To protect legal documents from prying eyes, test keystroke and mouse patterns

Security of legal documents – protection against hackers, phishers, and unauthorized eyes – concerns law departments. Nowadays, most law departments make their lawyers keep track of several IDs and pass codes, the prevailing method of protection (encryption being another), so that sensitive documents and data are safe.

Researchers have developed two new methods that may make secure identification easier, according to Fast Company, Sept. 2006 at 38. One company offers software that monitors keystroke patterns to verify identity. BioPassword, of Issaquah, Washington, tracks how quickly your fingers strike the keys, linger over them, and find the next ones. Artificial-intelligence software analyzes the pattern to confirm you and block impostors.

Less developed, Peter McOwan, professor of computer science at Queen Mary, University of London, has developed a keystroke-based security system that analyzes personal styles from the movement of the computer mouse.

Both kinds of technologies are in their formative stages but both would be easier to use than a congeries of passwords, smart cards, and finger or iris scanners.