American Consumer Acceptance of Biometric Technology

The American consumer has not fully accepted biometric technology in their daily lives. The path to acceptance of the technology is filled with apprehension and caution. Consumer concerns range from theft and hacking to illicit use of their information for monetary gains by unscrupulous corporations. For example, companies like Google and Facebook have been accused of using private information for their own gain. To investigate the key factors that must be addressed to increase the adoption of biometric technology in society, this study conducted a consumer survey on the acceptability of biometrics relative to the consumer’s education, income, and age. Over 440 participants distributed roughly equally in gender, in education, and in age completed the survey. The results indicated that the consumers are leery of claims made about biometric technology manufacturers. They are concerned with their privacy and security. They are afraid of the power of the technology in the hands of the government, the colossal corporations and by bad actors that use will use the consumer’s data for their own gains. This research was focused on identifying key factors that must be addressed to increase the adoption of the technology in society among consumers and other factors to avoid through new legislation or regulations to increase consumer protection. Some key factors identified by the research include privacy concerns, governments, and corporations. These concerns include the security of biometric data retained by the actors and the misuse of the data. Another issue that was identified was the use of biometrics by these actors to track individuals during the normal day to day living