(May 20, 2015) Watch
your language. Words mean different things to different people – so the
brainwaves they provoke could be a way to identify you.
Blair Armstrong of the Basque Center on Cognition, Brain,
and Language in Spain and his team recorded the brain signals of 45 volunteers
as they read a list of 75 acronyms – such as FBI or DVD – then used computer
programs to spot differences between individuals. The participants' responses
varied enough that the programs could identify the volunteers with about 94 per
cent accuracy when the experiment was repeated.
The results hint that such brainwaves could be a way for
security systems to verify individuals' identity. While the 94 per cent
accuracy seen in this experiment would not be secure enough to guard, for
example, a room or computer full of secrets, Armstrong says it's a promising
start.