Biometry authenticated ATM and Banking

Ameya was on the way to his college. He had to reach in time because he had his exams. But on his way, he had to withdraw cash from an ATM. He got the money but forgot the ATM card inside the machine and went off to write his exam. He was in the middle of his exam when he realized had missed the card in the machine. He came out of the exam to waste his valuable time calling up the Bank to block the ATM card. However, he had lost Rs.15,000 as someone else had withdrawn it already.

With Credit Cards, the situation is much worse. Information about Credit Cards is on sale on various unauthorised websites and we keep hearing the news of credit card rackets quite frequently.

Why not use biometric authentication instead of physical cards? This will eliminate the need for physical card and any passwords. The fingureprint will serve as a complete authentication.

One would have to develop a mathematical function to convert the image of fingureprint into a unique number. The mathematical function should be such that it should generate the same unique number corresponding to a fingureprint of a person. Also, the same number should not be generated for any other person, making it unique. The unique number can be 100 or 200 or even 1000 digits long, or even more. Parts of this number may represent various characterics of the fingureprint, like first 20 digits for the size, next 20 for the central curved lines, next 20 for periferal lines etc.

Once this unique number is generated, it can be encrypted and sent to the database for comparison to retrieve the corresponding bank account. This would save the bandwidth required to send the image of fingureprint and also save the processing time to compare the images.

Such fingureprint readers can be attached to laptops and mobile phones as well to make the access feasible.

Coupon based tax cuts to boost weak economy

Designing tax-cuts to boost economic activity

With the current slowdown in the economy, various monetary and financial measures were taken to boost economy.

While tax-cuts is one of the easiest ways of fiscal boost, it is also one of the least effective, as the taxpayers mostly end up saving this money rather than spending.

Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody's Economy.com found that tax cuts delivered the least bang for the buck, with a dollar's worth of a temporary nonrefundable tax rebate worth $1.02 with a one-year lag. Permanent tax cuts yielded less than 50 cents of additional spending.

In contrast, actual spending increases were worth $1.36 if they were disbursed as aid to state governments; $1.59 if the money went on infrastructure; $1.64 for extended unemployment benefits and as much as $1.73 from an increase in food stamps. [Ref: Reuters news, Dec 11, 2008]

An obvious solution that would pop up is, why can't there be other coupons or stamps like the one we have for food; To be used just until the economic recession lasts. Once the economy recovers, the coupons would cease to exist.

There can be coupons for consumer durables, coupons for non-food departmental store purchases, coupons for clothes or anything else. These coupons can be fully or partially tax exempt and may be valid for 6 months to 1 year depending on the government policy.

Thus, since only the purchase of coupons is (fully or partially) tax exempt, every dollar spent on such tax cuts would certainly result in increased spending. Secondly, since the coupons have a definite expiry date, the user would have to spend fast in order to benefit from the tax-cut.

Your comments on the post are most welcome.

Birth and Death of Gods

We are atheist about most of the Gods humanity has ever believed in, some of us just go one God further.
Check: http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/113

A few thousand years ago, on a planet called 'Earth', there were 'animals' called 'humans'.

They were living in groups in different parts of Earth and were usually separated by large distances. As they had no advanced means of transportation, those groups would seldom interact with each other. They were virtually isolated from each other.

Dingku was also living in one of the groups with other fellow humans. He was wiser than others in the group. He loved his group and always cared for everyone. Others knew this and hence accepted him as the leader of the group. He had ability to think clearly and to convince people through his lucid speeches. He told people that it was wrong to kill others, to steal or rob and to lie. He told people to work hard and to be satisfied. People agreed to him. He also resolved conflicts and kept everyone together in Harmony against all odds.

But Dingku was just another mortal human being. One day he died. Some believed he was killed. His ardent follower - Mivak - took over as the leader. Mivak also loved his group and cared for everyone. He also wanted harmony in the group. But Mivak lacked the ability to think and convince people to the extent that Dingku had. But Movak followed his principles. If anyone lied or cheated - Mivak would say - if Dingku was here, he would not have liked it. At times, he would punish the unruly. People would respect and agree to him. There was Harmony in the group.

Three generations after Mivak, Zopin became the leader of the group. Dingku had died long before Zopin was borne. Zopin didn't know how Dingku looked like, or if he ever existed. But if anyone lied or cheated, he would say "if Dingku was here, he would not have liked it. He would have punished you." Even people didn't know how Dingku looked like, or if he ever existed. But they would respect and agree to Zopin. There was harmony in the group.

Around 700 years later, 35 generations had passed. People still believed if they lied or cheated, Dingku would not like it. But they would think that Dingku would come and punish them. There were stories of how Dingku magically helped the poor by creating food out of nowhere and punished the unruly using his supernatural poweres. They believed, he was sitting in the sky watching everyone. He created the rain and the storms, he created the spring and the summer. Dingku had become what they called - 'God'.

1000 kms away from Dingku's group, there was another group of people. These two groups were oblivious of each other's existence. They had no means of transport to go that far and then even come back in a person's lifetime, which was around 40 years. This second group had never heard of Dingku. But they believed in Somu !! Somu was there - God!

Just like Dingku and Somu, there were also - Mirath, Zekor, Wipor and many others - all of them lovely human beings, wise and caring - had become 'Gods' for different groups - over a period of 1,000 - 2,000 years.

Both Dingku's and Somu's groups were now very large. They had even broken down into sub-groups and occupied different territories. And one day, a sub-group of Dingku and Somu ran across each other. They shared the stories of Dingku and Somu with each other. Now, there was a problem. They could not decide who was sitting in the sky watching everyone. Who created the rain and the storms? Dingku? or Somu?

There was a fight. Dingku's group killed Somu's group members who refused to believe in Dingku !!

As the 'human' progressed, there were buildings and cars, there were mobile phones and computers. And there were still - Dingku, Somu, Mirath, Zekor and Wipor !!

Nobody knew that they were just another people - caring, loving, with great thinking abilities and great orators - but yet just mortal human beings who existed long long ago.

People thought they were something called - Gods - and not worshiping 'their god' was a crime. Worshipers of other gods were 'the people who have lost their way' !!

There were riots, violence and terrorism!! There was no harmony in the group!

People like Dingku and Somu who wanted harmony among people had indirectly became cause of violence thousands of years after their death because of incompetent followers.

Your comments on this story are most welcome.