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worldcoin / orb-software

Software for the orb
https://worldcoin.github.io/orb-software
Apache License 2.0
215 stars 30 forks source link

Could fingerprint scanning and facial recognition be used for onboarding? #228

Open rajjanorkar opened 3 days ago

rajjanorkar commented 3 days ago

I had a random thought – instead of using the special orb device for onboarding, could we consider using fingerprint and/or facial recognition for signups?

This idea came to mind as, in India, I can perform banking transactions with just fingerprint recognition. With billions of people already registered under the AADHAAR system, fingerprints seem sufficient to uniquely identify individuals.

TheButlah commented 2 days ago

Good question! We elaborate on why we need custom hardware here: https://whitepaper.worldcoin.org/#why-custom-hardware-is-needed

We explain why fingerprints are not a viable approach here: https://whitepaper.worldcoin.org/#biometrics

There is also an explanation here: skip to 31:42

Basically, fingerprints on your phone or face-id are sufficient for re-authentication (is this person different from one specific person). But it's not sufficient for global uniqueness (is this person different from billions of other people)

AADHAAR does solve the global uniqueness problem, from what I've heard. But it's not privacy preserving. It's also not trustless or decentralized, the Indian government regulates and controls it. It's also not open to anyone in the world - you need to be a resident of India to use it.

rajjanorkar commented 9 hours ago

@TheButlah, thanks for your response! I'll review it thoroughly. For mass adoption, I was thinking if we could come up with an innovative solution that allows users to sign up on their own without needing custom hardware, we could achieve that more quickly. Of course, we'd still need to consider factors like privacy, uniqueness, and more.