Re: Security of Windows fingerprint reader

[Ken Shaurette <kmshaurette () MPCCORP COM>]

Some of these integrated devices such as for laptops allow replacement or setting up security such as the fingerprint 
is necessary for BIOS startup.  Some of these devices along with software provide encryption of files on the hard 
drive. 

As Mark points out in general most of the solutions only provide local replacement of passwords to access the laptop.  
In many cases they do not prevent someone from pulling the hard drive on a stolen or lost laptop and putting it in a 
similar device or in a standalone hard drive shell in order to access the data on it.  I have not tested whether data 
encrypted by a fingerprint solution in that case will remain safe, but I assume how safe would be dependent on the 
solution. 

A solution such as Utimaco's encryption that allows complete HD encryption becomes a very secure way to go when 
protecting the data, but again as Mark points out key management is critical, passwords under the keyboard still 
eliminate the value of any solution dependent on them.  Losing the passwords is another side problem with that. 

Educated and competent users, along with multiple layers of security still is about the only way to adequately reduce 
the risk.   How much security is enough?  Anyone could make a million dollars if they had the right answer to that 
question or to the question;  What is reasonable?

Ken 

Ken M. Shaurette, CISSP, CISA, CISM 
Information Security Solutions Manager
MPC Security Solutions Group, www.mpcscorp.com 
(262) 523-3300 x60486 
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October is CyberSecurity Month - Awareness does not end when the day is done!! 
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-----Original Message-----
From: Hart, Mark Smylie [mailto:mshart () UIUC EDU] 
Sent: Tuesday, June 07, 2005 10:03 AM
To: SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU
Subject: Re: [SECURITY] Security of Windows fingerprint reader


These devices will allow you to login to Windows, but only if the computer is in a workgroup...this feature is disabled 
for domain logins.

That may not have much of an impact on you, but one thing that concerned me about the one glowing brilliantly next to 
my keyboard is that it won't work with Firefox.

I don't touch the fingerprint reader anymore because of that ($35- down the drain).

It works in IE just fine, but some of the security measures it uses are kind of sketchy.  In the registry it keeps 
track of usernames and passwords.  I can't really fault the password hashing because it's not clear to me on how to 
de-code it...but the usernames are kept in there and if you view that key, you can see the username in clear text.
(HKLM\Software\DigitalPersona\DB\Data\IdList\#\User)

Also, in the Documents and Settings folder you can see the applications/pages for which a password has been stored 
(look for shortcut.ini).  You can't see the password, but from the registry you'd have a username and from here you'd 
get the application/site name.

Also, on some pages if I only stored a password and not a username, it would paste my password into the username field 
in clear text!! - probably because the username field was the first available field for data entry.

These issues and others have led us to NOT recommend this to users, and to explain to them that this is a password 
management utility...not a security device.  In that regard it can be quite useful, especially to staff who may have 
umpteen passwords that all have different length/complexity requirements...this will make life very much easier, but 
this is not a security device (nor would I consider it a very secure
device) - just a useful tool.

If you can wrap your head around it that way, you may ultimately be much better off.


Mark Smylie Hart
Network Security Officer
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
T - 217.333.4676
E - mshart () uiuc edu

-----------------------------[PGP KEY INFO]-----------------------------
bits/keyid                                                1024D/E73BD405
fingerprint            95E0 4BE2 C958 51ED 48C4 A2BD FDB5 E188 E73B D405
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tristan RHODES wrote:
> There are inexpensive fingerprint readers made by Microsoft which 
> allow a user to log into Windows using their fingerprint.
>
> How secure are these?
>
> If someone has physical access to the computer, are they still able to 
> boot into an alternative OS and insert a new password hash?  Or do 
> these devices have something that prevents this?  Is encrypting the 
> filesystem
> (EFS) required to protect your data?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Tristan Rhodes

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