London: Last year thousands of quake victims fled homes in Japan, leaving their cash cards behind in the hurly burly of survival. Luckily, one bank has the answer, ATMs that use a palm-scanner to issue money.
The announcement follows a trial started in December by Kraft of the iSample vending machine, which uses a biometric scanner to `read` the age and gender of people standing in front of it, and will serve adults, but refuse children.
The two machines went on trial in Chicago`s Shedd Aquarium and New York`s South Street Seaport. The biometric technology is already under test by companies such as Gillette, the Daily Mail reported. The scanner uses biometric data to `guess` the age of people standing in front of it, dividing adults into four `age brackets.` Other software has already been shown to be able to `guess` ages to an accuracy of around five years.
Biometric security systems on home laptops, meanwhile, are becoming increasingly popular. HP`s new DV6 and DV7 machines, for instance, both feature finger-scanning security.
IANS