NexID is a spinoff from West Virginia University and Clarkson University that develops technology to determine if a fingerprint image is from a live finger or a spoof.

Both optical and capacitive fingerprint readers are suspect to spoofing, but NexID’s software algorithms can be used to train these scanners to recognize spoofs, explains Mark Cornett, general manager at NexID.

The company is developing an SDK to enable anyone to incorporate liveness detection into biometric devices during the development process, says Cornett. They hope to extend the techniques beyond fingerprint to help guard against spoofing in other modalities in the future.