NZ face biometrics service passes BixeLab test with no significant bias

Radio New Zealand calls it a “good news IT story for a change.” The facial recognition system New Zealand’s government has put in place for online identity verification has passed an evaluation of demographic differentials carried out by BixeLab.

The Identity Check system confirms the identity of users with face biometrics and liveness detection, and has been used by New Zealand’s Ministry of Social Development to enable access for 70,000 users already.

The system was found by Australia’s BixeLab to exhibit “no significant bias,” Tim Waldron, leader of the Identity Check project for the Department of Internal Affairs told RNZ. The test is the first of its kind for New Zealand’s indigenous ethnicities. It involved tests with a representative sample of 150 New Zealanders.

The biometric bias test is just the latest in a series of pioneering evaluations carried out by BixeLab, including a recent test of ZeroBiometrics’ template protection.

Waldron says the latest stats show Identity Check has a 94 percent success rate, with little difference for Māori, Pasifika and Pākehā users. MSD says it is saving each user an average of seven minutes, on top of any travel time they may have needed to carry out interactions in person.

The biometric system will be rolled out to more government departments, with a budget of just NZ$850,000 (roughly US$515,000) over three years.

In return, a government report says the country’s economy could be boosted by billions of dollars, as biometric verification enables quick and secure access to a widening array of public and private services. RNZ notes that it is expected to be a key enabling capability for an upcoming launch of mobile driver’s licenses (mDLs).

New Zealand’s government enlisted BixeLab’s help earlier this year to address concerns about potential exclusion resulting from the use of face biometrics, and the country’s Privacy Commission is working to finalize a Code of Practice for biometrics.

Identity Check stores biometric data in a Datacom cloud and deletes all images within 31 days.

Article Topics

biometric bias  |  biometric liveness detection  |  biometric testing  |  biometrics  |  BixeLab  |  face biometrics  |  facial recognition  |  Identity Check  |  Māori  |  New Zealand