(Part of the biometric product marketing expert series)
If you listen closely, you can hear about all sorts of wonderful biometric identifiers. They range from the common (such as fingerprint ridges and detail) to the esoteric (my favorite was the 2013 story about Japanese car seats that captured butt prints).
A former coworker who left the biometric world for the world of Adobe Experience Manager (AEM) expert consulting brought one of the latter to my attention.
Tongue prints.
This article, shared with me by Krassimir Boyanov of KBWEB Consult, links to this article from Science ABC.
As is usual with such articles, the title is breathless: “How Tongue Prints Are Going To Revolutionize Identification Methods.”
Forget about fingerprints and faces and irises and DNA and gait recognition and butt prints. Tongue prints are the answer!
Benefits of tongue print biometrics
To its credit, the article does point out two benefits of using tongue prints as a biometric identifier.
- Consent and privacy. Unlike fingerprints and irises (and faces) which are always exposed and can conceivably be captured without the person’s knowledge, the subject has to provide consent before a tongue image is captured. For the most part, tongues are privacy-perfect.
- Liveness. The article claims that “sticking out one’s tongue is an undeniable ‘proof of life.'” Perhaps that’s an exaggeration, but it is admittedly much harder to fake a tongue than it is to fake a finger or a face.
Are tongues unique?
But the article also makes these claims.
Two main attributes are measured for a tongue print. First is the tongue shape, as the shape of the tongue is unique to everyone.
From https://www.scienceabc.com/innovation/how-tongue-prints-are-going-to-revolutionize-identification-methods.html
The other notable feature is the texture of the tongue. Tongues consist of a number of ridges, wrinkles, seams and marks that are unique to every individual.
From https://www.scienceabc.com/innovation/how-tongue-prints-are-going-to-revolutionize-identification-methods.html
So tongue shape and tongue texture are unique to every individual?
Prove it.
Even for some of the more common biometric identifiers, we do not have scientific proof that most biometric identifiers are unique to every individual.
- There is no proof that each of the 8+ billion living people and each of the dead ones has a unique fingerprint.
- There is serious doubt (if not outright denial) that everyone has a unique face (although NIST is investigating this via the FRTE Twins Demonstration).
But at least these modalities are under study. Has anyone conducted a rigorous study to prove or disprove the uniqueness of tongues? By “rigorous,” I mean a study that has evaluated millions of tongues in the same way that NIST has evaluated millions of fingerprints, faces, and irises?
We know that NIST hasn’t studied tongues.
I did find this 2017 tongue identification pilot study but it only included a whopping 20 participants. And the study authors (who are always seeking funding anyway) admitted that “large-scale studies are required to validate the results.”
Conclusion
So if a police officer tells you to stick out your tongue for identification purposes, think twice.
Bredemarket 