Intelligent interface agents for biometric applications

This thesis investigates the benefits of applying the intelligent agent paradigm to biometric identity verification systems. Multimodal biometric systems, despite their additional complexity, hold the promise of providing a higher degree of accuracy and robustness. Multimodal biometric systems are examined in this work leading to the design and implementation of a novel distributed multi-modal identity verification system based on an intelligent agent framework. User interface design issues are also important in the domain of biometric systems and present an exceptional opportunity for employing adaptive interface agents. Through the use of such interface agents, system performance may be improved, leading to an increase in recognition rates over a non-adaptive system while producing a more robust and agreeable user experience. The investigation of such adaptive systems has been a focus of the work reported in this thesis. The research presented in this thesis is divided into two main parts. Firstly, the design, development and testing of a novel distributed multi-modal authentication system employing intelligent agents is presented. The second part details design and implementation of an adaptive interface layer based on interface agent technology and demonstrates its integration with a commercial fingerprint recognition system. The performance of these systems is then evaluated using databases of biometric samples gathered during the research. The results obtained from the experimental evaluation of the multi-modal system demonstrated a clear improvement in the accuracy of the system compared to a unimodal biometric approach. The adoption of the intelligent agent architecture at the interface level resulted in a system where false reject rates were reduced when compared to a system that did not employ an intelligent interface. The results obtained from both systems clearly express the benefits of combining an intelligent agent framework with a biometric system to provide a more robust and flexible application

Face Verification Competition on the XM2VTS Database

In the year 2000 a competition was organised to collect face verification results on an identical, publicly available data set using a standard evaluation protocol. The database used was the Xm2vts database along with the Lausanne protocol [14]. Four different institutions submitted results on the database which were subsequently published in [13]. Three years later, a second contest using the same dataset and protocol was organised as part of AVBPA 2003. This time round seven seperate institutions submitted results to the competition. This paper presents the results of the competition and shows that verification results on this protocol have increased in performance by a factor of 3

Adaptive User Agents for Intelligent Biometric Applications

Interest in biometric systems for identity authentication has been growing in recent years. The strengths of biometric systems are well known [2], however, the success of any biometric system is measured ultimately by its usability and user acceptance. Serious obstacles to wider adoption of biometric systems include user interface issues that result in significant failure to enroll and failure to verify rates. Poor templates and template aging are important factors that need to be addressed by any biometric system developer

Intelligent Agents for the Management of Complexity in Multimodal Biometrics

Current approaches to personal identity authentication using a single biometric technology are limited, principally because no single biometric is generally considered both sufficiently accurate and user-acceptable for universal application. Multimodal biometrics can provide a more adaptable solution to the security and convenience requirements of many applications. However, such an approach can also lead to additional complexity in the design and management of authentication systems. Additionally, complex hierarchies of security levels and interacting user/provider requirements demand that authentication systems are adaptive and flexible in configuration. In this paper we consider the integration of multimodal biometrics using intelligent agents to address issues of complexity management. The work reported here is part of a major project designated IAMBIC (Intelligent Agents for Multimodal Biometric Identification and Control), aimed at exploring the application of the intelligent agent metaphor to the field of biometric authentication. The paper provides an introduction to a first-level architecture for such a system, and demonstrates how this architecture can provide a framework for the effective control and management of access to data and systems where issues of privacy, confidentiality and trust are of primary concern. Novel approaches to software agent design and agent implementation strategies required for this architecture are also highlighted. The paper further shows how such a structure can define a fundamental paradigm to support the realisation of “universal access” in situations where data integrity and confidentiality must be robustly and reliably protected . Universal Access in the Information Society Universal Access in the Information Society Look Inside Other actions Export citation Register for Journal Updates About This Journal Reprints and Permissions Add to Papers Share Share this content on Facebook Share this content on Twitter Share this content on LinkedI

Intelligent Management of Multimodal Biometric Transactions

Multimodal biometric systems provide both increased reliability and greater flexibility to users, yet also increase the degree of complexity in implementation and system management, especially where access permissions, security levels, data categorizations and user characteristics show a high degree of diversity. Also, sources of unreliability in biometric authentication are often traceable to problems of enrolment, and especially to poor data acquisition, and hence introducing a greater degree of monitoring and increasing intelligent user guidance at the system interface can make a significant impact on the overall performance of an identity authentication system, especially in a multimodal scenario. This paper illustrates some of these problems in practice and outlines an implementation framework which reconciles the need to support more effective interaction mechanisms with the wider problems of managing the complexity of data flow which arises in such systems