Top Articles: Using Biometrics to Engage with Consumers
Week 40, 2018
Biometrics involves using body measurements to identify individuals. This tech can be used for surveillance, but it can also be used for personalized experiences or UX Design. Currently, we have more bio-inspired applications emerging to engage with consumers thanks to AI. Facial recognition is offering personalized experiences, fingerprint scanners are tracking stress rates, voice technology is identifying us by how we speak, and DNA is being used to create custom music playlists. It’s a growing field that definitely has some intriguing features. The trick will be for them to make sure privacy is top notch and that the experiences are more than one-off gimmicks.
Delta’s Fully Biometric Terminal Is the First in the US
By Rachel England from Engadget
Delta Air is opening a biometric terminal at their headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. Travelers can expect an initial rollout of facial recognition stations at the ticket counter, TSA checkpoint, and when boarding. Fingerprint scanners will soon follow. Biometric airports are not particularly new–Dubai and Australia already have some biometric checks in several of their airports. The difference with Delta is that they are planning a fully comprehensive biometric airport experience from start to finish. With the rise of Engaging Cities, we can expect more physical locations like this in the near future.
In China, Beauty Brands Turn to High-Tech Toys to Plug Their Wares
By Yiling Pan from Jing Daily
Personalized experiences are expected in retail now, so some brands are developing biometric systems to meet these demands. “Smart stores” have begun popping up in China and beauty brands in particular are latching on to this idea. They are offering individualized skin care recommendations using in-store facial recognition and AI. However, it’s important to note that there is a difference between gimmicky tech integration and tech integrations that consumers find useful. These stores could easily fall into the former if they do not plan for long-term, continuous engagement.
Walmart Files Patent for Stress-tracking Cart Handle
By Dan Alaimo from Retail Dive
Let’s face it. Shopping can be stressful. That’s apparently why Walmart has filed a patent to monitor in-store stress levels via the shopping cart handle. This information could help them make design changes in the store to make the experience more enjoyable or intervene if they detect stress-inducing situations. Monitoring heart rates and body temperatures of their customers could also help Walmart avoid any serious health issues in their stores. It’s unclear if this technology will actually be implemented in the stores since this is just a patent, but there would be some interesting UX data if it did.
Emotion-detecting Technology Is Everywhere, but It’s out of Date
By Dr. Rich Firth-Godbehere from The Next Web
Whether it’s Amazon Alexa understanding tone or facial recognition beacons monitoring entire cities, there has been a recent the number of emotion-sensing devices in the past few months. While emotion tech can be very useful, it is often based on the idea that all humans express the same emotions in the same ways. Science shows us that this is not actually be the case, so emotion tech gets very difficult at scale, especially when it comes to different cultures. The moral of the story is that emotion tech is not quite as attuned to our emotions as the companies claim and more data is needed for these AI devices to become truly sentient.
Spotify and Ancestry Can Use Your Real DNA to Tell Your “Musical DNA”
By Aisha Hassan from Quartz
The largest for-profit genealogy company, Ancestry, has decided to give users a more tangible approach to their DNA results. Partnering with Spotify, Ancestry is creating custom playlists based on the different ethnicities and cultures that make up a customer’s genetics. The idea is to let customers engage with their histories beyond reading their results. It’s definitely one of the more creative takes on using biometrics and it’s certainly more entertaining.
