Regulators Drop By Worldcoin’s Paris Office – Identity News Digest

Welcome to FindBiometrics’ digest of identity industry news. Here’s what you need to know about the world of digital identity and biometrics today:

UK Home Office Seeks More Facial Recognition Tech

The United Kingdom’s Home Office is seeking submissions from vendors capable of providing new face biometrics systems for deployment over the next 12 to 18 months. This includes systems that “can resolve identity using facial features and landmarks” in real-time, and that can be integrated with existing CCTV cameras. The submissions exercise is being administrated by the Defence and Security Accelerator (“DASA”), an agency within the Ministry of Defence. DASA says it is not looking for biometric technologies beyond facial recognition in its current “Market Exploration”, and that submissions are due by midday on October 12, 2023.

X Privacy Policy Change Notes Potential Biometric Data Collection

X, the social media platform formerly known as ‘Twitter’, has changed its privacy policy, noting that the platform may collect users’ “biometric information”, with their consent, “for safety, security, and identification purposes.” The change comes soon after an independent app researcher found documentation suggesting that X will implement a selfie-based identity verification feature for subscribers. It also comes after the filing in July of a proposed class action lawsuit alleging that X has violated Illinois’s Biometric Information Privacy Act.

French Regulator Meets Worldcoin Executive

Officials with the French data regulator CNIL made an unannounced visit to Worldcoin’s Paris office on Wednesday and spoke with a top executive, Politico reports.. The office, situated in a coworking space, is the site where Worldcoin’s ‘Orb’ devices are used to register the iris biometrics of individuals in Paris seeking to register for the startup’s ambitious digital ID program. CNIL is one of numerous regulators worldwide that have opened investigations into Worldcoin, though the French body has made it clear that its role is to support an EU probe being led by the Bavarian State Office for Data Protection Supervision.

Nigerian Yoruba Group Calls for Biometric Census

Afenifere, a socio-political organization representing Nigeria’s large Yoruba ethnic group, has formally called on the federal government to use biometrics in its next population census, rather than a “manual method that is prone to abuse”, as the group’s National Publicity Secretary put it. The group noted that government authorities have successfully used biometric technologies to enroll individuals in the country’s voter registry.

NEC India Announces ‘Smart City’ Project

NEC India has been commissioned to lead a ‘Smart City’ project in Tirupati, India. The project will see the implementation of a number of ICT solutions for the NEC subsidiary’s client, Tirupati Smart City Corporation Limited, including the establishment of a ‘City Operations Centre’ for communications and real-time data analysis. It will also entail the deployment of “Facial Recognition Systems, Intelligent Video Management Systems, and the integration of feeds from existing and proposed CCTV cameras across the city,” NEC India said in a statement announcing the project.

iiDENTIFii Works With Banks to Get South Africa Off AML ‘Grey List’

iiDENTIFii has been working with three South African banks to implement a biometric onboarding process in an effort to help get the country off of a ‘grey list’ maintained by the global anti-money laundering organizations Financial Action Task Force. The latter plans to review its inclusion of South Africa on the list in January of 2025, giving the country time to demonstrate its commitment to AML. iiDENTIFii’s solution uses face biometrics for identity verification, with a ‘4D Liveness’ solution that flashes different colored lights on the user’s face. “Over the next 18 months, we believe the full impact of this solution will be visible and hopefully play a part in shifting the needle on the greylisting decision,” said COO Murray Collyer.

iDenfy Gets An Unusual New Customer

iDenfy has acquired an atypical customer in the remote identity verification market. Beyond the Pines Productions, a video production equipment rental company based in West Palm Beach, Florida, is using iDenfy’s ‘Magic Link’ and selfie-based onboarding solutions. Beyond the Pines plans to implement iDenfy’s Magic Link into an automated email system for online rentals, delivering to end users a link that reroutes them to a digital identity portal, where they’ll be asked to upload photos of their government-issued ID and submit a selfie scan. Before this, iDenfy’s most recent new customers were in the FinTech and crypto spaces.

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August 31, 2023 – by Alex Perala