Authors:
Max T. Curran
1
;
Nick Merrill
1
;
Swapan Gandhi
2
and
John Chuang
1
Affiliations:
1
BioSENSE Lab, UC Berkeley School of Information, Berkeley, California and U.S.A.
;
2
Starkey Hearing Research Center, Berkeley, California and U.S.A.
Keyword(s):
Usable Security, Multi-factor Authentication, Wearable Authentication, Passthoughts, Biosensing.
Related
Ontology
Subjects/Areas/Topics:
Applications
;
Biomedical Engineering
;
Biomedical Instruments and Devices
;
Biomedical Signal Processing
;
Biosignal Acquisition, Analysis and Processing
;
Brain-Computer Interfaces
;
Collaboration and e-Services
;
Devices
;
e-Business
;
Enterprise Information Systems
;
Health Information Systems
;
Human-Computer Interaction
;
Methodologies and Methods
;
Pattern Recognition
;
Physiological Computing in Mobile Devices
;
Physiological Computing Systems
;
Physiology-Driven Computer Interaction
;
Software Engineering
;
Usability
;
Usability and Ergonomics
;
Wearable Sensors and Systems
;
Web Information Systems and Technologies
;
Web Interfaces and Applications
Abstract:
Multi-factor authentication presents a robust method to secure our private information, but typically requires multiple actions by the user resulting in a high cost to usability and limiting adoption. A usable system should also be unobtrusive and inconspicuous. We present and discuss a system with the potential to engage all three factors of authentication (inherence, knowledge, and possession) in a single step using an earpiece that implements brain-based authentication using electroencephalography (EEG). We demonstrate its potential by collecting EEG data using manufactured custom-fit earpieces with embedded electrodes and testing a variety of authentication scenarios. Across all participants’ best-performing “passthoughts”, we are able to achieve 0% false acceptance and 0.36% false rejection rates, for an overall accuracy of 99.82%, using one earpiece with three electrodes. Furthermore, we find no successful attempts simulating impersonation attacks. We also report on perspective
s from our participants. Our results suggest that a relatively inexpensive system using a single electrode-laden earpiece could provide a discreet, convenient, and robust method for one-step multi-factor authentication.
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