The other day I heard a strange series of noises coming from Bryce’s office so I popped in to take a look.  Turns out he was messing around with his new Microsoft Fingerprint Reader, looked super cool.   Bryce had a second one that he “loaned” me so I could try it out too.  Since I always strive to be as “cool” as Bryce I jumped on the opportunity.

I hooked up the device and quickly had it reading my fingerprint,  set up as easy and while I really appreciate the ability to take an imprint of all 10 fingers,  I figured two would be enough especially since I don’t spend too much time playing with powertools these days. 

Mapping fingerprints to logins was a snap, I did this for several web sites that require credentials as well as my email requires credentials cause I use (RPC over HTTP).  All was good.  I was a little disappointed that I couldn’t use this device login or unlock my computer but I find it quite useful anyway.   Turns out however if you use fast user switching, which I do on machines at home, the reader can be used to switch users based on fingerprint.  I haven’t tried this yet because all my machines at work are domain joined.

Later that day Ken stopped by and noticed the device took a careful look at this and said “I bet I could crack this”.  I quickly put my hands under my desk and said, “yeah I’ll be watching my fingers carefully, and by the way no knives allowed at work!”  but Ken (being the creative genius he is) had other ideas (clearly he watches CSI)., something about lifting a print and latex, etc..   Ken loves a challenge so I wouldn’t be surprised to see him attempting to lift a print from my reader sometime in the near future.  I am however still secure because my machine is locked and can’t be unlocked with the reader and the settings that are necessary to map the are safely secure behind a gold old fashioned password.