The days of using ‘password123’ or a simple swipe card to access everything you need are long gone. From FaceID on our smartphones to more sophisticated iris scanners, biometrics are adding a more advanced security layer to many of the personal and business security systems we use every day.
Biometrics — the measurement and analysis of people’s unique physical characteristics — are increasingly being used for security purposes to identify, verify, and authenticate that you are who you say you are.
Physical traits like the pattern of your eye, the ridges of your fingerprint, or the shape of your face can offer much better security than using a character-based password, no matter how many uppercase, lowercase, characters, or numbers you pack into them.
For B Corp Daltrey, passwords and access cards are no longer a viable solution to protect the assets that allow us to operate and do business. Believing that ‘identity is the new perimeter,’ Daltrey can see a future characterised by secure and seamless authentication on any device, any channel and any access point, anytime, if technology is designed and applied the right way. Let’s find out more.
Image: Daltrey
Biometrics is perhaps not something many people know a lot about. Could you tell us a bit more about it and what Daltrey does?
As a biometric digital identity provider, Daltrey creates a single biometric credential that enables secure and convenient authentication for your people in any digital or physical environment.
What that means is that an employee could use their voice, iris, face, or fingerprint (known as biometric modalities) to access anything they need as part of their job through ‘access points’ like their mobile phone, laptop, or dedicated biometric devices like a fingerprint scanner, iris reader or facial reader.
Our mission is to redefine how identity is used to create safer, more secure environments. Our biometric digital identity technology can be used to authenticate users in any access scenario, whether they’re walking through a door or logging into an application.
In an industry first, Daltrey uses biometrics to take digital identity beyond onboarding. By combining identity proofing, attribute binding and advanced liveness capability, we allow organisations to manage physical and digital access with just one verified credential. This combination of additional security measures allows individuals and businesses to use this credential with confidence.
Image: Daltrey
We have created something designed to free your teams from passwords, swipe cards and PINs, to help businesses embrace non-negotiable security measures that don’t get in the way of people doing their jobs.
What made you want to get involved with biometric technology?
No one enjoys remembering complicated passwords or having to carry multiple swipe cards. Early in the business, the team started to see how biometrics could be better for businesses from a privacy and security perspective, and from a user experience (UX) perspective as well.
There’s this narrative in the marketplace that says: you compromise security if you increase the user experience. And if you have a great user experience, then somehow you don’t have the security tools in place to protect your business. That isn’t true.
Biometrics gives you the opportunity to have the best of both worlds. You can enjoy a better UX and also the highest levels of security. We wanted to change the way the market thought about that.
If you treat biometric information properly — if you encrypt it and make sure that appropriate mechanisms are in place from endpoint-to-storage — it will be secure. It will give you a seamless experience and give you the security.
As you know, data security, privacy and cybersecurity are critically important in today’s world. What are some of the key challenges you see in the modern workforce?
Firstly, we would say that there is a huge difference between using biometric technology for identification purposes and using biometric technology for authentication purposes. Daltrey is involved in the latter.
Our business is about the protection and privacy of users and businesses. Consent is the fundamental first step of a person creating a DaltreyID for authentication purposes. But it’s true — many previous implementations of biometrics have been like the ‘wild west’, with irresponsible applications and a lack of understanding among the public.
We need more education and conversations about what biometric information is used, how it’s stored, and what happens when you leave a company, for example.
Image: Daltrey
Did you know that the B Impact Assessment evaluates a company’s stewardship of data privacy and security under the ‘Customers’ impact area? Read more↗
There are also significant concerns over the misuse of things like facial recognition technology. What can you share about that?
Our industry must drive the responsible use of biometric technology, educate consumers and establish higher levels of trust and accountability. And, fortunately, there are now numerous standards to guide the use and applications of biometric technology.
Technology in itself isn’t good or bad, it’s how it’s applied. And there are plenty of examples of biometric technology being used in a responsible and ethical way — like verifying people accessing disaster relief payments during the bushfires and floods when they’d lost all of their identity documents.
It’s a great point. Often when we think of technology like this, we envisage its harm rather than focusing equally on its capacity to do good. On that note, why did you want to certify as a B Corp?
While our day-to-day is about securing businesses and people using biometrics and digital identity, this work is underpinned by a shift towards stakeholder governance, and away from shareholder capitalism, to create a business that has purpose beyond profit.
We made a conscious decision from day one to set up the business according to the B Corp framework, and this foundation has allowed us to achieve this alignment quickly, and in the very early stages of our journey.
We’re committed to building a business with purpose that has a positive impact on people and the environment.
Tell us some of the smaller changes you’ve made that have added up to make a big difference.
Some of the activities and initiatives we’ve implemented to align to the B Corp framework and achieve certification include:
- Upgrading our buildings: In December 2021, we moved to an A grade building where we can track and measure our environmental footprint.
- Diversifying our team: We’re proud of the diverse group of people we have working at Daltrey, representing 11 nationalities (circa 40 people).
- Making a shared investment: Each team member is invited to take part in our Employee Share Option Plan, where they’re issued options regardless of role or level.
- A different kind of recruitment: We’re working with SoldierOn and partnering with schools and universities to provide opportunities for both young people and returning or retired veterans who have an interest in cybersecurity.
Image: Daltrey
B Corps want to help transform our economy to one that is inclusive, sustainable, and regenerative. What business practices do you want to see become the norm?
For Daltrey, it’s all about the responsible use of biometrics. And we also want to see more of an understanding that prioritising environmental, social and governance concerns does not have to compromise financial returns – rather, the opposite:
- It attracts more sustainable and quality products via stronger community and government relations;
- It reduces waste, water, and energy consumption;
- It boosts employee productivity and engagement, and attracts talent through greater social credibility;
- It enhances investment returns by better allocation of capital.
Furthermore, as Daltrey is in the tech industry, we are also committed to see more done to encourage women to make technology a career choice to start evening out the gender imbalance. We believe this needs to be promoted to students early on in their high school education, so this industry can be seen as an exciting career choice.
Building a business with purpose is always a good idea.
Do you have any tips for aspiring B Corps about the certification process?
Ensure that you have a clear understanding of why B Corp certification is important to your business as it will impact everything you do.
Be prepared to implement initiatives that ensure you align with the intention of giving people, the community in which you operate, and the planet the same priority as profit. For example, investing in our staff from the start was an early and very deliberate decision for us.
And lastly, be patient with the process — as our CEO, Blair Crawford, says: “if it was easy, it wouldn’t be worth doing”.
Congratulations to Daltrey for certifying as a B Corp. If you’d like to learn more about biometrics or how you can get support to secure your digital assets, visit: daltrey.com
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