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    fingerprint reader and privacy

    Discussion in 'Sager and Clevo' started by Haff, Nov 4, 2011.

  1. Haff

    Haff Notebook Enthusiast

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    I am curious about the fingerprint reader.
    what kind of data does it store?
    how secure is that data?
    what happens when i injure my finger and the fingerprint looks different?
    can i completely disable it if i want to?

    thanks.
     
    Haff, Nov 4, 2011
    #1
  2. dave1812

    dave1812 Notebook Deity

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    all I can address is the injury question. The reader is very sensitive to changes in the fingerprint. A tiny bit of dried crazy glue will cause it to fail, for example.
     
    dave1812, Nov 4, 2011
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  3. Haff

    Haff Notebook Enthusiast

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    I think that reason alone will make me want to avoid it. I use my hands a lot and injuries happen. i'll probably try to find a way to stick to just passwords.

    The fingerprint scanners strike me a solution looking for a problem.
     
    Haff, Nov 4, 2011
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  4. daryldeal

    daryldeal Notebook Evangelist

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    actually you can enroll all your fingers fingerprints on it, like what i did. so say i injured my index finger, i can use my thumb etc
     
    daryldeal, Nov 4, 2011
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  5. Anthony@MALIBAL

    Anthony@MALIBAL Company Representative

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    Fingerprint scanners are really more about convenience than security. It's trivially easy to defeat a fingerprint sensor (the Mythbusters episode on them covers it well). As was pointed out though, you can enroll all your fingers and not just one of them. I also believe you can set it to allow you to log in with either the fingerprint reader OR passwords, not just one or the other.
     
    Anthony@MALIBAL, Nov 4, 2011
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  6. Atmosk

    Atmosk Notebook Evangelist

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    Thats default, fyi it handles the fingerprint login as supplemental alternative and regular password login is still there, just thought I'd add that for those curious.
     
    Atmosk, Nov 5, 2011
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  7. zakazak

    zakazak www.whymacsucks.com

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    You can use all your fingers.. so in case you injury one, the others are still there? If all your fingers are gone it will also be hard with a password :)

    But it's not "sensible" for your fingers. After a long hot bath/shower my fingers will still work with the reader. However, my fathers fingers never worked so far. You can always use the reader OR the password. Both of them work.

    Would love to see how easy it is to trick the finger print reader :p

    The reason I use it: I have UAC at max protection and use a standard account. So everytime I install smth or try to make changes to the system the UAC notification pops up. Instead of entering a password I just use the fingerprint reader (left hand). And when the screensaver goes on I use the right hand to log on with my normal account :p So I love that thing !
     
    zakazak, Nov 5, 2011
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  8. Redrud

    Redrud Notebook Enthusiast

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    Can you assign the fingerprint reader to log on different sites on the net?
     
    Redrud, Nov 17, 2011
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