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Amusement Parks Leverage Lumidigm Fingerprint Sensors in East Asia
September 2013 by Marc Jacob
Lumidigmannounced that attendees at several amusement parks in China are using their fingers to authenticate themselves on Galasys Technologies stations at entertainment complex gates, ticket booths and member kiosks. At the Beijing children’s park Babyboss, parents’ fingerprints must match their child’s RFID wristband when collecting their children from the park grounds — another innovative application.
The Galasys deployments facilitate a large number of end-user interactions with Lumidigm sensors in the entertainment and hospitality industry in East Asia. For example, at Chime Long (Guangzhou, China), attendees touch the Lumidigm sensors on Galasys Technologies ticketing systems over 4.2 million times per year. At the Changzhou Dinosaur Land, also in China, Galasys biometric system produces over 2.8 million touches and at Babyboss, 900,000 parents touch the multispectral imaging sensors.
“It is imperative that our customers’ visitors are able to quickly and easily use our systems, getting a read of their biometric the very first time,” explains Thomas Khew, Galasys Technologies Business Development Director. “With millions of reads per year at the venues we serve, we cannot have people standing in line while frustrated users try repeatedly to get into the parks.”
“Amusement parks exist, almost by definition, to create a positive atmosphere for customers looking for a fun get-away,” adds Phil Scarfo, Lumidigm Vice President, Worldwide Sales and Marketing. “Authenticating these customers at the gate – collecting tickets – has to be as easy and trouble-free as possible or park operators risk spoiling the mood for their customers before the experience has even begun. And yet, parks have a financial interest in ensuring that only one person uses each ticket. To prevent ticket fraud, parks today can link each ticket to a specific customer with the touch of a finger. That’s why multispectral imaging fingerprint sensors are used today at many park gates to meet both requirements.”
Multispectral imaging is a sophisticated technology specifically developed to overcome the fingerprint capture problems that conventional imaging systems have in everyday conditions. This more-effective technology is based on the use of multiple spectrums of light and advanced polarization techniques to extract unique fingerprint characteristics from both the surface and subsurface of the skin. Unlike surface fingerprint characteristics, which can be obscured during imaging by moisture, sunblock or cotton candy, the “inner fingerprint” lies undisturbed and unaltered beneath the surface.
Because of multispectral technology’s unique characteristics, biometric authentication is done without interfering with the positive experience of visitors as they pass through the entry gates. Over 200,000 people enter major theme parks through multispectral fingerprint-enabled gates every day, from the United States to Asia, saving park operators millions of dollars every year.
