SmartSafe puts your digital identity on your wrist
13 January, 2015
category: Biometrics, Corporate, Digital ID, NFC
It looks like a watch, but the SmartSafe wristband does more than tell time. It enables users to wear their digital identity.
The security device is by French startup Ionosys. The band encrypts and stores identifying information like passwords and is activated by the owner’s biometric data – a fingerprint and pulse. The device won’t activate on an unauthorized user’s wrist.
Here’s where it gets a little morbid. “If you remove the band from your wrist, or if you die wearing it, or if your arm gets cut (off), it will lock because there won’t be a blood pulse,” says Ionosys co-founder Anthony Le Pichon. “Thanks to that system, we can make sure that it is the owner – and no one else – who is using the device.”
SmartSafe can wirelessly access devices, software, applications or websites. The wristband communicates with other devices thanks to NFC and Bluetooth Low Energy. It can also be used to allow or restrict access to doors. “In fact, as long as the wristband is untransferrable, we can develop many uses responding to the needs of different industries,” Le Pichon says. “This product can be used by any business needing to secure any data or location. It can be integrated in a security system.”
Le Pichon says SmartSafe is not a gadget. “It answers actual needs as far as security and simplicity of use are concerned. The fact that it is absolutely untransferrable makes it the most secure of any solution on the market.”
Ionosys hopes to make SmartSafe commercially available within a year. Le Pichon says the company found potential clients, partners and investors at the Consumer Electronics Show.
“The feedback from people at CES was very encouraging,” Le Pichon says. “It would not surprise me if SmartSafe technology is utilized by automotive, home security, and airline companies to better secure their clients as well as their businesses. Governments all over the world could implement this technology in their operations.”
