The exponential growth in the processing power of computers and the increasing sophistication of the software that runs on them are fueling the development of biometrics as a viable security technology, but the origins of biometric authentication actually lie in antiquity. For example, we know that merchants in the Nile valley were using a form of biometric identification thousands of years ago. Traders routinely covered long distances and were often known to each other only through descriptions of physiological characteristics (scars, eye color, height). Roman legions are said to have tattooed mercenary soldiers to identify them more readily (and prevent them from deserting).

The use of fingerprints for the positive identification of criminals dates to the turn of the 20th Century. Sir Edward Richard Henry established Scotland Yard’s Fingerprint Bureau, building on the work of Dr. Henry Faulds, Sir Francis Galton, and Czech physiologist Johannes Evangelista Purkinje.

We are all aware of how DNA evidence has revolutionized forensic criminology, and how many innocent people have been freed and guilty people caught because of technological advances in this field. However, using DNA for identification purposes is currently neither quick - nor inexpensive.