As host to the Washington Redskins during the NFL season and various other sporting events throughout the year, FedExField in Andover, Maryland requires a large team of employees to keep the stadium running. During the off season, when there are no events, the stadium houses about 50 employees during the day. However, when an event rolls around, between seasonal, contract and temporary employees, the stadium workforce can expand to as many as 10,000 employees working for a single event. To secure access points and verify credentials, FedExField stadium operators implemented a new high-tech and biometric employee ID badge system.
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The use of biometric technology isn’t new or novel to many of us – we will provide our fingerprints for access control and identification at least once in our lives. Not all biometrics are as ubiquitous as the fingerprint, however. Another form of biometrics, facial recognition software, used by DMVs in the state of Illinois, has helped the state drastically cut down on one of its most infamous problems – drivers license fraud.
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It was supposed to be a seamless transition – students at Clinton County School District in Clinton County, Missouri, would switch from a lunch system that used encoded cards to one that uses biometric information from student fingerprints.
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Recent security breaches, including a well-publicized incident involving ID fraud at the O’Hare Airport, have caused Congress, airports, and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) to push for biometric identification for airport employees nationwide. While airports have issued employee ID badges for years, the focus is now shifting towards biometrics, and the inclusion of fingerprints and iris recognition in all airport worker credentials.
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Consumers all over the world have, almost overnight, become universal bearers of the debit card. A plastic card, usually with a magnetic stripe (and a smart chip in many parts of the world) is used like a credit card; but instead of paying the bill off at the end of every month, the money is drawn straight from the cardholder’s bank account. This secure, easy way to pay for almost everything has made the debit payment card system wildly popular.
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The days of simply showing student ID cards to attendants at Middle Tennessee State University’s rec center are over. Under a new ID card program aimed at higher security, upwards of 23,000 MTSU students are required to trade in their current ID cards, which simply had magnetic stripes, for new Blue ID Cards, which enable biometric featuers in order to ensure higher security.
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A new, dual biometric-based airport ID card has taken flight at 29 Canadian airports, boosting security to new heights. The Restricted Area Identity Card (RAIC) utilizes chip-based smart cards issued to all airport personnel. The cards work in conjunction with biometric readers for fingerprint or iris authentication.
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