Ohlthaver & List using Fujitsu biometrics system to secure SAP data

Ohlthaver & List, Namibia’s largest privately held group of companies outside of the mining sector, employing over 5,500 people in various sectors including food production, beverages, retail trade, property leasing, marine engineering, steelworks and hospitality, is testing Fujitsu PalmVein technology, in an effort to secure SAP data.

The firm has implemented employee fingerprint-based self-service kiosks since 2013 and has steadily added users. Use of real-time fingerprint scans for employees ensures timely access to personal data by employees and protection from data theft from others who may have spotted a password or stolen a smart card.

“Due to the diversity of our portfolio, our people work in numerous locations and many of them, in subsidiaries, where not everyone has his own PC,” says Rainer Rusch, Group IT Manager at Ohlthaver & List. “Just one example is our ‘Pick n Pay’ supermarkets, which are spread across the entire country. However, quick and secure access to personal data is important, but cannot be guaranteed via the traditional postal route.”

To provide everyone with constant access to employee data and pay systems, even in remote locations, Ohlthaver & List has used the kiosks to link employees with its SAP software, which is an enterprise system that manages business operations. The firm is now testing a Fujitsu PalmSecure biolock solution in an effort to increase the security and efficiency of its kiosks to include palm vein recognition. The small, but extremely smart vein scanner device can easily be integrated into the existing bioLock solutions and replace fingerprint authentication.

“The Fujitsu PalmSecure palm vein scanner is very interesting to us as it is has a lower error rate and is much faster than the current fingerprint method,” says Rainer. “This is important as we constantly add users and functionalities such as pay slip access. Therefore, we need to make sure that even in peak times employees can have a quick update.”

Rainer notes his IT department has examined additional use cases for biometric authentication with other various departments for completely different requirements, including improvement of maintenance procedures in production plants, as well as fraud prevention in finance.

Besides speed and stability, other advantages of PalmVain scanning include simultaneous dual approval functionality and contactless authentication which allows improving hygiene standards.

Article Topics

access control  |  biometrics  |  contactless biometrics  |  data protection  |  fingerprint authentication  |  Fujitsu  |  palm vein