Whose to Blame for UK Biometric Border Debacle?

The latest on the UK border debacle is a classic  case of “he said, she said”

UK border chief Brodie Clark quits over passport scandal with broadside against Theresa May

Brodie Clark, the senior civil servant at the heart of the scandal over relaxed passport checks, has made a direct attack on Theresa May, accusing the Home Secretary of misleading the public.

His resignation and attack on Mrs May escalates the most serious immigration row the Coalition has faced.

Over the summer, (Mrs May) secretly authorised border staff to stop checking biometric data in the passports of European arrivals at ports and airports. She says Mr Clark then defied her clear orders and extended the policy to non-Europeans.

Regardless of how this all washes out, whose at fault, and who actually takes the blame, the failure to complete biometric ePassport checks at the UK border is just bad news for biometrics at the border.

“Secure border” programs are consistently attacked  in many locations as  excessively expensive while providing minimal if any improvement in security. The  senstiive nature of  data related to these programs precludes most countries in most cases from releasing performance statistics. So, the only public relations are the fiasco stories aka the current UK border debacle feeding the fire of those with legitimate concerns about the cost benefit implications of identification programs.

Sadly, as we have seen many times in our industry, it is not the biometric or other identification technology that is at fault, but rather poorly designed, implemented, or managed ID programs that fail us.

Sprinting towards 1.2 billion

The latest from India presented both by Daon’s Cathy Tilton at last weeks BCC in Tampa and reported in the news is that

One year after launching the gigantic enrollment process, 37 million people have been issued biometric identity numbers. 60 million others have enrolled and will be given the numbers shortly. And starting next month, one million people are expected to register every day for the biometric ID.

While I appreciate the optimism expressed, 37 million ( or even 97 million if enrolled but not issued are included), this is a far cry from 1.2 billion. It is not just the challenge of maintaining a consistent level of 1 million “quality” enrollments a day for nearly three years non-stop that gives me pause.  Or successfully performing the unprecedented number of  biometric matches required to de-duplicate this data. It the inevitable “breakdowns” that occur within any IT system that relies on exponentially growing databases of this size.

An IT system can hum along and then reach certain data levels at which things just break. Maybe it is 200 million, or 500 million, or 1 billion. Or all three. It could be something simple requiring a relatively quick software fix. Or it could be a substantial flaw requiring significant system reengineering.

This type of inevitable system issue is easily exacerbated by the demands of  biometrics. There is no model for a  biometric database of this magnitude. What if half way through the process, a quality issue arises that limits the ability to successfully continue to complete biometric comparisons?  What if natural limits on biometric differentiation emerge?

While I do believe that biometric identification is inevitable in India and ultimately globally, the UID biometric system is based on untested theory so it might be prudent to temper enthusiasm for this mammoth undertaking. The harsh lessons learned from global industry experience  with delayed, severely delayed, or even failed biometic ID programs ought to provide a healthy dose of skepticism. 3 years to build a reliable, de-duplicated  database of high enough quality to ensure expected outcomes for more than 1 billion people is a sprint where clearly a  marathon is in order.

“It’s the Data, Stupid”

Wondering about the “Future of Biometrics”?  It is all about the data. At least if you look where IBM is placing its bets.

The news that IBM is buying Algorithmics for $387 million is yet another deal by Big Blue that enhances its analytical, risk management and financial expertise.

Over the last five years, IBM has spent more than $14 billion on 25 acquisitions focused on analytics to help its customers deal with “exponentially growing amounts of unstructured data from sources such as social media, biometrics and criminal databases,” notes Reuters. On Wednesday, IBM announced it will buy British security analytics software firm i2 for an undisclosed sum.

Organizing, integrating  and making sense of  ”exponentially growing amounts of unstructured data” will continue to drive IT development for the foreseeable future.  In the biometrics realm, we are in the  very early stages of trying to figure this all out.

Imagine the complexity as millions, perhaps hundreds of millions, of government, commercial, and even personal interactions and transactions are biometrically enabled over the next five years. A daunting, yet inspiring prospect.

National eID Marketplace

Acuity’s latest research report “The Global National eID Industry Report” is out and the findings – while not unexpected – shed some interesting light on the marketplace.

Global revenues are projected to reach more than $11 billion by 2013,  and while this number will fluctuate a bit based on program launches and deployment surges, Acuity believes this to be a sustainable market value.

While the number of countries with some form of National ID program is projected to increase 11% from 126 to 140 from 2010 to 2015, the number of countries with National eID programs will grow from 67 to 114, an increase of 70% over the forecast period.  This dramatic shift from National IDs to National eIDs characterizes the overall adoption pattern of the National eID market.

These adoption numbers vary significantly from the prepublication findings Acuity released earlier this year, that you may have seen on the website or presented at the SDW conference in April.  This is in part due to additional research and new announcements, but primarily due to an expansion of the definition of an “eID Program”.

Initially, for the purposes of the report, National eID programs were restricted to those issuing chip based cards. However, this excluded two key countries with programs in progress: India and Mexico. It seemed counterintuitive that these 2 critical countries did not qualify.

This led to a revised definition of an “eID Program” which includes 3 categories of programs: those that include a chip-based card and may or may not include biometrics, those that rely on biometrics but issue a non-chip based, or traditional card (Mexico), and the those programs that rely on centralized biometric registries (India).

The result is a lengthier report that includes more National eID countries (114) and reflects a more complex National eID ecosystem. More information and Previews are available at the Acuity website.

Mobility Rules on Steroids!

Anyone who cannot see the writing on the wall about where electronic identity is going, needs to have a look at this morning’s announcement from Google.

Google announced on Monday that it would acquire Motorola Mobility Holdings, the cellphone business that was split from Motorola, for $40 a share in cash, or $12.5 billion.

The offer — by far Google’s largest acquisition — represents a premium of 63 percent to the closing price of Motorola Mobility shares on Friday. Motorola is a Google Android partner.

Larry Page, CEO of Google, said in a statement: “Motorola Mobility’s total commitment to Android has created a natural fit for our two companies. Together, we will create amazing user experiences that supercharge the entire Android ecosystem for the benefit of consumers, partners and developers. I look forward to welcoming Motorolans to our family of Googlers.”

The competition to own the most important information and transaction platform of the 21st century is well underway and in spite of what I believe to be the financial service industry’s attempts to keep the telecom’s at bay e.g. the rapid rise and fall of ISIS (see AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile Developing Mobile Payment Platform and Wireless carriers cancel their plans for ISIS ), they will not succeed with the Googles of the world.

It is far more likely that internet generation companies like Google and eBay, or the next generation of such, or Apple which proven leadership in the arena of human machine interaction and has such once again redefined itself to be a leading edge tech innovator, will define and own electronic identity based platforms and the hefty revenue they will generate.

Let the games begin!