Cogneto, the pioneer of cognitive authentication, today launched UNOMI™, a two-way, multifactor authentication solution capable of identifying online users based on their unique memories and life experiences.

UNOMI is the first authentication solution to couple cognitive psychology with behavioral biometrics in order to identify users by observing their online behavior and computer interaction. UNOMI is a hardware-free, strong authentication platform. The solution is flexible, robust and more accurate, setting new standards for biometric technologies. It provides an effective, user-focused solution for protecting financial institutions, military organizations, online retailers and their customers against fraud and identity theft.

UNOMI asks users about vivid life experiences then observes their reactions and analyzes their responses. These user-created PassthoughtsTM are intuitive and cannot be forgotten, lost or stolen. The solution also tracks other cognitive and biometric factors during the authentication process, including response times, mouse movements, and individual user traits. All of these factors are used by UNOMI to generate a risk threshold for each log in. This risk adaptive solution gives organizations the power to control security in any given situation.

UNOMI’s user-centered design enables online customers to be authenticated accurately and quickly. The software-only platform makes it suitable for rapid mass deployment, while the intuitive nature of Passthoughts minimizes the need for user training.

“Identity theft and online security are major concerns for financial institutions, government organizations, retailers, and of course consumers,” said Ralph Scobie, CEO of Cogneto. “Users must be confident they are being protected without compromising their online experience. By developing UNOMI, which takes advantage of the unique experiences and life events that make us all different, users will no longer need to worry about identity theft hindering their ability to conduct business or spending time online.”

UNOMI consists of three integrated layers:

The User Experience is the visual interface of UNOMI, which can be customized to match the look and feel of an institution’s own brand. It is here that users create Passthoughts, vivid life recollections layered with cognitive biometric factors based on their own unique experiences. To authenticate, users need only recognize their own Passthoughts. By taking advantage of the latest advances in user interface technology, such as dynamic cascading and attentional focus, UNOMI interacts with users in a way that accelerates the login process while simultaneously protecting them from malicious attacks, such as phishing. Designed with superior usability in mind, the User Experience layer makes UNOMI simple, transparent, and fun to use.

The Cognometric Engine is the central coordinator for UNOMI, enabling the real-time analysis of behavioral characteristics, such as cognitive response, ‘mousemetrics’, and selection patterns to assess user identity. The Engine also links into the User Experience and Universal Risk Mitigation layers to integrate situational data, such as device prints, geo-location, and time of day. All of the behavioral, spatial, and temporal factors collected by UNOMI are used to make a consensus decision about a user’s identity claim. UNOMI goes beyond merely passing or failing users by using consensus decision-making to give institutions the power to be risk adaptive through policy-based authentication decisions.

The Universal Risk Mitigation layer provides proactive fraud prevention. UNOMI looks at security on individual, organizational and global levels simultaneously, empowering UNOMI with the ability to assess the possibility of security breaches in an organization before they happen. This threat assessment is passed to the Cognometric Engine to be used in consensus decision-making. Data from the Cognometric Engine also flows back into Universal Risk Mitigation, allowing UNOMI to adapt to potential security threats instantly.

Unlike other solutions, UNOMI has been designed to give organizations power over their own security. UNOMI features a zero-impact installation process, making deployment and integration easy. Consensus decision-making and continuous security ratings allow for varying levels of access to client services. Customers can set policies based on their needs and those of their users. For example, UNOMI gives banks the flexibility to restrict certain kinds of transactions, such as high-value money transfers, from occurring unless a user meets a risk threshold established by the bank. This form of policy-based security allows banks to protect customers without compromising their users’ needs and online experience.

UNOMI will be licensed on a per user per annum basis. Pricing will vary depending on the number of users. For further details, please contact Cogneto at (604) 662 7344.

After six months in stealth mode, Cogneto Inc. formally launched today with a mission to combat identity fraud for people using online services. Founded by a team of leading security experts, cognitive psychologists, network architects and specialists in human-computer interaction, Cogneto is pioneering a new branch of biometrics which identifies people based on behaviors inherent in the way they interact with computers.

‘Cognitive authentication’ is the most effective way to validate the identity of online customers since each person’s recognition abilities, response times and personal experiences are unique to them. Financial institutions, online retailers and military organizations need to authenticate their customers in a user-friendly, secure, reliable and cost-effective manner - a challenge which Cogneto aims to address.

Wireless and investment banking veteran Ralph Scobie, will lead Cogneto as chairman, president and CEO. He is joined by an experienced management team including:

• Patrick Audley, chief technology officer, and former founder of Group Telecom’s PKI division
• John Bradley, chief network officer, and founder of Group Telecom, Canada’s most successful CLEC
• Dr Andrew Csinger, chief strategy officer, former founder of Xcert Software Inc, a pioneer of public key infrastructure (PKI) software
• Martin Renaud, chief scientist, and experienced experimental psychologist with a specialism in memory
• Dr Barry Po, director of user experience, a leading expert in human-computer interaction

Adrian Beeston, managing director, international, will head Cogneto’s London office.

“With the increasing threat of online fraud and identify theft, banks and other online organizations must take proactive steps to protect their customers by deploying strong authentication and security solutions,” said Ralph Scobie, CEO of Cogneto. “Until now those security measures always meant some form of compromise, whether in terms of usability, cost or the level of security provided. With cognitive authentication, Cogneto ends that dilemma - it is hardware-free, user-friendly and extremely secure.”

Cogneto’s two-way, multi-factor, strong authentication platform, UNOMI™, will be launched in October. It combines cognitive authentication with proactive universal risk mitigation enabling online service providers to securely validate the identity of their customers based on a range of behavioral measurements (such as response times), device inputs (such as the user’s IP address) and global factors (such as the ambient fraud threat level).

Cogneto is funded by a group of angel investors and with private equity. It has offices in Seattle, Vancouver, Canada and London, England.

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