This Saturday, at the Chaos Communication Congress (31C3) new methods will be shown on how to utilize biometric attributes of someone else.

In the past years, it was successfully demonstrated a number of times how easily fingerprints can be stolen from its owner if a person touched any object with a polished surface (like a glas or a smartphone). [3] This time new, sometimes suprising ways to gather biometrical attributes will be introduced. [1] With this knowledge there will be no need to steal objects carrying the fingerprints anymore.

In his talk tonight, at 8.30 PM (CET), starbug will show and explain how he got fingerprints from persons during public events with just the help of a standard photo camera. These fingerprints could be used for biometric authentication. He will also present additional approaches of defeating fingerprints. The questionable validity of security claims by the vendors of fingerprint systems will be even more disputed after this presentation. "After this talk, politicians will presumably wear gloves when talking in public", said starbug of the Chaos Computer Club (CCC).

Like all talks at the 31C3, this one will be streamed via the internet. When you like to learn how easy it is to get the fingerprint of someone else, for example the German Minister of Defense, without even being physically close to her, you can follow the talk at http://streaming.media.ccc.de/saal1/. A recording of the talk will be made available online afterwards.

Links:

[1] Talk of starbug (in German): Ich sehe, also bin ich ... Du. Gefahren von Kameras für (biometrische) Authentifizierungsverfahren:

https://events.ccc.de/congress/2014/Fahrplan/events/6450.html

[2] 31C3 Streaming:

http://streaming.media.ccc.de/

[3] Chaos-Aktivitäten Biometrie (in German):

https://www.ccc.de/en/campaigns/aktivitaeten_biometrie