Posts filed under 'Biometrics'
Researchers from Simon Fraser University in British Columbia have developed a knee brace like device, that when worn while walking will charge an internal battery. The Biomechanical Energy Harvester (sounds more like an implant - it ain’t) generates power at the end of a walker’s step similar to that of an electric or hybrid car braking (that’s according to the researchers). Wearing the device on each leg can generate 5 watts of electricity at a normal pace. At a fast pace the device can generate up to 13 watts. With just one minute of walking and the Biomechanical Energy Harvester can power a standard cell phone for 30 minutes of talk time. That puts the
Hymini to shame. Although, I doubt it costs a mere
$49 like the Hymini. Dare I say: “The green energy race is on’.
More pics after the ‘leap’
February 11th, 2008
I just stumbled across this while reading this month’s issue of
Popsci. Have you ever worried about a crook snagging your card and ordering high end goods over the phone? Well, the
Beepcard contains a prototype paper-thin speaker, microphone and voice-recognition chip. In order to use the card the user must speak into the card - yes the card - and if the recorded sample is a match, the card will send “high frequency, hard-to-fake beeps over the phone or a computer microphone, signaling the credit card company to authorize the transaction”. I am not sure if it can have multiple users, but Beepcard is market ready and they’re currently looking for partners.
September 26th, 2007
A company known as
SmartMetric ordered a press release today announcing the development of what they tout as the first ‘affordable’ fingerprint scanner for credit cards and similar sized IDs. This isn’t the first time we’ve heard of such tech, but if they can hold up to the ‘affordable’ aspect, it may not be too long before we place our thumb instead of our John Hancock to make a purchase. Could also be applied to other fields of use such as identity and access cards via RF communication.
April 6th, 2006
You know those Vein scanners we talked about a couple months and some ago? Well, it looks like they are finally making their way into some consumer level products. The keyboard
here features a Vein scanner for computer security. Veins are said to be almost impossible to hack, and unlike fingerprint scanners you can’t chop off the appendage as blood has to be flowing for the biometric scanner to function.
Vein Scanning Keyboard Provides Extra Security [Akihabaranews]
March 9th, 2006
