DoD Awards Contract to International Biometric Group & Mich State University
Department of Defense Awards Contract to International Biometric Group and Michigan State University to Develop Multimodal Biometric Systems NEW YORK, Oct. 12, 2004 -- International Biometric Group, LLC (IBG) and Michigan State University were recently awarded a six-month contract by the Department of Defense through the United States Army Research Office's highly competitive STTR Program. The research will help in developing cutting-edge systems that fuse multiple biometric modalities such as iris, face, and fingerprint technologies in operational scenarios. Accurate identification and verification methods have come under increasing scrutiny in the wake of the 9/11 attacks and the release of the 9/11 Commission Report. This has resulted in substantial interest in biometric recognition systems that are being increasingly deployed in a variety of DoD, government and civilian applications; US VISIT is one such very large example. The IBG team will design experimental systems with customized fusion algorithms to combine the results of multiple biometric products into a single identification and verification decision process. The systems will be tested on live data from IBG's Comparative Biometric Testing efforts which have been collected in the field since 1999. "These new multimodal systems will leverage the benefits of several technologies to potentially boost performance much beyond what any one given product can currently demonstrate," said Raj Nanavati, Partner at International Biometric Group. "IBG's multimodal research team is excited to join forces with veteran biometric researcher Dr. Anil Jain from Michigan State University." "Single biometric indicators have to contend with noisy sensor data, restricted degrees of freedom, non-universality of the biometric trait and unacceptable error rates," said Dr. Anil Jain. "Multibiometric systems alleviate these drawbacks, combat spoofing, and increase performance by providing multiple evidences of the same identity." About International Biometric Group International Biometric Group is the leading biometric integration and consulting firm, addressing the identification and authentication needs of mid to large size organizations. IBG brings direct, hands-on expertise in all leading biometric technologies, including multiple-biometric systems. IBG works on behalf of both private and government clients to evaluate, design, and integrate biometric solutions for public sector programs, network security, Internet applications, point of sale applications, physical access, and smart card systems. Learn more at http://www.biometricgroup.com. About Michigan State University Professor Anil Jain's research group at Michigan State has been involved in biometrics research for over 15 years. He and his students have been pioneers in the design and prototyping of multimodal biometric systems. Other ongoing projects in his laboratory include fingerprint matching, 2D and 3D face recognition, soft biometrics, and matching dental x-ray images for establishing identity (dental biometrics). Learn more at http://biometrics.cse.msu.edu About Department of Defense and U.S. Army Research Laboratory This project is sponsored by the U.S. Army Research Office and the content of the information contained in this press release does not necessarily reflect the position or the policy of the Government, and no official endorsement should be inferred. CONTACT: Sarah Nedwek at 212-809-9491 or Contact@biometricgroup.com. SOURCE: International Biometric Group, LLC