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Comment by imron | Hacker News Reader

And now you know why fingerprints are a really bad security device.

They're fine for casual authentication, but really poor for actual security.

The bigger problem is that you only have one set of prints. If they're compromised, you can't just regenerate a new set (well, without grafts).

I know the biometrics suck, but I haven't considered casual muggers cutting fingers off before...

I'm way out of my league commenting on what criminals would or wouldn't do, but I don't think _casual_ muggers would resort to cutting fingers off.

More serious, organise, full time muggers might, but I would suspect those are more rare (and you're probably in a whole lot of danger with them anyway. missing digits probably isn't your biggest concern)

Who needs to cut off fingers when you've got a 3d printer?

http://www.3ders.org/articles/20140308-world-first-3d-printe...

http://openbiometrics.org/publications/arora20133D.pdf

I'm way out of my league commenting on what criminals would or wouldn't do, but I don't think _casual_ muggers would invest in custom 3d printing solutions.

Because it's faster?

"Malaysia car thieves steal finger" (2005) [0]

These were not casual muggers, since they resorted to kidnapping, also keep in mind that this was done to steal a very valuable car.

With phones also now also becoming wallets, it's not outlandish to think a thief would cut off a finger.

[0] http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4396831.stm

That's probably why fingerprint scanning doesn't work after 48 hours of not unlocking.

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