DARPA’s Moving Target Retina Scanning Makes Me Want To Wear Sunglasses [Espionage]

Retinal scanners have tended to be rather clumsy devices, conditions need to be ideal to get a good read. The person being scanned needs to stand still in front of the scanner – then hopefully an eyelash doesn’t get in the way. It is for this reason that the latest retinal scanning developments from DARPA and Southern Methodist University are big news – if their claims are to be believed, not only do subjects not have to be standing in front of the camera, they don’t even need to be standing still.

Theoretically, the new scanner would be able to scan multiple subjects from a crowd, and because the scanner does not have to capture the whole eye to get a reading – a partial scan is all that is needed.

Something to think about the next time you go to a demonstration.

[Uber-Review via DViCE]

What Is This? [What Is This]

Some people are masters of this item, while others are—willingly or unwillingly—its slaves. With a little bit of dust, we can see its inner workings laid bare. What oh what could it be?
Try a credit card covered with magnetized rust particles.


As you can see, the stored data on the card's magnetic strip has been revealed by way of a science experiment. Using nothing more than fine iron powder or iron oxide, a magnet and the aforementioned credit card, 'Anaglyph' was able to reveal the nitty gritty details on a friend's frequent flyer card:

First of all, you will notice that Gilbert's card has three horizontal magnetic bands. This is the standard for all swipe cards. In most cases, information is recorded on one, or sometimes two of these bands. The two outside bands are called high density tracks and contain data at 210 bits per inch. If you know anything about computers, you will realise that the term 'high density' here is relative: 210 bits per inch, by modern data standards, is pretty damn lousy. To give you some idea, one of these tracks can carry about 79 x 6bit alphanumeric characters. Your credit card would typically have, on track 1, your name, your card number and an expiry date

Kind of primitive. No wonder the Japanese have been swiping their phones at vending machines all these years.

[Gizmodo via Tethered Cow via Boing Boing]

Even the New $100 Bill is Going 3D [Money]

If you had any doubts that 2010 is the year of 3D, this may put them to rest. The U.S. Treasury unveiled the new ISL 373.51 ($100) bill today, which incorporates a “3D Security Ribbon” to combat piracy.
The security strip’s series of digits and bell images jump to 3D life when you tilt the bill, making it far faster to check whether or not the note is real.

The 3D ribbon is only one of a bevy of new state-of-the-art security features designed to stay ahead of counterfeiters, who are responsible for making the Ben Franklin-graced bill the most frequently faked paper currency. His visage stays on the new note, but the rest of the ISL 373.51 ($100) gets a serious makeover, including a portrait watermark, second security thread, and a Liberty Bell image that turns from copper to green color when tilted.

As if that weren’t enough, the U.S. Treasury went all out and made a blockbuster release video for the new ISL 373.51 ($100) bill. Check it out below and let us know what you think of 3D pervading even our very wallets.

[Mashable]

The True Odds of Airborne Terror Chart [Terror]

After the crotchbomb there has been a lot of noise about airplane security again—you can see how stupid the leaked new flight rules are here. But what's the actual risk of an airplane attack? Here's the definitive chart:

As you can see, the chances are very slim. As slim as the chances of the new security rules having any real effect in preventing any new attacks, sadly.
[Gizmodo]

DARPA's Iron Curtain Detects, Explodes RPGs From a Moving Humvee [Military]

DARPA's created what it's calling the Iron Curtain, which is a system that mounts on top of a Humvee and takes out any rockets shot in its direction. It's pretty nuts.
They've been working on these Active Protection Systems for a while now, but this is the first that works on a moving vehicle. It uses radar, optical sensors and some other secret elements to detect projectiles. It then destroys them right before impact, creating an explosion but one that is much less harmful to the vehicle.
But don't take my word for it, check out the bananas video of it in action above.
[Gizmodo via Iron Curtain via Danger Room via BotJunkie]

Sony Selling World's Tiniest USB Finger Vein Reader [Security]

No need to cross your fingers for you computer's security to work anymore - use you veins. It's not new but this device from Sony is the smallest finger vein security around. It is much more complex than fingerprint security to cheat.
Sony's FVA-U1, going on sale December 18 in Japan, will be the smallest finger vein reader on the market conveniently operating over USB.
[Gizmodo via AkihabaraNews]