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Are retinal scans a big deal? It requires a decent camera with very good optics or short distance from your eyes to get a meaningful identification, so your ca

Are retinal scans a big deal? It requires a decent camera with very good optics or short distance from your eyes to get a meaningful identification, so your casual CCTV mass surveillance isn't a problem. If I want anonymity, irises are going to be very low on my list of potential worries. Also, I consider those to be public data (just like my face, fingerprints, overall appearance, voice or DNA), because anyone willing within a reasonable proximity can get this data anyway and there's no stopping it. So, if some company wants to use that as an authenticator... well, that's a stupid idea that I would protest for anything sensitive (unauthorized access to which could actually cause me some griefs), but as long as it's not my liability (and for a credit card it is not - fraud disputes aren't fun but it's not my money either) they can do... whatever, I guess. Or am I missing something?

autorizo 2y ago
You nailed it, we should not use public data for important things like this that could result in fraud.
- drdaeman 2y ago
  Totally! Like I said - biometrics is a very bad idea for anything actually sensitive. I wouldn't let my door lock open upon seeing my face - high convenience but high risk. But I don't mind a PAM module on a non-portable desktop computer that would let me passwordless sudo when camera sees me - low risk, high convenience. And if some credit organization or airport security says they're fine with using it - I see this as their risks, not mine. And giving them my biometrics isn't hurting me because I won't use it for anything I care about. Unless, of course, I'll be forced to, somehow - but I doubt that's likely. I see MasterCard doing this as they estimated a risk-to-profit factor to be satisfactorily low. My overall impression of banking/finance industry is that they're very different when it comes to security - they tend to have what we'd call poor security practices, but they compensate this by taking responsibility for when things fail, swallowing the losses (cheaper than upgrading everyone and everything) and just making sure they earn more than they lose. It's more prominent in US (where half of the industry relies on knowing last four of secret SSN number that you have to share-not-share with a lot of companies, and some very "secret" questions like my birthday - and the economy still works somehow!) than in EU, though.
mywittyname 2y ago
> Or am I missing something? The security issue. I.e., Mastercard treats their technology as infallible and the people who find an exploit select you as the victim. Mastercard fails to take responsibility and continues to allow you to be exploited with absolutely no mechanism to defend yourself. Credit card numbers can be changed a lot easier than eyeballs can be.
- drdaeman 2y ago
  > Mastercard treats their technology as infallible They're not unlikely to claim that it was me because machine reports seeing my eyes (because it doesn't hurt them to try to deny the claim), but generally industry is well aware that fraud exists. > Mastercard fails to take responsibility and continues to allow you to be exploited True for debit, but for credit the idea is that it's card issuer's problem if they still authorize those biometrics-authenticated transactions afterwards. The most probable scenario is that they'll immediately block the card and ability to use biometric payments after receiving the fraud report. Then start figuring out what happened. So, I guess, as long as I don't have all eggs in one basket (MasterCard), I will be inconvenienced but not really exploited. And given that it's not exactly trivial to quietly steal then impersonate someone's eyes and face, until that actually happens (low-probability event) it seems convenient to pay (high-frequency event) without reaching for a wallet or device.
  - makeitdouble 2y ago
    > it's card issuer's problem if they still authorize those biometrics-authenticated transactions afterwards. Isn't it the reverse, with the issuer declining fraud allegations as they can "prove" you originated the transaction ? That's the building block of 3DSecure and other additional authentication, where the merchant is protected from chargebacks in exchange for pushing stronger check on the customer.
    - drdaeman 2y ago
      If it wasn't me who made the transaction, they won't be able to prove it because such proof cannot exist by definition. They can (and most likely will) try to claim otherwise, but best they can do is say that they've scanned something that resembled my eyes to them. It's like with cloned cards (or even EMV proxy attacks) - yea, they've read the magstripe that read as my card, but they can't counter the fact that I was not physically present in that store paired with a statement that I haven't made that transaction. Also, in my experience, when a fraudulent transaction happens, banks tend to not challenge it much. When someone impersonated my card (I'm not sure but I suspect it was a BIN stuffing attack, since it was a sock drawer card) they just handled it without any issues. 3-D Secure shifts the risk/convenience balance and adds additional security checks, but it doesn't make customers liable for fraud.

autorizo 2y ago

You nailed it, we should not use public data for important things like this that could result in fraud.

drdaeman 2y ago
Totally! Like I said - biometrics is a very bad idea for anything actually sensitive. I wouldn't let my door lock open upon seeing my face - high convenience but high risk. But I don't mind a PAM module on a non-portable desktop computer that would let me passwordless sudo when camera sees me - low risk, high convenience. And if some credit organization or airport security says they're fine with using it - I see this as their risks, not mine. And giving them my biometrics isn't hurting me because I won't use it for anything I care about. Unless, of course, I'll be forced to, somehow - but I doubt that's likely. I see MasterCard doing this as they estimated a risk-to-profit factor to be satisfactorily low. My overall impression of banking/finance industry is that they're very different when it comes to security - they tend to have what we'd call poor security practices, but they compensate this by taking responsibility for when things fail, swallowing the losses (cheaper than upgrading everyone and everything) and just making sure they earn more than they lose. It's more prominent in US (where half of the industry relies on knowing last four of secret SSN number that you have to share-not-share with a lot of companies, and some very "secret" questions like my birthday - and the economy still works somehow!) than in EU, though.

mywittyname 2y ago

> Or am I missing something? The security issue. I.e., Mastercard treats their technology as infallible and the people who find an exploit select you as the victim. Mastercard fails to take responsibility and continues to allow you to be exploited with absolutely no mechanism to defend yourself. Credit card numbers can be changed a lot easier than eyeballs can be.

drdaeman 2y ago
> Mastercard treats their technology as infallible They're not unlikely to claim that it was me because machine reports seeing my eyes (because it doesn't hurt them to try to deny the claim), but generally industry is well aware that fraud exists. > Mastercard fails to take responsibility and continues to allow you to be exploited True for debit, but for credit the idea is that it's card issuer's problem if they still authorize those biometrics-authenticated transactions afterwards. The most probable scenario is that they'll immediately block the card and ability to use biometric payments after receiving the fraud report. Then start figuring out what happened. So, I guess, as long as I don't have all eggs in one basket (MasterCard), I will be inconvenienced but not really exploited. And given that it's not exactly trivial to quietly steal then impersonate someone's eyes and face, until that actually happens (low-probability event) it seems convenient to pay (high-frequency event) without reaching for a wallet or device.
- makeitdouble 2y ago
  > it's card issuer's problem if they still authorize those biometrics-authenticated transactions afterwards. Isn't it the reverse, with the issuer declining fraud allegations as they can "prove" you originated the transaction ? That's the building block of 3DSecure and other additional authentication, where the merchant is protected from chargebacks in exchange for pushing stronger check on the customer.
  - drdaeman 2y ago
    If it wasn't me who made the transaction, they won't be able to prove it because such proof cannot exist by definition. They can (and most likely will) try to claim otherwise, but best they can do is say that they've scanned something that resembled my eyes to them. It's like with cloned cards (or even EMV proxy attacks) - yea, they've read the magstripe that read as my card, but they can't counter the fact that I was not physically present in that store paired with a statement that I haven't made that transaction. Also, in my experience, when a fraudulent transaction happens, banks tend to not challenge it much. When someone impersonated my card (I'm not sure but I suspect it was a BIN stuffing attack, since it was a sock drawer card) they just handled it without any issues. 3-D Secure shifts the risk/convenience balance and adds additional security checks, but it doesn't make customers liable for fraud.