ECG-Based Biometrics

Motivation & Goals

Whereas attackers can easily produce artifacts to replicate one's face or fingerprints, and potentially use them to get illegal access to protected resources, replicating a person's heartbeat is not so straightforward. The main challenge remains, however, how to measure the heartbeat in a reliable but non-intrusive manner. Furthermore, external factors such as the environment (e.g., extreme low or high temperatures) or physical activities (e.g., having a relaxed conversation vs. doing sport) can have a big impact on the heart rate. Last but not least, biometric data are sensitive personal data which need to be protected - and, in the case of electrocardiogram (ECG) signals, further health-related information could be extracted from the ECG.

Tasks

• Study the state-of-the-art in ECG-based biometrics
• Develop and evaluate new ECG-based recognition methods
• Benchmark the developed methods against the state-of-the-art
• Optional: collaborate on the acquisition of a new dataset

Contact

Marta Gomez-Barrero (marta.gomez-barrero@unibw.de)