Video: An advanced Tamagotchi-like gadget sustained by its owner鈥檚 presence could be a more secure way to safeguard your secrets
Portable electronic pets able to recognise their owner鈥檚 voice and walking style could replace passwords and PINs as a way to keep personal details and accounts secure, say UK researchers.
Other experts, though, say the advanced Tamagotchi plan still needs some work.
Called 鈥渂iometric daemons鈥�, they borrow a concept from Philip Pullman鈥檚 His Dark Materials books, in which people are accompanied by an .
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, a psychologist and computer scientist at Northumbria University and computer scientist at Newcastle University, both in the UK, think their take on the idea could match the security of biometric security systems, and avoid the privacy fears these systems raise.
Pets not passwords
Instead of a person鈥檚 biometric signature being stored on a distant database, they would reside only in the daemon 鈥� a small gadget carried around by its owner.
Like a real pet, that daemon would learn to imprint itself on its owner. After that it would thrive on their unique biometric signals, such as their voiceprint, fingerprints or walking style.
The human-daemon bond would be further cemented by games and interaction between the two. 鈥淭hink how people bond with babies,鈥� says Briggs. 鈥淵ou would do the same things with your daemon 鈥� cuddle it, stroke it, play verbal games.鈥�
In the presence of its owner, those nourishing signals make the daemon 鈥渉appy鈥� and able to verify the owner鈥檚 identity, just like a PIN or password.
Dead daemon
However, a daemon separated from its owner would no longer receive nourishment in this way and would pine away and die, just as Pullman鈥檚 daemons die when separated from their humans.
The idea might sound bizarre, but Olivier says that the elements needed to make a prototype daemon already exist.
Accelerometers 鈥� similar to those used in the 鈥� could detect an individual鈥檚 gait, and speech recognition software could identify a unique voiceprint. 鈥淭he main problem would be with battery life,鈥� Olivier says.
The researchers are reluctant to discuss exactly what form that the daemons would take (see video, top right).
鈥淭he key thing is not the daemon鈥檚 physical form, but the way one interacts with it,鈥� says Briggs. The daemon could be made in any form, she says, depending on what people relate to best 鈥� for example, a toy animal.
鈥業mmature idea鈥�
If a person lost their daemon, their access to their online life would be lost too, says Briggs, so a way to get a new one would be needed.
Reaction to the idea from security experts is mixed. 鈥淲ork on agents and daemons does not tend to be very rigorous, says at the University of Cambridge, UK. 鈥淚t is difficult to find very much scientific or mathematical content to sink one鈥檚 teeth into.鈥�
at Florida State University, Tallahassee, US, says the idea is interesting, but so far immature. 鈥淚t is hard to predict its potential,鈥� says Yasinsac. 鈥淔or instance, to understand how nurturing could become irreversible.鈥�
was presented at the Usability, Psychology, and Security 2008 conference in San Francisco, California, last month.
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