washington

Biometrics have been widespread for some time in sectors such as law enforcement and the nuclear power industry, where hand geometry is used to control access to secure facilities. But they have begun in the last five years to be used in ways far more likely to be encountered by ordinary people.

Since 1995, for example, the US Immigration and Naturalization Service has enrolled more than 80,000 travellers in a system that allows them to jump lengthy queues at airports by scanning their hand geometry.

Companies are using fingerprint imaging devices to serve as passwords for computer networks. And welfare programmes from Connecticut to Los Angeles County are using biometrics to deter welfare fraud.

If privacy advocates are anxious about the implications of biometrics, some members of the public may be less concerned. In the United Kingdom, the Nationwide Building Society and NCR Corporation last year tried out an iris scanning system with 1,000 customers at Nationwide's Swindon branch.

Instead of using PIN numbers or signatures at the cash machine or bank counter, customers' irises were recognized by cameras which gave them access to their accounts. Some 91 per cent of participants favoured the system over the use of PIN numbers or signatures, according to the Pegram Walters Group, which carried out the research.