Amazon Will Pay You $10 in Credit for Your Palm Print Biometrics (techcrunch.com) 96
How much is your palm print worth? If you ask Amazon, it's about $10 in promotional credit if you enroll your palm prints in its checkout-free stores and link it to your Amazon account. From a report: Last year, Amazon introduced its new biometric palm print scanners, Amazon One, so customers can pay for goods in some stores by waving their palm prints over one of these scanners. By February, the company expanded its palm scanners to other Amazon grocery, book and 4-star stores across Seattle.
Amazon has since expanded its biometric scanning technology to its stores across the U.S., including New York, New Jersey, Maryland, and Texas. The retail and cloud giant says its palm scanning hardware "captures the minute characteristics of your palm -- both surface-area details like lines and ridges as well as subcutaneous features such as vein patterns -- to create your palm signature," which is then stored in the cloud and used to confirm your identity when youâ(TM)re in one of its stores.
Amazon has since expanded its biometric scanning technology to its stores across the U.S., including New York, New Jersey, Maryland, and Texas. The retail and cloud giant says its palm scanning hardware "captures the minute characteristics of your palm -- both surface-area details like lines and ridges as well as subcutaneous features such as vein patterns -- to create your palm signature," which is then stored in the cloud and used to confirm your identity when youâ(TM)re in one of its stores.
They can have my palm prints... (Score:3, Funny)
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I'm sure they could get it off all the people you've smacked.
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Mod parent funny. (Mod grandparent meh?)
The extremely rare case where an AC said something witty (though obvious) and got a witty (and subtle) response. And yet I wish you had quoted it within your reply for the benefit of those of us who don't see AC. (And in my case I even dislike following the chain into the depths. (England expects each moderator to do his duty, and in this case the AC joke should have been Funny moderated into visibility.))
Substantively, I already knew Amazon was evil and Jeff doesn't
Interesting this is palm instead of face (Score:1)
Interesting they would use palms instead of facial recognition, but maybe that is because various laws coming around to block use of facial recognition make that approach more of a problem. Or maybe palm scanning is just more reliable.
I don't personally get the pushback the article has on people saying that using palm biometrics is "selling your body" since what else can Amazon do with your palm print? Read your future?
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Interesting they would use palms instead of facial recognition, but maybe that is because various laws coming around to block use of facial recognition make that approach more of a problem. Or maybe palm scanning is just more reliable.
I don't personally get the pushback the article has on people saying that using palm biometrics is "selling your body" since what else can Amazon do with your palm print? Read your future?
Print it out as a glove [pri.org], assassinate a major political figure, leave your palmprint on the glove and dispose of both you and the blame in one go. Apart from that can't really think of anything important I was planning for this week. Why do you ask? Go back to your facebook citizen. Nothing to see here.
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leave your palmprint
Palm-print on gun; glove in furnace. Easy to confuse. You can see why Amazon pretends to have so many accidents in it's warehouses.
Re:Interesting this is palm instead of face (Score:5, Informative)
No, it's not a palm print, it's an image which includes both surface features and the subcutaneous vein pattern. Here's a FAQ:
https://one.amazon.com/how-it-... [amazon.com]
Full Disclosure: I work at Amazon, but nothing to do with this.
I've worked in physical security (key cards, alarms, cameras, and the like) for the last decade and a half and hand scanners were always the most loathed and least trusted device in that industry. Went out of calibration if you looked at them wrong, broke if you winked at them, and were either so touchy they would deny you if you got a scratch gardening or so permissive as to be useless. I was part of the Alpha test group for this thing, and was impressed. Not only did it work reliably and consistently, but it was calibrated one initial install and the test group said that they had moved the scanners to half a dozen sites and not needed to recalibrate it. Apparently they think it's tough enough for retail installations.
Re:Interesting this is palm instead of face (Score:4, Interesting)
Or maybe palm scanning is just more reliable.
A long time ago I had to get fingerprinted for a job at NASA Langley Research Center, but had to wait a week because my fingers were torn up a bit from working on my car and the fingerprints weren't clean. Other than not wanting to give Amazon my biometric info, especially for a stupid reason like saving 5s in a grocery-store checkout line, unless they offered another way to pay, I would hate to think I couldn't buy food because I had a cut or abrasion on my hand...
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NASA has a research Center near the CIA headquarters? Interesting.
In case you're not joking, NASA Langley Research Center is in Hampton, Virginia next to Langley Air Force base.
Re: Interesting this is palm instead of face (Score:2)
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I was. I had to look it up though. Apparently the cia headquarters often called langley, is in McClean, VA. I never could find anything geographically on the map that identified an actual Langley. Maybe that got renamed to McClean.
Actually, "McLean", and I've lived there too.
As for the similar names... Langley, VA [wikipedia.org] and Langley AFB [wikipedia.org] (for anyone else interested):
Langley [Virginia] is an unincorporated community in the census-designated place of McLean in Fairfax County, Virginia, United States". The land which makes up Langley today once belonged to Thomas Lee, former Crown Governor of the Colony of Virginia from 1749 to 1750. Lee's land was named Langley in honor of Langley Hall, which was part of the Lee home estate in Shropshire, England.
Langley Air Force Base, originally known as Langley Field, is named after Samuel Pierpont Langley, an aerodynamic pioneer and a former Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution.
Re: Interesting this is palm instead of face (Score:2)
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"Other than not wanting to give Amazon my biometric info, especially for a stupid reason like saving 5s in a grocery-store checkout line,"
5s? I want to live where you live, Buttfuck, Idaho?
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"Other than not wanting to give Amazon my biometric info, especially for a stupid reason like saving 5s in a grocery-store checkout line,"
5s? I want to live where you live, Buttfuck, Idaho?
I get what you're trying to imply, but I live in Virginia Beach VA and my grocery-store check-out lines are usually actually about that long, at least when I usually go shopping in the mid afternoon. I used to go in the middle of the night, but the stores aren't open that late any more since the pandemic started...
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"I get what you're trying to imply, but I live in Virginia Beach VA and my grocery-store check-out lines are usually actually about that long, at least when I usually go shopping in the mid afternoon. I used to go in the middle of the night, but the stores aren't open that late any more since the pandemic started..."
I try everything, but there's always a granny before me wanting to pay with pennies and no glasses, some dude who feels lonesome and tries to talk the cashier up, the girl who 'just forgot one q
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I try everything, but there's always a granny before me wanting to pay with pennies and no glasses, some dude who feels lonesome and tries to talk the cashier up, the girl who 'just forgot one quick thing, be right back', the guy who forgot his wallet and his cousin who forgot his pin ...
Many of the stores I go to have self-checkout areas -- I can usually get by with just a (full) hand basket for shopping as it's just me -- so there's not much of that dilly-dallying you described -- which would actually be entertaining in this case. :-)
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>unless they offered another way to pay
So you would do it if it was the only way to do business with Amazon? Pathetic.
No I wouldn't. Sorry, my sentence structure/punctuation may have been misleading ...
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Actually seems pretty robust. Went into the Fresh store (I live a mile away from the first one) after gardening all day and it still had no issue reading my hand, I was impressed. BTW, the Fresh store also has a traditional checkout lane, although they don't take cash.
Re:Interesting this is palm instead of face (Score:5, Informative)
The problem with biometrics as combined identity & authentication is that you can't change them if they're ever compromised. I think they're better used locally on a phone, for example, where the biometric hashes are just stored in a local chip enclave, and not stored on the cloud.
Amazon is one of the few companies that seems to take their security seriously, but even so, breaches are not impossible, even for them. I don't consider myself overly paranoid about such things, but I'm not sure I'd be comfortable until I learn quite a bit more about how these would be stored and used. In fact, I'm not sure I'd be willing at all until very firm laws are in place nation-wide dealing with the use and storage of biometric data.
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The problem with biometrics as combined identity & authentication is that you can't change them if they're ever compromised.
Not arguing with you in general and not defending this use case specifically, but from TFA:
Amazon also says it stores palm data indefinitely, unless you choose to delete the data once there are no outstanding transactions left, or if you don’t use the feature for two years.
So I imagine you could pay off your bill, delete and recreate your data -- or not shop there for 2 years then recreate it. :-)
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you can't change them if they're ever compromised
I see this idea come up every time biometrics are mentioned. It sounds more insightful than it is. A palm print, fingerprint, whatever, is not a password. It does not consist of secret data. What makes biometrics secure is not that bad guys don't know them, but that bad guys can't fake them. That requires that they are read and processed by a secure device, one which is trusted by the system to only take input from its sensors and to be robust against forgery of the biological markers. It does *not* require
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You completely ignored the GP's comment that you quoted.
When my palm print has been compromised and someone else is buying shit from Amazon with it, what do I do?
If my password gets compromised, I change it.
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No, you're still not getting it. If your palm print has been compromised, that's fine. Knowledge of your palm print cannot be used as a substitute for the palm in question, because the device that authenticates your palm ensures that it's scanning a palm, not a copy of one. Of course this requires that the tech is sound, but that's true of any authentication method.
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OK, I'll bite, how is someone going to "compromise" your palm data and buy something with it? You need to present your hand at the reader, and it's not just an image but also details of the subcutaneous vein pattern. The technology just plain does not exist to fake this. I suppose they could cut your hand off and present it, but without the blood flow the IR signature of the veins won't be correct and it still wouldn't work.
This actually seems to be one of the better thought-out schemes in the entire bio
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Amazon never sells customer data, ever. It's kept at the highest security level, we have to take periodic tests to remind us of the data security model. It's literally easier to get Jeff Bezos' personnel data than to access your customer record.
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The problem with biometrics is you can't change them. Once some company or agency gets ahold of them there's nothing you can do to prevent them tracking you with them.
Other than the crappy design of certain NFC readers, I really don't see what's so hard about using Google Pay, Apple Pay, etc. Wave a device you always have with you over a pad. Quick and easy.
If Amazon wanted to they could offer you $10 to try using a small nfc wristband instead of this crap. At least you could change the wristband if you wan
Tracking how though? (Score:1)
Once some company or agency gets ahold of them there's nothing you can do to prevent them tracking you with them.
Well, they are going to do that no matter what so it doens't matter anyway but in this case specifically...
How are they going to track me using my palm exactly? It's not like you leave "palm prints" in the same way you do fingerprints, you would need a scanner to read my palm.
The face stuff I get because anyone can track you with any security camera, but palms require hardware and my intent.
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A Bill Gates microchip is better. You can disable it by putting your head in a microwave.
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A Bill Gates microchip is better. You can disable it by putting your head in a microwave.
And, give yourself a tan!
(P.S. Werd Al reference).
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"I don't personally get the pushback the article has on people saying that using palm biometrics is "selling your body" since what else can Amazon do with your palm print? Read your future?"
Exactly! From the life-line on your palm, they can see when to show you ads for coffins.
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"Interesting they would use palms instead of facial recognition, "
Not at all.
Amazon has warehouses in California too and millions of people there have different facial features almost every week.
One of these days (Score:2)
they'll ask you for your DNA so they can create a clone army of every person to take over the world.
DNA and rights to your offspring under the eula (Score:2)
DNA and rights to your offspring under the eula.
For that $10 is an joke maybe 10M for that.
$10 for biometric information what could go wrong? (Score:5, Insightful)
And it's a $10 credit for purchases on Amazon.
What's the tipping point where people say enough is enough with Amazon? They started as a really great way to get books but have not so slowly turned into a company run by a Bond Villain.
What's my DNA worth if I spit in their face?
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I have bought 1 thing in my life off Amazon and I could have got it elsewhere.
On the other hand, I've bought a bunch of stuff off Amazon that I cannot find locally and/or from other online retailers. Even if I could, buy them online elsewhere, then I'd probably have to have multiple accounts with multiple retailers rather than just one with Amazon.
Their site is ... filled with overpriced disposable Chinese sh1te
I've purchased many things off Amazon that were/are made in the USA (and other countries). Furthermore, Walmart sells a bunch of stuff made in China (as do many, many other retailers) so I'm not sure what your argument is here.
Lastly, I
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Call Amazon evil, duplicitous, and creepy all you like—you'll get no argument from me. But to say you don't see the appeal is frankly bizarre. It's usually cheaper than B&M stores, has fast shipping, and features a wider variety of products than you'll pretty much anywhere else. The only time Amazon doesn't have what I want is when I'm looking for a very niche specialty product. Even then, they've improved a lot over the last couple of years.
the laws may stop this from happening state by sta (Score:2)
the laws may stop this from happening state by state
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the laws may stop this from happening state by state
I can see states and provinces and even countries saying that Amazon can't use it in their stores but that will be long after Amazon has collected millions of people's information - I don't think they'll care that they can't use it in store check out.
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I know he is a super villain. Him, Musk, Jobs, the person running John Deere, what ever group run the cable news companies. Maybe Gates, but him quitting and all the charity make it seem not likely.
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Re:$10 for biometric information what could go wro (Score:5, Informative)
What's the tipping point where people say enough is enough with Amazon? They started as a really great way to get books but have not so slowly turned into a company run by a Bond Villain.
So many sellers use the Amazon platform and Amazon warehousing & logistics because it eliminates this as a start-up cost now, so it's harder and harder not to have anything to do with this accursed company. Did you know, for example, that opening a seller account get's you warehouse space where Amazon Logistics will handle receiving, racking, inventory, picking and shipping? To a small business, that is gold right there: a major cost center for a small business simply gone for a small monthly fee.
Walmart is getting here - and Walmart doesn't abuse their employees anything like Amazon does. But there is no such thing as Walmart Logistics for sellers.
But to your point, the tipping point is getting further and further away as the company becomes more ubiquitous. Did you see the report where Amazon now has over a million employees? Like, one out one every 167 people who work in the United States is an Amazon employee?
My wife and I have tried to break with Amazon for a few years now, but they generally have a better price than anywhere else. If there is price equivalency, or as near as dammit, then the other person get my money. But our monthly Amazon spend is still in the hundreds of dollars a month.
The other problem is their range. Right now, I'm buying the bits to make a Raspberry Pi ESXi VMware setup as a homelab. The Pi's I bought from PiShop, because I could easily (and at a better price; I wanted the bare boards, not CanaKits where I'd toss most the rest of the box). But the other stuff necessary, like a hub, rack for the Pi's, PSU etc... I could find them elsewhere, I'm sure. But for the sheer convenience of one shopping cart for all these bits and one place to keep track of the orders, it's hard to go past Amazon.
If there was a tipping point to be done with Amazon, it's long gone. And that's a shame.
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The other problem is their range. Right now, I'm buying the bits to make a Raspberry Pi ESXi VMware setup as a homelab. The Pi's I bought from PiShop, because I could easily (and at a better price; I wanted the bare boards, not CanaKits where I'd toss most the rest of the box). But the other stuff necessary, like a hub, rack for the Pi's, PSU etc... I could find them elsewhere, I'm sure. But for the sheer convenience of one shopping cart for all these bits and one place to keep track of the orders, it's hard to go past Amazon.
It's probably not better in the long run, but I'm buying all parts like your Raspberry Pi ESXi from AliExpress - won't get the same turn but maybe save a few bucks as well as avoiding Amazon.
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Walmart doesn't abuse their employees anything like Amazon does
WT everlasting F are you babbling about? Most full time employees at Walmart still qualify for food stamps, and the Walmart HR department hands out brochures detailing welfare programs that employees might need to use to stay above water. The only reason that there is any discussion about a $15/hr minimum wage is because Amazon forced all of its contractors to pay that as a minimum (and most places they pay more). Amazon had already spent $800 million dollars on COVID remediation by the end of May last y
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I'm debating if I should give them my prints or not.
On one hand, I don't trust them to keep that data safe. On the other hand if I'm ever accused of a crime, it would be nice to be able to throw some doubt on the fingerprint evidence, if any.
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First off, it's not fingerprint data, it's a scan of your palm surface and its subsurface details. Second, they wouldn't hand that data over to police or anyone else without a search warrant (and then it wouldn't be any sort of usable data for anything other than an Amazon One hand scanner).
You wouldn't trust Amazon to keep your data safe? The company with multiple security teams larger than the IT departments of most Fortune 500 companies? Really?
Practical (Score:1)
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TEH MARK OF TEH BEEST! (Score:1)
The mark of the beast was inside your hand the entire time! AAHHH!
(Funny how the nuts who want to apply this label to any new technology of their choosing never picked up on regular ol' credit cards, which have been a turnkey mark-of-the-beast system since the days they were used with carbon paper, just waiting for someone to turn the key. With the difficulty of buying many things without a credit card these days, I'd say the key is already in the ACC position).
For $10.. (Score:2)
...they can have a biometric print of my butt.
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...they can have a biometric print of my butt.
We should all do this. Or use someone else's hand. Anything to pollute their database.
Soon (Score:3)
"Cybercriminals today made off with $500,000 in e-scooters on Amazon after they waved a print-out of somebody's hand they found on Facebook. The victims apparently uploaded a high-res picture of them waving hello to a camera, and their palms were clearly visible.
Facebook have stated that they *would* smudge the palm-prints of all photos in an attempt to stop the cyber attacks, but that this would be a violation of their Social Media freedoms."
Re:Soon ...palm vein pattern is concealed (Score:2)
Forgot some zeroes (Score:2)
Is that the market rate? (Score:2)
I'm holding out for $1000 ... per year for my biometrics. I'm willing to lease them but not sell them, especially not for a pitiful $10.
I created my finger and palm prints with my body, and I consider them my intellectual property and copyrighted for at least the remainder of my life.
10 bucks? (Score:2)
For $10 credit? Hell no!
For a percentage of gross revenue? Now we're talkin'...
NO WAY.....but (Score:2)
Amazon, Facebook, Google, the trifecta of companies I do NOT trust .
How bout $10/day? (Score:2)
I've switched to a subscription model to better optimize Amazon's experience with my biometric data.
which is then stored in the cloud (Score:4, Insightful)
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Well, AWS hasn't had a data breech since its foundation in 2006. not sure how much more you can ask.
Best I can do... (Score:3)
Make it $10/visit (Score:1)
If they made it $10 each time I went into the store... I'd consider it.... briefly... before rejecting it.
Data protection (Score:2)
There's a reason they only do this in the US.
Because in other parts of the world, I'd give you my print, get my money, and then demand you delete my personal information with legal consequences if you don't.
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Zero. Won't work without blood flowing through the hand.
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I think it's blood flow, same as the higher quality fingerprint readers, but that's just my guess. On the other hand the scanner generates its verification template using subdurmel veins, which would collapse without blood pressure.
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... most countries in South America have been using palm readers in their ATMs for a decade or more.
And that makes it a good idea to have a single data point used as both identification AND authentication? Just because something is being done somewhere else doesn't mean it's a good idea here.
I found it really convenient to just hold out my hand and have it give me money.
Good for you, you opted for convenience over security.
No pin or other interaction if you just want the default express cash withdrawal from checking.
So all someone would need to do to get money out of your account would be to knock you out, drag your limp body, or just your hand, to the atm and they get your money. Another option would be for them to knock you out and make a mold of your hand before they st
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Cool.
Wake me up when it's a true authentication process and allows you to revoke a credential.
They will sell it (Score:2)
Amazon will clean it up a little and sell them in bulk along with other verified metadata.
And for those that say "it cant be faked", sure it can if there is enough incentive.
The recognition has to have enough fuzz to verify quickly so defeat is likely something simple.
A warm oven mitt, a little metallic ink and some plasticine.
Everything has a security hole. There are no magic exceptions.
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Amazon never sells customer data. Right there you've shown your utter ignorance about the entire topic.
Here's a FAQ about how the Amazon One device works, on the off-chance you *don't* want to sound like an ignoramus next time.
https://one.amazon.com/how-it-... [amazon.com]
Thus demonstrating (Score:2)
The value of your personal information to them.
Here's the NO thread. (Score:2)
Feel free to post your "No."s below.
Dunno what /.'s comment reply limit is.
Royalties (Score:2)
And remember, (Score:1)
You only have one set of biometrics. (Score:2)
And selling to.... (Score:2)
Only $10? (Score:2)
How about 10 trillion dollars?
Stupid... (Score:2)
Only stupid people would go along with this.
That is why Amazon could grow so big.
10 $ bucks? (Score:1)
EW... community hand grease! (Score:1)