Biometric

Part of speech: adjective

Pronunciation: /ˌbaɪ.oʊˈmɛt.ɹɪk/

Definitions

1. The process of measuring unique physiological or behavioral attributes to establish identity is essential in various security systems
2. Pertaining to techniques that analyze unique body features to verify who someone is
3. Connected with identifying individuals through their distinct biological or behavioral characteristics

Etymology: "Biometric" is a modern technical coinage built from two Greek elements: "bios", meaning "life", and "metron", meaning "measure". The first element appears in "bio-", while "-metric" comes from "metric", which is itself the Greek-derived "metrikos" relating to measurement. The word was formed in English by combining these parts, and its sense of identifying people through bodily or behavioural traits reflects a later extension of the older idea of measuring living things. The source also allows a second possible route: the word may come from "biometry" with the adjectival suffix "-ic" added. "Biometry" is itself a compound of the same two Greek elements, referring to the statistical measurement of biological data, so both routes lead back to the same measuring of life. The surprise here is how little the word has to do with fingerprints or faces in its own making: it was built as a general scientific term for measuring living things, and the identification sense developed afterwards from that base.

Synonyms: biometric identification, biometric authentication