NSA 's Mandrake identifies users based on how they type on their devices. According to a Lockheed IT associate, the National Security Agency ( NSA ) has tested a technology called Mandrake that recognizes swipes on a smartphone's touchscreen. The NSA has developed a new technology, called Mandrake, that can identify users based on how they use a touchscreen. The news was officially announced by Lockheed Martin employees who helped design the technology. According to John Mears, Lockheed's senior associate for IT and Security Solutions, Lockheed Martin recently developed a recognition technology that allows it to identify smartphone users based on how they type. “The National Security Agency has tested a swipe recognition technology for smartphones, according to the program’s creator. The feature, developed by Lockheed Martin, verifies a user’s identity based on the speed and shape of their finger strokes on a touchscreen,” according to Nextgov. Mandrake is able to analyze the curve, unique speed , and acceleration of a finger on a touchscreen, and these properties are different for every person, Mears explains. “No one else has the same strokes,” Mears explains. “Someone might be able to forge your handwriting in two dimensions, but it’s impossible to do it in three or four. The third dimension is the pressure you apply, on a touchscreen just like in two dimensions of paper.
The fourth dimension is time. The most advanced character identification system monitors all four dimensions”. Officially, the NSA developed the Mandrake technology for identity verification and it is already available in the service, but the ubiquitous supporters of citizens' privacy fear a possible use of it for surveillance activities.
“We’ve worked with the National Security Agency on gesture-based identification on smartphones,” says Mears. “It’s completely functional and useful.” John Mears added that this technology could also be used in emergency situations where traditional methods of identity verification aren’t possible. “If you’re driving down the road and you’re going 160, you can’t really type in a complicated 12-character code on a website,” he said. “We also have customers who work with radioactive materials and can’t use a small keyboard with gloves on… how are they going to identify themselves?”
Nextgov also reported that Lockheed Martin participated in other projects with the US Government that could pose a major threat to citizens' privacy, and specifically referred to an FBI project that cost $1 billion and is a biometric identification system that takes into account facial scanning, fingerprint, retina and tattoos. This FBI project, called Next Generation Identification (Next Generation Identification), could in the future identify a person by their voice or the way they walk.
