March 12, 2014 – by Peter B. Counter
Yesterday, the International Biometrics & Identification Association (IBIA) announced that the connect:ID exhibition and conference will be held from March 17-19 next week at the Ronald Reagan Center in Washington D.C.
This is going to be a comprehensive biometrics industry event, covering the government, commercial and consumer markets with equal opportunity. It comes at a dynamic time in identity management, in which we are seeing an increase in adoption across all markets, real deployments, major acquisitions and an increase in mobility, global reach and scope of application.
Bob Harbour, chairman and president of the IBIA expands: “With exhibitors and speakers from around the globe, this unique and cutting edge event embraces the full spectrum of biometric and identity applications in the rapidly expanding commercial verticals and consumer arena, including mobile, healthcare, financial services, cyber threats, identity theft, and data breaches as well as new and innovative government uses.”
Peter O’Neill, president of findBIOMETRICS recently had a chance to interview Harbour, who is also the executive director of Lumidigm. O’Neill asked for a comment on the importance of this kind of activity at this critical time in the biometrics industry.
“What I have seen during the time that I have been with the IBIA is that biometrics started with largely a government, law enforcement and civil ID focus and that is still important but there is all kinds of evidence over the last few years that people are looking for something other than PINs and passwords for convenient and secure authentication solutions in commercial and consumer markets,” answered Harbour. “Biometrics is crossing all facets of our lives, and with the introduction of the iPhone with the biometric and other smartphones that are soon going to be coming out with biometrics, you’ve got millions of newly habituated biometric users which is going to help with the acclimation of society to use biometrics more freely. Biometric identification solutions have to be both secure and convenient to be broadly accepted. From the IBIA perspective, I see a lot of excitement and focus in this area and new members are joining IBIA representing these newer verticals and newer customer bases. So it really is a dynamic time of change for our industry and for all the companies with a stake in this industry it is time to get involved to jointly face the challenges and opportunities ahead.”
The IBIA is presenting this event in association with Science Media Partners. It is sponsored by Cross Match Technologies, NEC, Qualcomm, Deloitte, Gemalto and Biomorph. The exhibition floor is sold out, but anyone wanting to attend is encouraged to visit the connect:ID website.
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