What makes security systems secure?
Access to buildings and vehicles without a key is already technically possible, since digital and biometric authentication method finding their way into modern locking systems. But how safe are these systems? For the safety of mechatronic locking systems are encryption methods, such as those established in the IT sector, of vital importance. Increasingly be transponders and biometric information like fingerprints used to identify, but not only increase safety and comfort, but also the need for reliable data protection. Especially "digital traces", ie motion profiles, which can be in the evaluation of personal access create unnoticed be challenging.
The bunch of keys shows the trend towards mechatronical systems of authentification. More and more electronical keys, so called transponders, can be seen. Scientists at the "Institut für Sicherungssysteme" are doing research on what makes locks in doors of buildings and cars more safe and comfortable. Those mechatronical security systems are used wherever personalized access is essential.
New solutions granting highest secure access as well as the protection of personal data are beeing developed in close cooperation with the industry and other research institutes. Those cooperational research projects focus on new methods for the evaluation of security systems and the development of new technologies for the locking industry.
Biometrical access control is more and more applied. Instead of a common key a fingerprint or the distinctive picture of the iris in the eye is the means of authentification. The lines of a fingerprint or the iris are said to be distinctive and therefore suitable to identify a person.
Biometrical methods of authentification become more and more relevant in protecting public or private buildings. "Digital marks will be a major issue in the near future, because already today there is a trend in social networks like Facebook or Myspace of broad archiv data backup of user profiles for commercial purposes. Personal data that is beeing used for biometrical authentication is of interests because it makes proiles of movement and activities possible."
"Users will only accept the wide use of biometrical authentification if the protection of personal rights and data can be guaranteed and transparency is assured", explains Kai-Dietrich Wolf, director of the "Institut für Sicherungssysteme" at the beginning of the "Security 2010" in Essen.
"Therefore new technologies of authentification make great demands on the safety of information technology."
It is characteristic for the technological change in the locking industry, that classical mechanical components are more and more combined with electronical modules to construct mechatronical systems. These systems use for example biometrical methods or a transponder to give access.
The question "How safe is this?" is a scientific challenge for researchers. Wherever access needs to be locked a security system that combines state of the art with usability and protects personal data is needed. Technological engineering and evalutation of innovative security systems demand new technical expertise from fields of research and technology like Mechatronics, information- and communication technology, microsystems technology, security technology, basic material technology, optical technology and future locking systems and technologies.
