Feature Company

Interview with Scott S. A. Coby, CEO Triad Biometrics LLC

September 2008

FB

Can you please provide our readers with a brief background of the company?

Triad

Mark Cohen, Shailesh Chirputkar and I founded Triad Biometrics in 2004 because we saw what we perceived to be a gaping hole in the biometrics industry which caused it to be highly fragmented. Device manufacturers were building capture devices that would run only on their specific software and everyone was extolling that their devices were the best. It reminded us of the early days of the computer industry. Manufacturers built machines that worked only on their own software. There was no interoperability. Until the advent of interoperability and open source architecture, the personal computer industry languished. Once there was interoperability, that industry exploded. We believe that the same conditions exist today in biometrics, and that is why we believe that we can fill that gaping hole that I mentioned earlier with TEAMS which besides being interoperable, is highly scalable and robust. In essence, Triad was formed to respond to a need of the market.

FB

Can you tell us about your Triad Enterprise Authentication and Migration System (TEAMS) and some of its advantages?

Triad

TEAMS was designed to thwart identity fraud at the application level as well as provide an interoperable biometric authentication solution. The product eliminates the need to submit usernames and passwords in any TEAMS-enabled application. This attribute also provides a side benefit of eliminating the possibility of SQL injection from the client-side by elimination of the password field. As you know, that is often used as the point of entry for intruders or hackers.

Additionally, there are several advanced features in the product that set it apart from others in the industry such as true device interoperability, military-grade encryption of all client-side data in transit, a secure exception mode, a duress feature for VIP users, choice of three enterprise-level databases for secure, tamper-resistant data storage, advanced logging and reporting, and a unique non-hardware-based application licensing system. Everyone benefits from the combination of these unique features.

FB

You received some very good results from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) testing. Please elaborate on these results.

Triad

Yes, in the 2003 NIST competition, our matching system was found to have a very low incidence of false acceptances…something on the order of more than 10 -7 which equates to a less than one in ten million probability of false acceptance. The matching system produced superior results in comparison to many well known systems.

FB

Has this been a good year for the company?

Triad

This has been an excellent year for the company as we have finished development work on TEAMS and have been able to produce a first version which by many accounts is groundbreaking and fully baked. As a matter of fact, we already have some new exciting enhancements and capabilities which we plan on incorporating in the next version of TEAMS which will further differentiate it from the typical biometric authentication system.

FB

Which vertical market segments are you concentrating on?

Triad

From the outset, we have focused upon the financial service, healthcare, and government sectors. We felt that there was an unsatisfied need there to say nothing of the well publicized breaches that have taken place in those industries or segments.

FB

What are some of the challenges you face in biometrics?

Triad

There are a number of challenges that we face, some of which are common to the industry and others which are typical of smaller companies within the industry. Let me explain: Particularly in the United States, privacy has always been an issue. It is unfortunate that many people don’t realize that a well secured biometric system like ours actually enhances the privacy of its users by vastly reducing or eliminating the possibility of the theft of confidential, sensitive personal data. I think that over time, people will realize this, and there will be a general embracing of secure biometric systems which will cause biometrics to become more mainstream.

People will ultimately realize that the digital templates stored are really a series of O’s and 1’s from which one cannot reverse engineer a fingerprint image. Another industry problem that has to be dealt with is the fact that since Windows is such a popular platform, its innate shortcomings place a significant impediment with respect to a pure biometric logon. You see, when someone, for example, swipes his finger for logon on his imbedded reader on his notebook, he is actually releasing a Kerberos password which is a requirement for Windows to open. If there were an authentication API available for Windows logon, this industry wide problem could be averted.

Turning to our particular challenges, I would have to say that being a small, young company, it is extremely important for us to forge strong reseller and integrator relationships to propel the adoption of TEAMS. We have always thought that partnerships with industry giants were an important thing for us, and it was central to our business model from the start. I am happy to say that progress is being made on that front almost every day, and we will be making announcements when contracts are signed. Additionally, another challenge of note is the prioritization of development tasks which directly bears upon new enhancements as well as the necessity of supporting new capture devices as they enter the market while, at the same time, continuing to maintain all important interoperability. This is a continuing challenge and a continual focus of our efforts. One additional challenge which is emerging is the entry of virtual desktop technologies on the horizon. We will have to decide, probably in the not too distant future, which ones to support.

FB

In terms of new product development, what can we expect to see from Triad in the near future?

Triad

TEAMS will be continually refined as we expect to have beta 4 available in October (2008). We expect that will be our final beta version prior to our first General Release 1.0 and will continue to take feedback from pilot tests into consideration before we finalize the 1.0 release. As I alluded earlier, we have some major enhancements in mind which will be incorporated in the 2.0 version of TEAMS.

FB

How can someone evaluate TEAMS?

Triad

That’s easy. We have created Phase 1 and Phase 2 Pilots which progress as the potential client (user/reseller/integrator) increases interest in deployment. In Phase 1, the potential client has access to the TEAMS client (which is Microsoft certified) so that he can experience the look and feel of the product. He has access to our server so that he can access an application that mimics one that he would ultimately like to secure with TEAMS. Once he feels at ease and familiar with the way the system works from the client side, he can then progress to a Phase 2 Pilot which entails actually using TEAMS to secure a small number of applications on the potential client’s server as he, at this time, will have installed the TEAMS server on his equipment. That’s all that there is to it!

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