Eye Based Authentication: Iris and Retina Recognition

Biometric authentication comes in play to release the users from the difficulties of remembering and protecting passwords as required by traditional authentication systems. Among all the biometrics in use today, eye biometrics (iris and retina) offers the highest level of uniqueness, universality, permanence, and accuracy. Despite these convincing properties of iris and retina biometrics, they have not been in widespread use. Moreover, humans have more or less a natural ability to recognize individuals staring at the person’s eye. So, it is interesting to investigate to what extent the eye based biometrics (iris and retina recognition) are capable of distinguishing individuals, and what factors are there, which hinder the adoption of these technologies. This report presents a comparative study on iris and retina biometrics based on literature review. The study aims to investigate the two biometrics, conduct a comparative analysis in a fair level of technical detail, and identify the challenges and future possibilities towards their ubiquitous use. In presenting the findings, the study contributes in three ways: (1) This report may serve as a tutorial of eye biometric for those who are new in the area, (2) The comparison between iris and retina biometrics will be helpful for individuals and organizations in choosing the appropriate eye biometric for use in their context. (3) The technical, security, and usability issues identified by the study reveal avenue for further research in order to improve eye biometrics.