Biometrics are starting to be deployed commercially according to "Supermarket: Let your fingers do the paying" from News.com. A Seattle Washington grocery store allows you to register a credit or debit card to a fingerprint, and then pay by fingerprint. While this sounds incredibly convenient, there are a myriad of concerns that should be considered. Even assuming the system used is hard to fool, do you really want to be uniquely identified with what you purchase? Stores want to have data about you, consider some of the stuff going on with radio id tags, Walmart®; for instance was curious about what parts of the store people buying various things will visit, and how long they spend where. Consider if someone did find a way to fake out the system, how would you go about trying to prove it? Can you imagine trying to say "yes, I know that my finger print was used, but I didn't really buy that" with a straight face? Do you think anyone would believe you? Consider something somewhat more mundane. Now instead of just using your credit card once, they get to store your credit card number. How secure is the server storing it? Can it be hacked? Can someone walk off with it? Pranas says that the company he worked for had a server stolen recently. Not only that, they aren't even sure it was an inside job. If a government contractor cannot keep employees personal information secure, how well do you think a grocery store or convenience store would do?
