non-repudiation of operators, reducing the risk that unauthorized personnel (including intruders) misuses a workstation. A continuous multi-biometric authentication mechanism is developed and applied in which biometric data is acquired transparently from the operator and verified continuously through time. This paper presents the authentication system design and prototype, its execution and experimental results.