The working groups of ISO/IEC JTC1 SC37 on biometrics had another round of virtual meetings in July and progressed a number of relevant standards.
Due to the corona crisis the meetings continued to be organised as virtual meetings, with an interleaved schedule that allowed experts to participate in multiple working groups, and as a result the involvement of experts increased. Working Group 3 (Biometric Data Interchange Formats) hosted up to 60 registered experts over a 4-day meeting.
In addition to the biometric data interchange formats, a second working area of WG3 is the field of biometric sample quality. WG3 discussed the revision of ISO/IEC 29794-1 Biometric sample quality – Part 1: Framework. The discussion concluded with a clarification of the distinction of quality measures resulting in (unified) quality scores that are represented in the range 0 to 100 (with higher being better) and quality components which are measured but not necessarily represented in the range 0 to 100, which can serve as actionable feedback. Moreover, the framework will specify the procedures to register modality specific Quality Algorithm Identifiers (QAID) with the biometric registration authority (IBIA).
WG3 also made good progress on the revision project ISO/IEC 29794-5 Biometric sample quality – Part 5: Face image data, which related to quality requirements from both ISO/IEC 19794-5:2010 and ISO/IEC 39794-5. Good progress was achieved on the definition of numerous quality components, which can constitute elements in a quality vector. Most quality measures will be obtained from the segmented face region produced by landmark detection algorithms thus ignoring potential deficiencies (e.g. lack of sharpness) in the background.
In the joint meeting of WG1, WG2, WG3, WG4 and WG5 it was reported that the revision of ISO/IEC 2382-37:2022 Information technology — Vocabulary — Part 37: Biometrics has recently been published. The development of new concepts in the vocabulary continues and new terms and definitions will be added to the 2027 edition of the vocabulary standard.
Revision project ISO/IEC 30107-1 Biometric presentation attack detection – Part 1: Framework was also discussed in the joint meeting. The intention of the revision is to harmonise with the harmonised vocabulary ISO/IEC 2382-37:2022 and to integrate the concept of bona fide presentation. Moreover, the revision of ISO/IEC 30107-4 was under discussion. This Part 4 is a testing profile for evaluation of mobile devices.
Finally the joint meeting discussed the proposed New Work Item Proposal (NWIP) on vulnerability of face recognition systems with respect to morphing attacks. The proposal suggested the morphing attack potential as a measure for testing and reporting.
The next set of meetings will take place in January 2023.