I think your response raises an issue of perspective. Are we focusing on fingerprint technology from a user's point of view - or are we considering its implications over many years?
This reminds me of certain U.S. Supreme Court decisions. As someone who's interested in constitutional law, I often find myself defending things that seem trivial and nitpicky. Why does it matter if the police enter one drug dealer's home without a proper warrant? Who cares if we restrict someone's speech, considering that the person was, say, a racist whose ideas were ignorant and offensive?
Of course, the content in this analogy is very different. I'm not comparing fingerprint scanners to crimes. But the logic is very similar: when judging law and technology, respectively, it's important to consider how seemingly small decisions serve as a precedents for bigger trends.
If fingerprint scanners become a common replacement for passwords, and the author's argument is correct, the scanners may dramatically change our security and expectations of privacy.
This reminds me of certain U.S. Supreme Court decisions. As someone who's interested in constitutional law, I often find myself defending things that seem trivial and nitpicky. Why does it matter if the police enter one drug dealer's home without a proper warrant? Who cares if we restrict someone's speech, considering that the person was, say, a racist whose ideas were ignorant and offensive?
Of course, the content in this analogy is very different. I'm not comparing fingerprint scanners to crimes. But the logic is very similar: when judging law and technology, respectively, it's important to consider how seemingly small decisions serve as a precedents for bigger trends.
If fingerprint scanners become a common replacement for passwords, and the author's argument is correct, the scanners may dramatically change our security and expectations of privacy.