| ABSTRACT: |
The hardware and biometrics authentication market presently has the nature of a
loose confederation of clones. Although similar technologies are being used
among token, smart card, and biometrics vendors, the applications for which
they are being used vary dramatically depending upon the type of market,
whether for commercial/corporate or government markets. The overall hardware
authentication market remains highly fragmented, with many applications. For
this report, IDC has placed such vendors into markets according to their lowest
common denominator technologies. However, comparisons among vendors within each
of these submarkets, especially for biometrics, cannot be directly made.
Because of September 11, 2001, and the creation of a Homeland Defense
initiative in the United States, the awareness of security with respect to
physical and logical access has significantly increased. Historically, IDC has
only reported revenue obtained from IT authentication products. However, this
year's report includes revenue obtained from both IT authentication and
physical access products.
Within the biometrics market, IDC has categorized the market according to seven
technology sectors -- facial scan, signature verification, iris scan, finger
scan, voice authentication, hand/finger geometry, and keystroke dynamics.
Featured vendors include Viisage, Iridian Technologies, EyeDentify, Identix,
Digital Persona, SecuGen, Nuance, Veritel, SAFLINK, Visionics, and Net Nanny.
For the token authentication market, IDC has divided the market into hardware
tokens, universal serial bus (USB) tokens, software licensing authentication
tokens (SLATs), and other forms of hardware authentication. Featured vendors
within this space include RSA Security, Ensure Technologies, Secure Computing,
ActivCard, Rainbow Technologies, Aladdin Knowledge Systems, Griffin
Technologies, Spyrus, and VASCO.
IDC has tracked the use of smart cards for IT authentication and physical
access purposes. However, smart cards are most popularly used for stored value
and telecommunications applications. Smart card vendors, such as Datakey,
Gemplus, SchlumbergerSema, SSP Solutions, and Oberthur, are increasingly adding
multifunctional capabilities to their cards. This new trend may enhance the
deployment of the cards in the future.
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