Handwritten signature is still the most widely accepted biometric used to verify a person's identity. Banks, corporations, and government bodies rely on the human eye and digital devices such as tablets or smart pens to capture, analyse, and verify people's autographs.
New software developed by researchers at Tel Aviv University and Ben-Gurion University of the Negev now enables smartwatches, currently worn by one in six people around the world, to verify handwritten signatures.
A popular device worn by so many people should feature additional, critically useful functions," said study co-author Dr. Erez Shmueli of TAU's Department of Industrial Engineering, who added that 373 million of these devices will be in use by 2020. "Considering how dependent we are on signatures, we decided to develop software that would verify the smartwatch device wearer's handwritten signature."
The next step in signature verification
Signing on a digital pad or using a special electronic pen has replaced pen and paper in many instances, but these alternatives often require cumbersome dedicated devices. The new software developed by Dr. Shmueli and his student Alona Levy, in collaboration with Prof. Yuval Elovici of BGU's Department of Software and Information Systems Engineering and his student Ben Nassi, would turn any generic smartwatch into an expert signature verifier.
The novel technology utilizes motion data—a person's wrist movements measured by an accelerometer or a gyroscope—to uniquely identify them during the signing process and subsequently classify the signature as either genuine or forged.
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