Biolmetrics refers to the automatic identification of a person based on his/her physiological or behavioral chara-cteristics. This method of identification preferred over traditional methods involving passwords and PIN numbers for various reasons:

* the person to be identified is required to be physically present at the point-of-identification
* identification based on biometric techniques obviates the need to remember a password or carry a token.

With the increased use of computers as vehicles of information technology, it is necessary to restrict access to sensitive/personal data. By replacing PINs, biometric techniques can potentially prevent unauthorized access to or fraudulent use of ATMs, cellular phones, smart cards, desktop PCs, workstations, and computer networks. PI-Ns and passwords may be forgotten, and token based methods of identification like passports and driver's licen-ses may be forged, stolen, or lost. Thus biometric systems of identification are enjoying a renewed interest. Va-rious types of biometric systems are being used for real-time identification, the most popular are based on face recognition and fingerprint matching. However, there are other biometric systems that utilize iris and retinal sca-n, speech, facial thermograms, and hand geometry.

A biometric system is essentially a pattern recognition system which makes a personal identification by determi-ning the authenticity of a specific physiological or behavioral characteristic possessed by the user. An important issue in designing a practical system is to determine how an individual is identified. Depending on the context, a biometric system can be either a verification (authentication) system or an identification system. Verification (Am I whom I claim I am?) involves confirming or denying a person's claimed identity. In identification, one has to est-ablish a person's identity (Who am I?). Each one of these approaches has it's own complexities and could proba-bly be solved best by a certain biometric system.