Using pictures for passwords
24 October 2008
by
Gunthy
Filed under
Security
The University of Twente has made a press release about a PhD of one of their students, the Romanian Ileana Buhan, that has developed a way of using pictures for generating passwords.
The idea is that when exchanging data between for example PDA’s using Bluetooth, a 4-digit password is not secure and can easily be compromised. With biometric security measures on the rise, miss Buhan looked into the possibility of using this technology to dramatically increase security.
In her thesis, she describes a way of using pictures to generate secure passwords. The idea is that 2 users that want to exchange data through their mobile device, have a picture of both themselves as the other person on their mobile. Software then compares the 2 photos and generates a security code. This code can then be used to exchange the data. The way this code is built makes it almost impossible to crack.
Since a lot of mobile devices these days already are equipped with cameras, this doesn’t sound so far-fetched. It takes little effort on the user side, as they only need to take the photos and the software does the rest. In my opinion, this is very, very interesting technology, and I’m hoping to see some real-world applications in the near future. As a matter of fact, I can’t wait to test this stuff out 
.
