A posting from Phillip H. Griffin (OASIS XCBF TC Chair) announces that the XML Common Biometric Format specification from the XML Common Biometric Format Technical Committee has been approved as an OASIS Committee Specification. The TC has also voted to begin the CS public comment period required for to move the specification forward toward approval as an OASIS Standard. The public review period extends from January 28, 2003 through February 28, 2003. The TC has invited comment from its external liaison affiliates and other expert bodies, including X9F, ISO TC68/SC2, INCITS T4, INCITS M1, ASN.1 Consortium, ASN.1 ITU-T list, and the Biometric Consortium. "Biometrics are automated methods of recognizing a person based on physiological or behavioral characteristics. They are used to recognize the identity of an individual, or to verify a claimed identity. The XCBF specification defines cryptographic messages represented in XML markup for the secure collection, distribution, and processing, of biometric information. These messages provide the means of achieving data integrity, authentication of origin, and privacy of biometric data in XML based systems and applications. Mechanisms and techniques are described for the secure transmission, storage, and integrity and privacy protection of biometric data."

Bibliographic information: XML Common Biometric Format. OASIS Committee Specification. Edited by Phillip H. Griffin (Griffin Consulting). 20-January-2003. Produced by the OASIS XML Common Biometric Format TC. Contributors: Tyky Aichelen (IBM), Ed Day (Objective Systems), Dr. Paul Gérôme (AULM), Phillip H. Griffin - Chair (Griffin Consulting), John Larmouth (Larmouth T&PDS Ltd), Monica Martin (Drake Certivo), Bancroft Scott (OSS Nokalva), Paul Thorpe (OSS Nokalva), and Alessandro Triglia (OSS Nokalva).

Specification Abstract

"Biometrics are automated methods of recognizing a person based on physiological or behavioral characteristics. They are used to recognize the identity of an individual, or to verify a claimed identity. This specification defines a common set of secure XML encodings for the patron formats specified in CBEFF, the Common Biometric Exchange File Format (NISTIR 6529). These XML encodings are based on the ASN.1 schema defined in ANSI X9.84 Biometric Information Management and Security. They conform to the canonical variant of the XML Encoding Rules (XER) for ASN.1 defined in ITU-T Rec. X.693, and rely on the security and processing requirements specified in the X9.96 XML Cryptographic Message Syntax (XCMS) and X9.73 Cryptographic Message Syntax (CMS) standards."

Overview

Biometrics are automated methods of recognizing a person based on physiological or behavioral characteristics. They are used to recognize the identity of an individual, or to verify a claimed identity. This specification defines a common set of secure XML encodings for the patron formats specified in CBEFF, the Common Biometric Exchange File Format (NISTIR 6529). These CBEFF formats currently include the binary biometric objects and information records in two ANSI standards.

These XML encodings are based on the ASN.1 schema defined in ANSI X9.84:2003 Biometric Information Management and Security. They conform to the canonical variant of the XML Encoding Rules (XER) for ASN.1 defined in ITU-T Rec. X.693, and rely on the same security and processing requirements specified in X9.96 XML Cryptographic Message Syntax (XCMS). Values of the Biometric Information Record (BIR) defined in ANSI/INCITS 358-2002 -- Information technology -- BioAPI Specification that can be represented in the X9.84 biometric object format can also be represented using XML markup and secured using the techniques in this standard.

This standard defines cryptographic messages represented in XML markup for the secure collection, distribution, and processing, of biometric information. These messages provide the means of achieving data integrity, authentication of origin, and privacy of biometric data in XML based systems and applications. Mechanisms and techniques are described for the secure transmission, storage, and integrity and privacy protection of biometric data.

This standard defines a set of cryptographic messages represented in XML markup that can be used for the secure collection, distribution, and processing, of biometric information. All of the cryptographic operations provided in this standard are applied to a set of values of the ASN.1 type BiometricObject defined in the ANSI X9.84 standard.

This document describes the process for translating between an X9.84 BiometricObject and a BioAPI-1.1 Biometric Information Record (BIR). The X9.84 schema is the same as the schema defined in this standard and provides a common means of representing in XML markup the binary values described in the X9.84 and BioAPI-1.1 standards. Once BIR format values are represented as values of type BiometricObject they can be secured using the techniques described in this standard. [excerpted from the Committee Specification]

XCBF TC Mission

The OASIS XML Common Biometric Format (XCBF) Technical Committee has been chartered to "define a common set of secure XML encodings for the patron formats specified in CBEFF, the Common Biometric Exchange File Format (NISTIR 6529). These XML encodings will be based on the ASN.1 schema defined in ANSI X9.84 Biometrics Information Management and Security. They will conform to the XML Encoding Rules (XER) for ASN.1 defined in ITU-T Recommendation X.693, and rely on the security and processing requirements specified in X9.96 XML Cryptographic Message Syntax (XCMS)."