世論 What Japan Thinks

This short survey from Marsh Inc and reported on by japan.internet.com looked at the subject of biometric identification.

Demographics

Between the 19th and 22nd of December 2008 300 members of the Marsh monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. The sample was split exactly 50:50 male and female, and 20.0% in their twenties, 20.0% in their thirties, 20.0% in their forties, 20.0% in their fifties, and 20.0% aged sixty or older.

Just about all the non-special permanent resident foreigners in Japan will have had experience with biometrics as we all get out fingerprints and face scanned at immigration, but this survey is about biometric identification, and as I understand it the machines can only identify people on immigration blacklists in real-time, it perhaps does an offline (2-day turn-around) scan of ordinary criminal records, but there are no reference prints to verify the average law-abiding non-citizen against.

Many of the newer mobile phones have face-identification for unlocking the phone, but even though mine has I’ve never tried it out for fear of locking myself out of my mobile!
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With the overblown fuss and much misunderstanding in the foreigner community about fingerprinting and the horrors of biometric scanning, this recent survey reported on by japan.internet.com and conducted by Marsh Inc into biometrics provides some insight into how the Japanese view this matter.

Demographics

Between the 4th and 8th of April 2008 300 members of the Marsh internet monitor group successfully completed a private online questionnaire. The sample was exactly 50:50 male and female, and 20.0% were in their teens, 20.0% in their twenties, 20.0% in their thirties, 20.0% in their forties, 14.7% in their fifties, and 5.3% aged sixty or older.

I’ve not actually used any biometric identification system (excluding US immigration!), although my wife used to have a mobile phone with a fingerprint scanner, but rather than use it for unlocking the phone, she used it for a virtual pet game where scanning one’s finger initiated the petting action!
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