Features
The state of biometrics and identity management today

The COVID-19 pandemic shook up the security industry in several ways, and biometric access technology was one area where it had a big impact.

The reason? “While biometrics have been in use for many years, the pandemic accelerated certain trends and led to changes in the types of biometric scans being used, as well as the adoption of the technology,” said Vito Fabbrizio, managing director of HID’s biometric business unit.

This being said, “we have not found COVID to be a major impetus for the adoption of biometric scans,” noted Chad Asselstine, president of Fire Monitoring of Canada, a professional alarm monitoring and security integration services provider. “We continue to see cards and fobs as the primary methods of credential, with dual authentication (credential plus keypad) remaining more prevalent for high security locations.”

From touch to touchless

The push to counter the spread of COVID-19 took many forms, including a move from touch-based to touchless systems wherever possible. When it came to biometric access systems in this context, “many organizations recognized a need to move away from fingerprint readers out of concern that surfaces could be a vector for transmission of the virus,” said Lyndell Kline, regional sales manager with Boon Edam. Taking the place of fingerprint readers were facial recognition systems, which could leverage biological differences between individuals using cameras rather than touchpads.

For companies such as Toronto-based Invixium, this unexpected shift changed the direction of the biometric access industry in short order. “I would say 90 per cent of our revenue in 2019 came from selling fingerprint based biometric solutions,” said Invixium CEO and president Shiraz Kapadia.

“Then COVID happened and all of a sudden — I would say almost within a week — the whole adoption of fingerprint-based biometrics went on hold because nobody wanted to touch anything. People were even afraid of hugging their loved ones, let alone touching a community device like a fingerprint scanner.”

On the positive side, the abrupt drop in fingerprint access systems was offset by a surge in sales in facial recognition access technology. “I say that a decade’s worth of adoption for face recognition happened in a span of one to two months thanks to the pandemic,” Kapadia said.

“It was that rapid, it was that fast, and people didn’t call it face recognition: It was called ‘touchless biometrics.’ So a technology that had no prominence before COVID within a span of two months became extremely prominent — probably the de facto biometric when it comes to access control and workforce management — because you didn’t have to touch anything. I don’t think that the rapid adoption of such an amazing technology would’ve happened if COVID-19 had not happened.”

Facial recognition wasn’t the only beneficiary of COVID’s touchless revolution. According to Kline, many companies looked for other ways to make all their entrances completely touchless.

For example, “some considered retrofitting existing manual swing doors with low-energy, electric operators, which are typically used with wide doors for disabled and wheelchair access,” she said. “However, while this may appear to be a simple solution, automatic swing doors create opportunities for tailgating, as they must open to a full 90 degrees and then close again quite slowly to allow time for disabled entry and to comply with building codes.”

A booming market

Across the board, the demand for biometric access control systems is strong today.

“According to a Precedence Research study, the global market for biometric technology was estimated at $46 billion in 2022, and is projected to reach approximately $163.91 billion by 2032, with a compound annual growth rate of 13.6 per cent during the period 2023 to 2032,” said Kline.

These sales include fingerprint access systems, whose adoption is rebounding as COVID fades away. “Yes, fingerprints took a dip and facial recognition became very prominent,” Kapadia said. “But now that COVID is over, fingerprint demand has come back. What’s different now is that the demand for facial recognition systems is at the same level.”

There are many reasons for the booming biometric access technology market. “With a biometric system, there is no need to carry keys or credentials, which can be shared, copied or lost,” said Kline. “Users do not need to remember their PIN or password. Most important, the physical characteristics of each identity are 100 per cent unique, ensuring higher levels of overall security than other forms of access technology.”

“Biometric access systems have been gaining ground due to their increased accuracy and the demand for more secure and contactless access control,” Fabbrizio agreed. “However, the adoption of access technology is highly context-dependent, and organizations often choose the method that best suits their specific needs, budget and security requirements. Moreover, the adoption of biometric access systems can vary significantly depending on the region, industry and specific application. Generally speaking, we see a steady adoption of biometric access solutions across the globe with certain areas accelerating in the adoption of these solutions. Contactless biometric solutions are providing the highest growth rate.”

At the same time, biometric access technology is not dominating the entire security industry. Take the alarm monitoring/notification sector served by Fire Monitoring of Canada. “It is very low in our market,” said Asselstine. “We utilize it more when we have an integration into an HR platform for payroll management.”

Privacy concerns have also been a barrier to the adoption of biometric access solutions, but these concerns are being addressed by best practices that deliver friction-free “privacy protection by design,” Fabbrizio said. “These best practices include picking the right biometric for the use case and scenario, making sure you go with a vendor that gives you choice — whether finger, face, or behavioural — for various use cases, and selecting a modular approach that will help customers be ready to implement the optimal level of security and privacy protection for these use cases.”

Who is moving to biometric access?

While not everybody is moving to biometric access control yet, the trend seems to be going in that direction.

“Certainly, the most expansive adoption of biometric technology to date has been the incorporation of facial and fingerprint recognition into smartphones,” said Klein. “This has been beneficial in that it has helped to condition the population to the convenience and general use of this technology. Today, facial recognition has been incorporated into various use cases at airports for security screening, gate check-ins, baggage screening, and passport control in international terminals. In addition, biometric scanning checkpoints are currently being used by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection to verify the identifications of some foreign travelers crossing both southern and northern U.S. borders.”

“Biometric access technology is being used in various markets and industries around the world,” added Fabbrizio. These markets include corporate and office environments, government and law enforcement, health-care facilities, schools and colleges, banks, hotels, power plants, data centres, health and fitness facilities, airports and transportation hubs, cars/trucks, and even homes. “Some homeowners use biometric locks for their houses to enhance security and convenience,” he said.

Biometric access technology is also being integrated into existing security. This is because “the combination of security entrances, physical access control systems (PACS), and biometrics provides a trifecta solution that transcends traditional security,” said Kline. “By integrating the brute force of a security entrance such as a full height turnstile or a security revolving door with bullet-resistant glass, the intelligence of a PACS solution, and the identification and authentication accuracy of biometrics, facility management and security personnel can leverage the data generated from such solutions for a multitude of applications.”

The payoff from such integrated security systems is profound. “Beyond providing superior security access/egress control and management at perimeter and high security interior locations within a facility, these integrated secured entry solutions also facilitate emergency management operations, time and attendance, occupancy compliance, building HVAC and lighting management, and more,” she said. “This further increases the overall ROI of integrated secured entry solutions across other enterprise operations, further validating the necessity and cost justification for these installations.”

Looking to the future

COVID-19 has certainly affected and altered the adoption rate of biometric access technology worldwide. So what’s next?

“Without question, biometric technology is here to stay,” said Kline.

“In general, we see this technology gaining more adoption across many use cases, with the fastest growth in contactless technologies,” Fabbrizio said. “There also is steadily growing adoption of contact technologies now that people have moved on from their pandemic concerns.”

“I do think that there will be a place for biometric facial recognition down the line,” said Asselstine. But he cautioned that current adoption may be limited as “customers are not ready for it just yet.”

“Biometrics is the only way to prove that you are who you say you are,” Kapadia concluded. “So as the world becomes more and more insecure — as humans trust each other less and less — I see biometrics becoming more and more prominent.”