A review on performance,security and various biometric template protection schemes for biometric authentication systems

Identifying a person based on their behavioral and biological qualities in an automated manner is called biometrics. The authentication system substituting traditional password and token for authentication and relies gradually on biometric authentication methods for verification of the identity of an individual. This proves the fact that society has started depending on biometric-based authentication systems. Security of biometric authentication needs to be reviewed and discussed as there are multiple points related to integrity and public reception of biometric-based authentication systems. Security and recognition accuracy are the two most important aspects which must be considered while designing biometric authentication systems. During enrollment phase scanning of biometric data is done to determine a set of distinct biometric feature set known as biometric template. Protection of biometric templates from various hacking efforts is a topic of vital importance as unlike passwords or tokens, compromised biometric templates cannot be reissued. Therefore, giving powerful protection techniques for biometric templates and still at that very moment preparing great identification accuracy is a good research problem nowadays, as well as in the future. Furthermore, efficiency under non-ideal conditions is also supposed to be inadequate and thus needs special attention in the design of a biometric authentication system. Disclosure of various biometric traits in miscellaneous applications creates a severe compromise on the privacy of the user. Biometric authentication can be utilized for remote user authentication. In this case, the biometric data of users typically called templates are stored in a server. The uniqueness and stability of biometrics ended it useful over traditional authentication systems. But, a similar thing made the enduring harm of a user’s identity in biometric systems. The architecture of the biometric system leads to several hazards that lead to numerous security concerns and privacy threats. To address this issue, biometric templates are secured using several schemes that are categorized as biometric cryptosystems, cancelable biometrics, hybrid methods, Homomorphic Encryption, visual cryptography based methods. Biometric cryptosystems and cancelable biometrics techniques provide reliable biometric security at a great level. However, there persist numerous concerns and encounters that are being faced during the deployment of these protection technologies. This paper reviews and analyses various biometric template protection methods. This review paper also reflects the limitations of various biometric template protection methods being used in present times and highlights the scope of future work.