palm vein technology

Technical Paper Presentation On PALM VEIN TECHNOLOGY

Abstract: Palm vein technologies are one of the up coming technologies which is highly secure. It is the worlds first contactless personal identification system that uses the vein patterns in human palms to confirm a persons identity. It is highly secure because it uses information contained within the body and is also highly accurate because the pattern of veins in the palm is complex and unique to each individual. Moreover, its contact less feature gives it a hygienic advantage over other biometric authentication technologies. The palm secure works by capturing a persons vein pattern image while radiating it with nearinfrared rays. The PalmSecure detects the structure of the pattern of veins on the palm of the human hand with the utmost precision. The sensor emits a near-infrared beam towards the palm of the hand and the blood flowing through these back to the heart with reduced oxygen absorbs this radiation, causing the veins to appear as a black pattern. This pattern is recorded by the sensor and is stored in encrypted form in a database, on a token or on a smart card. Veins are internal in the body and have wealth of differentiating features, assuming false identity through forgery is extremely difficult, thereby enabling an extremely high level of security. The Palm Secure technology is designed in such a way that it can only detect the vein pattern of living people. The scanning process is extremely fast and does not involve any contact meaning that PalmSecure meets the stringent hygienic requirements that are normally necessary for use in public environments. The opportunities to implement palmsecure span a wide range of vertical markets, including security, financial/banking, healthcare, commercial enterprises and educational facilities. Applications for the device include physical admission into secured areas; log-in to PCs or server systems; access to POS , ATMs or kiosks; positive ID control; and other industry-specific applications. This paper also describes some examples of financial solutions and product applications for the general

market that have been developed based on this technology. Typically palm vein authentication

technology consists of a small palm vein scanner that's easy and natural to use, fast and highly accurate.

Introduction: In the ubiquitous network society, where individuals can easily access their information anytime and anywhere, people are also faced with the risk that others can easily access the same information anytime and anywhere. Because of this risk, personal identification technology, which can distinguish between registered legitimate users and imposters, is now generating interest. Currently, passwords, Personal Identification Numbers (4-digit PIN numbers) or identification cards are used for personal identification. However, cards can be stolen, and passwords and numbers can be guessed or forgotten. To solve these problems, biometric authentication technology, which identifies people by their unique biological information, is attracting attention. In biometric authentication, an account holders body characteristics or behaviors (habits) are registered in a database and then compared with others who may try to access that account to see if the attempt is legitimate. Fujitsu has researched and developed biometric authentication technology focusing on four methods: fingerprints, faces, voiceprints, and palm veins. Among these, because of its high accuracy, contact less palm vein authentication technology is being incorporated into various financial solution products for use in public places. The Palm Secure sensor developed by Fujitsu is a biometric authentication solution offering optimum levels of security. Palm Secure detects the structure of the pattern of veins on the palm of the human hand with the utmost precision. Background: The ability to verify identity has become increasingly important in many areas of modern life, such as electronic government, medical administration systems, access control systems for secure areas, passenger ticketing, and home office and home study environments. Technologies for personal identification include code numbers, passwords, and smart cards, but these all carry the risk of loss, theft, forgery, or unauthorized use. It is expected that biometric authentication technology, which authenticates physiological data, will be deployed to supplement - or as an alternative to - these other systems. The Fujitsu Group has developed biometric authentication technologies based on fingerprints, voice, facial features, and vein patterns in the palm, and has also combined two or more of these

capabilities in multi-biometric authentication systems. Although biometric authentication is already being used to some extent by companies and government authorities, for it to gain wider acceptance, it needs to be considered less intrusive, and concerns about hygiene need to be addressed. For that reason, there is a market need for voice or facial recognition systems and other biometric authentication technology that can read physiological data without requiring physical contact with sensor equipment, and the development of such systems that are both practical and offer greater precision. Technology: Palm vein authentication works by comparing the pattern of veins in the palm (which appear as blue lines) of a person being authenticated with a pattern stored in a database.Vascular patterns are unique to each individual, according to Fujitsu research evenidentical twins have different patterns. And since the vascular patterns exist inside the body, they cannot be stolen by means of photography, voice recording or fingerprints, thereby making this method of biometric authentication more secure than others. Principles of vascular pattern authentication: Hemoglobin in the blood is oxygenated in the lungs and carries oxygen to the tissues of the body through the arteries. After it releases its oxygen to the tissues, the deoxidized hemoglobin returns to the heart through the veins. These two types of hemoglobin have different rates of absorbency.Deoxidized hemoglobin absorbs light at a wavelength of about 760 nm in the nearinfrared region. When the palm is illuminated with near infrared light, unlike the image seen by the human eye, the deoxidized hemoglobin in the palm veins absorbs this light, thereby reducing the reflection rate and causing the veins to appear as a black pattern.In vein authentication based on this principle, the region used for authentication is photographed with near-infrared light, and the vein pattern is extracted by image processing and registered. The vein pattern of the person being authenticated is then verified against the preregistered pattern.

Advantages of using the palm: In addition to the palm, vein authentication can be done using the vascular pattern on the back of the hand or a finger. However, the palm vein pattern is the most complex and covers the widest area. Because the palm has no hair, it is easier to photograph its vascular pattern. The palm also has no significant variations in skin color compared with fingers or the back of the hand, where the color can darken in certain areas. Advantages of reflection photography: There are two methods of photographing veins: reflection and transm ission. Fujitsu employs the reflection method. The reflection method illuminates the palm and photographs the light that is reflected back from the palm, while the transmission method photographs light that passes straight through the hand. Both types capture the near-infrared light given off by the region used for identification after diffusion through the hand. An important difference between the reflection method and transmission method is how they respond to changes in the hands light transmittance. When the body cools due to a lowered ambient temperature, the blood vessels (in particular the capillaries) contract, decreasing the flow of blood through the body. This increases the hands light transmittance, so light passes through it more easily. If the transmittance is too high, the hand can become saturated with light and light can easily pass through the hand. In the transmission method, this results in a lighter, lesscontrasted image in which it is difficult to see the vessels. However, a high light transmittance does not significantly affect the level or contrast of the reflected light. Therefore, with the

reflection method, the vessels can easily be seen even when the hand/body is cool. The system configurations of the two methods are also different. The reflection method illuminates the palm and takes photographs reflected back from the palm, so the illumination and photography components can be positioned in the same place. Conversely, because the transmission method photographs light that passes through the hand, the illumination and photography components must be placed in different locations. This makes it difficult for the system to be embedded into smaller devices such as notebook PCs or cellular phones. Fujitsu has conducted an in-depth study of the necessary optical components to reduce the size of the sensor, making it more suitable for embedded applications. Completely contactless design minimizes hygiene concerns and psychological resistance: Fujitsu is a pioneer in designing a completely contactless palm vein authentication device. With this device, authentication simply involves holding a hand over the vein sensor. The completely contactless feature of this device makes it suitable for use where high levels of hygiene are required, such as in public places or medical facilities. It also eliminates any hesitation people might have about coming into contact with something that other people have already touched. High authentication accuracy: Using the data of 140,000 palms from 70,000 individuals, Fujitsu has confirmed that the system has a false acceptance rate of less than 0.00008% and a false rejection rate of 0.01%, provided the hand is held over the device three times during registration, with one retry for comparison during authentication. In addition, the devices ability to perform personal authentication was verified using the following: 1) data from people ranging from 5 to 85 years old, including people in various occupations in accordance with the demographics released by the Statistics Center of the Statistics Bureau; 2) data about foreigners living in Japan in accordance with the world demographics released by the United Nations; 3) data taken in various situations in daily life, including after drinking alcohol, taking a bath, going outside, and waking up. Applications: Product development for financial solutions : Financial damage caused by fraudulent withdrawals of money using identity spoofing with fake bankcards has been rapidly increasing in recent years, and this has emerged as a significant social problem2. As a result, there has been a rapid increase in the number of lawsuits filed by victims of identity theft against financial institutions for their failure to control information used for personal identification. The Act for the Protection of Personal Information came into effect in

Japan on May 1, 2005, and in response, financial institutions have been focusing on biometric authentication together with IC (smart) cards as a way to reinforce the security of personal identification. Vein authentication can provide two types of systems for financial solutions, depending on where the registered vein patterns are stored. In one method, the vein patterns are stored on the server of a client-server system. The advantage of this system is that it provides an integrated capability for managing vein patterns and comparison processing. In the other type, a users vein pattern is stored on an IC card, which is beneficial because users can control access to their own vein pattern. Suruga Bank uses the server type for their financial solutions, and The Bank of TokyoMitsubishi uses the IC card system. In July 2004, to ensure customer security, Suruga Bank3 launched its Bio-Security Deposit the worlds first financial service to use PalmSecure. This service features high security for customers using vein authentication, does not require a bankcard or passbook, and prevents withdrawals from branches other than the registered branch and ATMs, thereby minimizing the risk of fraudulent withdrawals. To open a Bio-Security Deposit account, customers go to a bank and have their palm veins photographed at the counter. In order to guarantee secure data management, the palm vein data is stored only on the vein database server at the branch office where the account is opened. In October 2004, The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi4 launched its Super-IC Card Tokyo-Mitsubishi VISA. This card combines the functions of a bankcard, credit card, electronic money and palm vein authentication. From a technical and user-friendly point of view, The Bank of TokyoMitsubishin arrowed the biometric authentication methods suitable for financial transactions to palm veins, finger veins and fingerprints. The bank then mailed a questionnaire to 1,000 customers and surveyed an additional 1,000 customers who used devices in their branches. Finally, the bank decided to employ Palm Secure because the technology was supported by the largest number of people in the questionnaire. The Super-IC Card contains the customers palm vein data and vein authentication algorithms, and performs vein authentication by itself. This system is advantageous because the customers information is not stored at the bank. When a customer applies for a Super-IC card, the bank sends the card to the customers home. To activate the palm vein authentication function, the customer brings the card and his or her passbook and seal to the bank counter, where the customers vein information is registered on the card. After registration, the customer can make transactions at that branchs counter and any ATM using palm vein authentication and a

matching PIN number. In 2006, Fujitsu reduced the Palm Secure sensor to 1/4 of its current size for its next generation product. By using a smaller sensor on existing ATMs there will be room on the operating panel for a sensor for Felica mobiles, a 10-key pad that meets the DES (Data Encryption Standard), as well as an electronic calculator and other devices. The downsized sensor can also be mounted onATMs in convenience stores. Product development for general market : In addition to product development for financial solutions, Fujitsu has started to develop product applications for the general market .Two products are in great demand in the general market. One is for a physical access control unit that uses Palm Secure to protect entrances and exits, and the other is a logical access control unit that uses Palm Secure to protect input and output of electronic data. This section describes the features of these applications. Access control unit using Palm Secure: The Palm Secure access control unit can be used to control entry and exit for rooms and buildings .This unit integrates the operation and control sections. The operation section has a vein sensor over which the palm is held, and the control section performs authentication processing and issues commands to unlock the door. The system can be introduced in a simple configuration by connecting it to the controller of an electronic lock. Palm Secure units are used to control access to places containing systems or machines that manage personal or other confidential information, such as machine rooms in companies and outsourcing centers where important customer data is kept. Due to increasing concerns about security, some condominiums and homes have started using this system to enhance security and safety in daily life.For both of these applications, the combination of the following features provides the optimum system: a hygienic and contactless unit ideal for use in public places, user-friendly operation that requires the user to simply hold a palm over the sensor, and an authentication mechanism that makes impersonation difficult.

Fig : Palm Vein Access Control Unit

Login unit using PalmSecure: The palm vein authentication login unit controls access to electronically stored Information .As with the units for financial solutions, there are two types: a server type and an IC card type. Because the PalmSecure login unit can also be used for authentication using conventional IDs and passwords, existing operating systems and applications can continue to be used. It is also possible to build the unit into an existing application to enhance operability. In the early stage of introduction, the units were limited to businesses handling personal information that came under the Act for the Protection of Personal Information enforced in April 2005. However, use of the units is now expanding to leading-edge businesses that handle confidential information.

Fig : palm Secure Login Unit

Other product applications: Because of the importance of personal identification, we can expect to see the Development of new products for various applications, such as: Management in healthcare _ Access control to medication dispensing Identification of doctors and nurses when accessing protected health records Patient identification management Operator authentication _ Settlement by credit card Obtaining various certificates using the Basic Resident Register Card Owner authentication _ Retrieval of checked luggage Driver authentication

Attendance authentication _ Checking attendance in schools Clocking in and out of the workplace.

Conclusion: This paper explains palm vein authentication. The Fijitsu Palmsecure is a palm-vein based authentication system that utilizes the latest in Biometric Security Technology. Answering a worldwide need from governments to the private sector, this contactless device offers an easy-touse, hygienic solution for verifying identity. This technology is highly secure because it uses information contained within the body and is also highly accurate because the pattern of veins in the palm is complex and unique to each individual. Moreover, its contactless feature gives it a hygienic advantage over other biometric authentication technologies. This paper also describes some examples of financial solutions and product applications for the general market that have been developed based on this technology.

For several years, Fujitsu has been developing a new type of biometric technology expected to be more secure, reliable, and perceived as less intrusive than current biometric systems, which protect against bank card thefts, fraudulent financial transactions, and unauthorized entries.

Forget about signatures and photo IDs, forget about PIN numbers, forget about fingerprint, voiceprint, iris scan, or facial recognition security technologies to counter forged or stolen user IDs. Enter Fujitsu's palm vein ID authentication, which uses an infrared sensor to capture the user's vein pattern unique to every individual's palm for an exquisitely sensitive biometric authentication technique. Fujitsus novel ID technology has a few other advantages over other biometric technologies. The palm vein scanner has no deleterious effect on the body, nor does it require that the device be touched, unlike current fingerprint scanners, which proved to be disadvantageous because of sanitary and/or psychological issues related to hygiene or association with criminals, as well as reasons of usability (frequent use may increase the rejection rate of the system). Other limitations of various other technologies are related to measuring external features. Aging or the camera angle could affect facial recognition systems; fingerprints can be forged, as shown by a University of Tokyo study. On the contrary, palm vein recognition seems not to be affected by aging; neither cuts, scars, tattoos, nor skin color affect the scans outcome; and, given that veins are internal, they can hardly be tampered with.

Infrared vein image of the palm (Credit: Fujitsu)

The Basis of Palm Vein Technology

An individual first rests his wrist, and on some devices, the middle of his fingers, on the sensor's supports such that the palm is held centimeters above the device's scanner, which flashes a near-infrared ray on the palm. Unlike the skin, through which near-infrared light passes, deoxygenated hemoglobin in the blood flowing through the veins absorbs near-infrared rays, illuminating the hemoglobin, causing it to be visible to the scanner. Arteries and capillaries, whose blood contains oxygenated hemoglobin, which does not absorb near-infrared light, are invisible to the sensor. The still image captured by the camera, which photographs in the near-infrared range, appears as a black network, reflecting the palm's vein pattern against the lighter background of the palm. An individual's palm vein image is converted by algorithms into data points, which is then compressed, encrypted, and stored by the software and registered along with the other details in his profile as a reference for future comparison. Then, each time a person logs in attempting to gain access by Palm Vein Technology highly secure (Credit: Fujitsu) a palm scan to a particular bank account or secured entryway, etc., the newly captured image is likewise processed and compared to the registered one or to the bank of stored files for verification, all in a period of seconds. Numbers and positions of veins and their crossing points are all compared and, depending on verification, the person is either granted or denied access.

How Secure is the Technology?

On the basis of testing the technology on more than 70,000 individuals, Fujitsu declared that the new system had a false rejection rate of 0.01% (i.e., only one out of 10,000 scans were incorrect denials for access), and a false acceptance rate of less than 0.00008% (i.e., incorrect approval for access in one in over a million scans). Also, if your profile is registered with your right hand, don't log in with your left - the patterns of an individual's two hands differ. And if you registered your profile as a child, it'll still be recognized as you grow, as an individual's patterns of veins are established in utero (before birth). No two

people in the world share a palm vein pattern - even those of identical twins differ (so your evil twin won't be able to draw on your portion of the inheritance!)

Potential Applications
The new technology has many potential applications (some of which are already in use) such as an ultra secure system for ATMs and banking transactions, a PC, handheld, or server login system, an authorization system for front doors, schools, hospital wards, storage areas, and high security areas in airports, and even facilitating library lending, doing away with the age-old library card system. Fujitsu is planning to continue the development of the palm vein technology, shrinking the scanner to fit a mobile phone. Fujitsu hopes that its success might usher in a new age in personal data protection techniques, which is especially important when sales of Smartphones and other handhelds are skyrocketing. TFOT had a quick word with Mr. H. Watanuki of Fujitsu's Biometric Business Development Department about the application of their palm vein technology.

Palm vein access control unit (Credit: Fujitsu)

Q: Is there currently a retail product on the market that uses your technology? A: Yes. Some Japanese banks have adopted our palm vein authentication technology on their ATMs (e.g., Bank of TokyoMitsubishi).

Palm Vein Technology on an ATM (Credit: Fujitsu)

Q: When do you expect that commercial end-user products (such as personal computer biometric systems and door-lock mechanisms) based on your technology will be available on the global market? A: Fujitsu has globally released an SDK (software development kit or "devkit") for palm vein technology since April, 2006. We do hope that some vendors will soon develop related products using our SDK, including the ones you have described.

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Comments & Replies (18)

Forging Palm Recognition (02/24/09 - 22:51 - by Abhijit) Can\'t we forge a palm recognition technique. Is there any technology that can be used to take picture of a persons veins undernath the palm. Comp (03/12/09 - 1:29 - by Afzal) There is a chance of cuting of once palm to be used by others as an ID? it seems very robust... (06/26/09 - 9:00 - by phil) 1) it is a near-infrared scan relying on the rays for capture, holding up a picture will show up with nothing 2) since the rays are absorbed by deoxygenated hemoglobin, and thats what creates the pattern, a dead hand would not have the correct pattern... the vein AND arteries would show up from a detection and access standpoint the solution seems pretty seamless and with other manufacturers entering the field, the cost of these readers should decrease. my only hesitation before i start touting this as the cure for all things concerning access IdM is the inherent problem of the root data. sure someone cannot dup a palm, but they can still get into the database backend and insert their vein imprint to allow access. it all gets back to securing the database where all the information gets held. palm vein seems to have solved the physical user side, but how is crypto doing on their end? Not that robust... (07/07/09 - 13:08 - by madian)

Deoxidized hemoglobin absorbs near infrared radiation, but it is not the only substance that does so. There are plenty of markers and inks with the same property. In many commercial scanners artificial hands can be presented to the device and it will be fooled. In some systems even a white sheet of paper with the vein model drawn on it is enough (anyone can get your vein model by just photographing your hand with a ir modified camera in plain sun or under the light of tungsten lamps) I want to buy it (01/26/10 - 2:33 - by Mohd Amir) I am making a project and for that , i need this device , can please tell me the way that how can i get it approx. price? (02/01/10 - 17:25 - by aaron) Does anyone know an approx price for this product? i want to buy one (04/29/10 - 15:15 - by Adrian) i am based in south africa. where do i buy this? Vascular IDM (06/07/10 - 9:10 - by BioT) "In many commercial scanners artificial hands can be presented to the device and it will be fooled". MADIAN: Where did you get this info ? Vascular IDM (06/07/10 - 9:16 - by BioT) Also MADIAN: Did you check the Near IR aborbtion RATE of deoxyhemo\' as compared with other markers that you mention? Regards PALM VEIN SCANNER (06/10/10 - 6:52 - by ROHIT KHANNA) PLEASE GIVE ME DETAILS OF YOUR PALM VEIN SCANNER WE ARE INTERESTED IN BUYING IT. palm vein (10/05/10 - 1:15 - by varma) its very usefull comment (11/01/10 - 3:16 - by srisha) this information is very useful...plz try to give some more pictures about this topic PALM VEIN (11/01/10 - 3:19 - by SRISHA) TEL ME THAT,IF ONCE HAND IS INJURED THEN HOW CAN U PROVIDE THE SECURITY BY USING THIS TECHNOLOGY DETAILS (11/27/10 - 23:19 - by pinacle) it was very interesting,please give us details about when it was developed,is this the latest

WANT DETAILS (02/27/11 - 3:58 - by humaira) its intresting,i want some more detail about the scanner.. Palm Vein scanner (05/24/11 - 14:47 - by Mary Chavarria) I would like to know the price of a palm vein scanner gud (08/10/11 - 4:27 - by anna) very useful system To capture and store palm vein (08/23/11 - 5:07 - by Raja Sekar J)

Palm-vein biometrics help accurately ID patients

Joel Hagberg, vp, marketing and business development, Fujitsu Technology Products July 02, 2008

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All too often, people are victims of identity theft. Less common, but perhaps more dangerous, is the growing trend of medical identity fraud. According to an FTC report, three percent of all identity theft victims in 2005 were victims of medical identity theft which means of the 8.3 million ID theft victims that year, approximately 250,000 people were victimized by medical

identity theft. Victims do not normally realize that they have been victimized unless they get a hospital bill for a procedure they never received.

What is even more troubling, however, is that doctors might make incorrect diagnoses based on data from the identity thief's medical history. It may take years for a victim to clear his or her medical record of incorrect data, and HIPAA, which is designed to protect patient privacy, can work against victims if their files contain someone else's medical information.

For example, Anndorie Sachs is a medical identification theft victim. Another woman stole her driver's license and gave birth using her name, leaving her with $10,000 in hospital fees. To make matters worse, the woman abandoned the newborn baby in the hospital, and the child later tested positive for methamphetamine. Afterwards, an agent from the Utah Division of Child and Family Services notified Sachs that she was putting together paperwork to take custody of Anndorie's four children, then ages two to seven. In the end, the false accusations were dropped, but Sachs' medical record had been altered to include the blood type of a complete stranger, putting her at risk for future treatments, especially since she has a blood-clotting disorder. If she were administered the wrong type of blood, it could be fatal for her.

Clearly, patient identification relates directly to patient safety, which is a number-one priority for hospitals. In recent years, biometric technologies have emerged as solutions to not only protect medical records from being tampered with, but also to accurately identify patients. Biometric technologies, however, present several challenges.

Biometric technology deals with the human body, and tends to be intrusive. Some people are not comfortable providing a fingerprint or standing in front of a device exposing their eyes to some unknown emission. Additionally, because the human body and the nature of biometrics that deal with physiological factors are unique, some biometric technologies statistically cannot be applied to certain users. In fact, it is said that two to eight percent of the U.S. population cannot successfully interface with today's fingerprint technology. Some users' fingerprints are too thin and others have been exposed to harsher elements where the skin has become too worn or dry to be read accurately. Even when a user can successfully interface, their body is always subject

to changes for which the technology cannot account for. Some factors as simple as paper cuts, for example, can throw off certain fingerprint biometric systems.

Another important issue is accuracy. Although biometric identification is known to be an accurate method of identifying people, no single biometric technology can guarantee 100 percent accuracy. Vendors are competing with one another by attempting to get close to a zero error rate. Though fingerprint biometric technology is widely deployed, most of these technologies present some accuracy issues. In many cases, they may be good enough for certain applications limited to personal use (for example, laptops and PDAs). But other, more critical, enterprise applications require consistently accurate technologies. Iris scanning technology is one of the most accurate biometric technologies today, but it is not easy to deploy. It's also an intrusive technology to many people, and is highly cost prohibitive to the average organization.

The final major stumbling block is ease of deployment. In the biometrics field, some vendors only provide sensors, some provide just the middleware and some provide only software. This leads to an integration-intensive security project for most IT departments, where they want a product that will work right out of the box and will easily work with existing IT systems.

Turning to palm reading In recent years, palm-vein pattern recognition technology, also referred to as vascular recognition, has been refined to meet these concerns. The underlying technology of palm-vein biometrics works by extracting the characteristics of veins in the form of an image. The image is captured by a high performance sensor that maps the deoxygenated hemoglobin running through someone's veins.

Deoxygenated hemoglobin absorbs near-infrared rays. In practice, a sensor emits these rays and captures an image based on the reflection from the palm. As the hemoglobin absorbs the rays, it creates a distortion in the reflection light so the sensor can capture an image that accurately records the unique vein patterns in a person's hand. The recorded image is then converted to a biometric template a numeric representation of several characteristics measured from the captured image, including the proximity between veins. This template is then used to compare

against a user's palm scan each time they authenticate.

This technology is non-intrusive: There is no need to physically touch the sensor. All users must do is to hold their hand above the sensor for less than a second.

The method is also highly accurate. The International Biometrics Group (IBG), which evaluates all types of biometrics products through comparative testing, found that palm-vein technology was on par with iris scan biometrics in accuracy ratings.

Palm-vein recognition technology is significantly less expensive than iris scanning technology. In fact, the only biometric solution less expensive than palm-vein authentication is fingerprint recognition.

For health care organizations, effective palm-vein recognition solutions enable accurate identification of patients, enabling them to quickly retrieve their electronic medical records when they check into a hospital. This eliminates the potential human error of pulling the incorrect record, and helping to protect patients from identity fraud attempts.

Until now, there has been no biometric technology that can achieve the highest levels of security and usability at a reasonable cost. Palm-vein recognition hits that sweet spot of biometrics between security, cost, accuracy and ease of use that make it an optimal physical and IT access control solution for health care organizations.