Template Protection is essential for biometrics in order to protect the privacy of users and to overcome security gaps. Xuebing Zhou, employee of the “Identification and Biometrics” competence center at Fraunhofer IGD has taken up the assessment and protection of biometric reference data in her doctorate and developed an assessment framework.

Template Protection improves security and data protection of biometric procedures. However, there are no sufficient measurement methods yet permitting statements about the quality of protection and security. In her dissertation entitled “Privacy and Security assessment of Biometric Template Protection“, Zhou designed a general assessment framework with regard to threat models, protection targets and the corresponding assessment criteria. This can substantiate potential gaps in the privacy protection of existing biometric systems as well as the security of the biometric data and their secure references.

The assessment tool is not only useful for technological innovations and improvement, but also to substantiate data protection and security enhancements. Moreover, the dissertation lays the foundation for a comparability of the criteria.

Xuebing Zhou successfully graduated from Darmstadt Technical University on September 19, 2011. The supervisor of her doctorate thesis was Professor Dr. Dieter W. Fellner, head of Fraunhofer IGD and of the Graphic Interactive Systems and Computer Science department at TU Darmstadt.