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Ethical Issues in Governing Biometric Technologies

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Ethics and Policy of Biometrics (ICEB 2010)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNSC,volume 6005))

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Abstract

This article deals with the ethical considerations raised by the collection, storage and use of biometric data. Comparisons are drawn with human genetic databases. It will be shown that besides ethical assessment of new technologies, it is also interesting to see how the advancement of these technologies has posed challenges to existing ethical frameworks, putting collective values and public interests above individual rights. The comparison of biometric databases with medical research oriented genetic databases shows that public interest may be differently constructed: while genetic databases projects create a discourse of hope, biometric databases are surrounded by a discourse of threat. What both have in common is the imbalanced discussion of benefits and risks. The lack of knowledge and understanding of possible benefits and drawbacks of new technologies makes it difficult to build and maintain authentic public trust, which is of crucial importance for good ethical governance of databases.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Tartu, Estonia

    Margit Sutrop

Authors
  1. Margit Sutrop
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Biometrics Research Laboratory, Department of Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, New Delhi, India

    Ajay Kumar

  2. Department of Computing, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong

    David Zhang

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Sutrop, M. (2010). Ethical Issues in Governing Biometric Technologies. In: Kumar, A., Zhang, D. (eds) Ethics and Policy of Biometrics. ICEB 2010. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 6005. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-12595-9_14

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-12595-9_14

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-12594-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-12595-9

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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