/Veridas Bootcamp: The Artificial Intelligence camp that fights against digital fraud and deep fakes.

Article
August 27, 2021

Marta Morrás

Global Marketing Director

Introduction

Veridas is constantly innovating and developing its biometric technology that allows individuals, companies and organizations to increase security in identity verification processes.

For this reason, and for the second consecutive year, it has organized ‘Veridas BootCamp’, a camp for young university talent that, among other projects, reinforces the continuous training process of the facial biometric engine created by Veridas. This technology is already in use by companies such as Deutsche Telekom, Prosegur, BBVA, Catalana Occidente, Codere, or Ventocom, in countries such as the United States, Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Spain, United Kingdom, Austria or Japan, among others.

During the months of July and August, a total of 8 students from the UPNA, the University of Navarra and the Complutense University of Madrid, with computer science, industrial engineering and Business Administration and Management (ADE) profiles, have joined the Veridas Technology and Innovation team to participate in the training that supports the top quality of one of the best biometric software systems in the world, detecting digital identity fraud and deep fakes around the world, all within the commitment of the technology company with compliance with the regulation on data protection.

Veridas software is endorsed by NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) and certified with ISO 30.107 iBeta level 1 PAD, ISO 27.001 and the Spanish National Security Scheme, in addition to complying with the most demanding data protection regulations such as the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) or the California CCPA.

Veridas BootCamp, an education and innovation opportunity

This summer “camp” has been a unique opportunity for the academic and professional development of the participating students who, mentored by Veridas professionals, deepen their specialized knowledge of the sector while experiencing the innovation culture of a software development company that leads the international market of biometric solutions based on Artificial Intelligence, combating digital identity fraud and providing confidence in onboarding processes.

For Veridas, a company committed to the creation and training of new professions, it is an opportunity to show how its technology works to these future professionals. Some of the BootCamp participants will soon join the Veridas team, made up of more than 140 people.

“The experience of the participating students through the Veridas BootCamp contributes to the quality of the biometric technology created by Veridas to lead the fight against digital fraud, proves the motivation and potential of young talent, and reaffirms Veridas’ commitment to Technology, Talent and Work, founding values of the Navarre-based company.”

The Technology and Innovation team values the contribution of the students, who are being aware of their role in supporting the training process of Veridas systems. The students have more than proved themselves capable of generating fully functional teams using Agile techniques in just a few weeks.

Students participating in the BootCamp experience different roles and levels of responsibility within their teams, while learning how to increase the security level of biometric engines, always in compliance with personal data protection. In addition, to foster the development of their talent in close contact with their areas of professional interest, they have participated in internal company activities and training, applying their own learning and discovering the working methods of the technology company’s specialists.

How does an AI-based biometric engine work?

Thanks to the boost in Artificial Intelligence (AI), and in particular Machine Learning, that has occurred in recent years, facial recognition technologies (along with voice recognition) have reached very high levels of accuracy, well above the best human physiognomists. Machine Learning biometric models are created from complex mathematical algorithms, which are “trained and taught” as one would do with the human brain, although their “intelligence” is very specific to a certain task, and not generalist.

The results obtained by these systems are much more efficient, accurate and with less bias than those that could be offered by any person. These systems do not allow inferring other characteristics of the subject such as behaviors, attitudes, emotions, tendencies, gender, ethnicity, skin colors, etc., nor do they imply the classification of the person in a profile that can determine future characteristics or behaviors.

According to the latest report of the NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) 1:N face recognition vendor test 一test in which a facial image is compared against a gallery of millions of images and it is determined whether that person is found within that database一, the latest version of the Veridas biometric engine is capable of performing a 322 millisecond search within a gallery of 1.6 million faces. At the same time, the engine’s accuracy ranks Veridas 15th out of 144 engines in facial identification for galleries of 12 million.

Veridas biometric engines achieve greater than 99.9% identity verification accuracy (determining that a person is really who says he/her is) in both its facial biometrics and voice biometrics solutions.

Thanks to the advanced anti-spoofing and liveness detection techniques integrated in Veridas’ solutions, facial recognition differentiates whether a real face is actually presented and not a printed face or one presented on a screen, while being able to detect whether the face belongs to a real and live person in identity verification processes.

Training the professionals of the future

The Veridas BootCamp, now in its second edition, is bringing skilled, curious and awake young people closer to the professional environment of software creation, a necessary objective in a country like Spain, with a shortage of approximately 100,000 digital professionals.

Training young talent in the professions of tomorrow, arises from the urgent need that exists globally to train thousands of professionals that will allow us to develop and execute the great challenge that faced by companies, institutions and society: the digital transformation. As is logical, the creation of new technologies requires profiles of different academic preparation: from basic technicians, through vocational training technicians, to engineers and doctors, all of them being necessary.

Our universities and education centers have the proven capacity to generate these skills and profiles. And that is why we at Veridas want to contribute our knowledge and position in the market so that the new talent that emerges from the educational centers can live, in first person, the experience of working in a world leading technology company. This is a way to create and train new professional profiles that do not yet exist in the labor market, being a perfect link with the universities where young students are trained.