New Fujitsu Laptop Reads Your Palm, For Security

judgecorp writes "Fujitsu has launched a laptop which authenticates users using the veins of their palm. The contactless technology is hard to deceive and — since it detects haemoglobin in the veins, is not so likely to be breakable using the gruesome method of cutting off a hand."

Obligatory:

[fyngyrz]

XKCD has the last word on this subject [xkcd.com]

Biometrics are not good as a "password"

[Jody Bruchon]

You can't change your palm vein layout or your fingerprint when an attacker makes a copy of it somehow. You can easily change a password with practically no real effort. Biometrics are a key to a door where the key is unchangeable. I reinstalled everything on a laptop of mine and didn't even waste time putting a driver in place for the fingerprint reader it came with.

Re:Hemoglobin? Uh. Not quite.

[Rosyna]

Cut off the hand in such a way as to keep the appendage from bleeding out (think fire-heated axe), and there's still going to be blood (and hemoglobin) in there.

Pretty sure it uses the RF properties of iron when in motion. If it does use IR, then the blood needs to be a different temperature than the skin. Cutting off the hand would cause the blood to cool too much.