TR2007-006

Secure Storage of Fingerprint Biometrics Using Slepian-Wolf Codes
Citation: Draper, S.C.; Khisti, A.; Martinian, E.; Vetro, A.; Yedidia, J.S., "Secure Storage of Fingerprint Biometrics Using Slepian-Wolf Codes", Information Theory and Applications Workshop (ITA), January 2007 (ITA 2007)
Date:January 2007
MERL Contacts:Anthony Vetro, Jonathan Yedidia

We describe a method to encode fingerprint biometrics
securely for use, e.g., in encryption or access control.
The system is secure because the stored data suffices to validate
a probe fingerprint but not to recreate the original fingerprint
biometric. Therefore, a breach in database security does not lead
to the loss of biometric data. We present a model for a secure
biometric system for which we can make strong encryption-like
security guarantees. We derive a fundamental trade off between
system security and the robustness of authentication. The trade
off is quantified for simple statistical models. We outline an
implementation and report the effectiveness of our method as
tested on a data base consisting of 579 datasets, each containing
roughly 15 measurements of a single finger.

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