INESC TEC organised the eighth edition of “IWBF 2020 – International Workshop on Biometrics and Forensics”, in partnership with the Norwegian Biometrics Laboratory of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) and European Association of Biometrics (EAB). The virtual event took place on April 29 and 30, with 30 participants from 15 different countries.
The eight edition of the IWBF brought together illustrious names in the fields of Biometrics and Forensic Sciences, such as Christoph Busch (NTNU, Hochschule Darmstadt, Fraunhofer IGD), Mark Nixon (University of Southampton, United Kingdom), Massimo Tistarelli (University of Sassari, Italy), Lena Klasén (Swedish Police authority, Linköping University) and Hugo Proença (University of Beira Interior), as well as keynote speakers Peter Eisert (Berlin Humboldt University, Fraunhofer HHI) and Zeno Geradts (Netherlands Forensic Institute, University of Amsterdam).
If it were not for the challenges of COVID-19, it would be the first time that the city of Porto would welcome some of these and other names at this international conference.
As to INESC TEC, a team composed of elements from the Centre for Telecommunications and Multimedia (CTM) – Jaime Cardoso (coordinator), Ana Filipa Sequeira, Sara Oliveira, João Pinto, Ana Rebelo and Renata Rodrigues – was “at a distance of a Zoom link” right before the conference.
Ana Filipa Sequeira, responsible for organising the event, emphasised the importance of teamwork in overcoming contextual challenges: “We’ve established a united front to manage a group of participants from different parts of Europe and also the U.S.A., India and Hong Kong!”
INESC TEC researcher won “Computers Journal Best Paper Award”
The event included 27 accepted articles (divided into 17 oral presentations and 10 posters), as well as the presentation of two practical cases (demos) and a Doctoral Consortium session.
Some of said articles were selected as the best in three categories: “Computers Journal Best Paper Award”; “Most Remarkable Oral Presentation” and “Most Captivating Poster Presentation”.
“Secure Triplet Loss for End-to-End Deep Biometrics”, by INESC TEC researchers João Pinto and Jaime Cardoso, from CTM, and Miguel Correia, from the Centre for Biomedical Engineering Research (C-BER), won the prize for best scientific article (“Computers Journal Best Paper Award”).
The award-winning article proposes a reformulation of the triplet loss, well-known in the world of neural networks, in order to guarantee the security of personal data stored in biometric systems. This way, models based on deep learning can ensure the cancellability of biometric data, without performance loss or additional encryption or hashing processes. In other words, these methods enable the biometric identification of an individual without compromising the original information, such as a face photograph – which, once compromised, cannot be revoked.
Ana Filipa Sequeira has a positive outlook of the two-day event: “The feedback we received from the participants was extremely positive and I dare saying that we’ve surpassed this challenge quite successfully”.
The INESC TEC researchers mentioned in this news piece are associated with INESC TEC and UP-FEUP.
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