Your ears have fingerprints, too

In the 1940s, researchers believed ear-generated noises would eventually be heard, but otoacoustic emissions (OAEs) could not be detected until the development of ultra low-noise microphones in the 1970s. Now audiologists looking to diagnose hearing loss in newborns routinely listen to OAEs.

If bankers could do the same, depositors could transact business over the phone as securely as if they were confirming their IDs with iris scans, and stolen cell phones could not be activated because their new users "didn't sound right."

In the UK, University of Southampton engineer Stephen Beeby tells New Scientist that work is going forward on OAEs, although it "still needs a lot of work" to be acceptable as a real-world biometric.

"In the controlled conditions of a lab, everybody's emissions are indeed different," Beeby says. But it is not yet clear that a person's OAEs will sound the same at age 60 as they do at age 20. Drugs and alcohol also alter or deaden the emissions.

The project's deadline is mid-2010, Beeby says, and if OAE patterns are found to truly be consistent and measurable, researchers hope electronics companies will be encouraged to develop cellphones and headsets with built-in supersensitive microphones.

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