The Biometric Update Podcast

Major changes in the regulatory world are paving the way for digital identity. Will Fall 2026 be looked back on as a tipping point for digital ID? In this episode, host Joel McConvey and Biometric Update Managing Editor Chris Burt offer a survey of how regulatory and operational approaches have set the stage for a global shift. 

Changes to the UK's Mandatory Licensing Conditions for alcohol sales have been promised for years. This month, the bill passed; now all that's left is to sign it into law. But that's just the legislation. Yoti's Group Product Manager, Emily Hyett, joins the Biometric Update to talk implementation, trust and what the identity sector can expect. 

Tony Allen of the Age Check Certification Scheme (ACCS) and Julian Corbett of the OpenAge initiative join the Biometric Update Podcast to discuss reusable age checks, certification, and the path to trust for online age assurance. 

FIDO Alliance Executive Director and CEO Andrew Shikiar discusses how the Alliance's work on passkeys is helping it draw a map for digital credentials, wallet certification and agentic frameworks, as identity shifts from a point-in-time model to continuous trust. 

HarmonEyes is bringing its eye movement tracking tech into the age assurance space. In this episode, CEO Adam Gross discusses how the technology works, why it's trustworthy, and why the identity market is a target for growth for a company that has built its reputation in other sectors. 

In 2026, synthetic media is everywhere, and deepfake detection has become an essential part of a layered security stack. In this episode, Identy's Jesus Aragon sketches out the scale of the deepfake fraud problem, and Resemble.ai's Zohaib Ahmed explains the tech behind the company's newly launched DETECT world model detection tool. 

Veridas CEO Eduardo Azanza discusses the company's recent merger with Fourthline in the context of an industry shift toward consolidated identity services. 

Age assurance is everywhere. Around the world, legislators are exploriong how to regulate age-restricted products and services online. The debate is moving fast – so fast, that it can be  hard to follow everything.   

This episode of the biometric update podcast goes deep on age assurance regulation – what’s happening where, what it means for organizations and individuals, and how changing laws are reflecting a bigger shift in public trust and the online ecosystem.

How much would you let a machine do for you? How much would you let it do autonomously, on your behalf? These are the questions driving a growing market for identity governance that applies to AI agents, as well as humans. 

Today’s episode features an interview with Alice Sesay Pope, author of The Trust Algorithm: How Leaders Build Trust in Generative AI. After we hear from Alice, Biometric Update Managing editor Chris Burt discusses about the scaling of the agentic enterprise, and how it’s shaping the digital identity sector.

The Biometric Update Podcast's 50th episode looks at what's changed since we launched in April 2025, from fraud tools to age checks to the agentic economy. 

Imprivata CEO Fran Rosch is an identity veteran who has watched the sector cycle and transform over decades. As agentic AI enters the healthcare space, Rosch reflects on how the existing toolkit has prepared organizations for the moment - and why change has to happen fast. 

Part 2 of the Biometric Update Podcast's coverage of the 2026 ID4Africa AGM features BU managing editor reporting from the conference floor, in conversation with representatives from Cognitec, Thales, Iris ID and Regula. Their combined observations and insights are essential listening for anyone interested in Africa's ongoing journey toward a world-leading digital identity ecosystem. 

The 2026 ID4Africa AGM took place in Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire in May, and Biometric Update was on location to cover all the latest developments in the African identity sector. Part 1 of our special coverage features Biometric Update Managing Editor Chris Burt's conversation with Dr. Joseph Atick, executive chairman of ID4Africa, about the present and future of the continent's digital identity ecosystem. 

Claire Ma is the co-founder of Sign, a company building identity infrastructure and verifiable credential systems for government digital ID programs. From India to Africa to the UK, digital identity is on the governmental agenda. On this episode of the Biometric Update Podcast, Claire Ma discusses how AI, public trust and digital infrastructure all play a role in shaping the global ecosystem. 

If you’re in Illinois, and you’re facing class action litigation, who you gonna call? Daniel Saeedi. He’s a bona fide BIPA buster with the Biometric Privacy Team at Blank Rome, with more than 50 biometric privacy cases under his belt.

On this episode of the Biometric Update Podcast, Dan discusses what's changed with BIPA and what hasn't, and how organizations can ensure they stay on the right side of the law(suit). 

Valentin Vasilyev is the Chief Technology Officer of Fingerprint. After creating Fingerprint.js, he established a company to specialize in browser fingerprinting. In this episode, Vallentin Vasilyev discusses the sweeping changes wrought by AI agents, and how his tech can help. 

On top of her work for Idemia Public Security North America and frequent speaking appearances, Teresa Wu led the creation of the SIA's new Corporate Credential Design Guide, which establishes a unified, vendor-neutral framework for designing secure, interoperable, and user-friendly corporate credentials. In this episode, Teresa Wu talks about how the guide came to be, who it's for - and why she deserves the title of Captain Credential.   

David Crack, chair of the Association of Document Verification Professionals (ADVP) has been busy advocating for providers verified under the Digital Verification Service trust framework. He says the DVS only exists because of the work of Phil Booth, national co-ordinator of the influential NO2ID campaign. On this episode of the Biometric Podcast, Crack and Booth debate what a good digital ID looks like for the UK. 

This is the moment Concordium has been waiting for. CEO Boris Bohrer-Bilowitzki says the blockchain protocol is among those best positioned to bring trusted authentication to the emerging AI economy. In this episode, hear him discuss why building identity in at the protocol level is going to be a key feature -- and sooner than you might think.  

In February, Colorado-based biometrics and vision AI provider ROC closed the first big biometrics IPO of 2026. I’m Joel McConvey, and today on the Biometric Update Podcast, ROC CEO Scott Swann joins me to discuss the company’s IPO, the security landscape, and where ROC is headed in a fraught world.

Wizz, a French social chat platform for young people, recently became one of the few European members of the Tech Coalition, a collection of companies working together to prevent online child exploitation. In this episode, Alexandra Ryabova, Head of Ops for Wizz, and Sean Litton, CEO of Tech Coalition, talk about about how the industry is approaching online safety as regulations roll out.

Ben Fischer is a Marshall scholar who graduated from Stanford University, and is now at the University of Edinburgh studying the technical and social implications of privacy preserving age assurance. He had a chance to sign an open letter from a group of scientists, calling for a moratorium on age assurance laws globally. He chose not to sign it. In this episode, he explains why. 

It used to be that good help was hard to find. These days, real help is hard to find. Amplified by AI, fraud attacks target every part of the hiring pipeline, from fake resumes to deepfake interviews. In this episode, Socure's Head of Product Deepanker Saxena takes us into the world of hiring fraud. 

The way digital identity is commonly presented – as a tool for protecting against fraud and other benign uses – is different from how it’s being built, according to World Ethical Data Foundation Director of Institutional Programming Michael Nash.

Nash tells The Trust Files, presented by Velvet and Biometric Update, that digital ID is redesigning how people are allowed to live their lives, without fixing the problems it was intended to solve.

Hal Lonas thought he might like to be an astronaut. So he studied aeronautics. But he got bored. 

The world of identity fraud moves faster than just about any sector, so Hal has found a suitable challenge as the CTO of Trulioo. In this episode, he talks about how to stay ahead of the bad guys when you're fighting fraud on a cosmic scale. 

Cooperatives emerged as a reaction to the excesses of the industrial revolution. In the digital context, an equivalent can give people control and ownership over their own data while benefitting local communities, SafeGuarden Co-founder and Chair of CDD Services David Crack.

Data cooperatives offer the opportunity to reuse the data for proof of age or to share a range of credentials, Crack says I the latest episode of The Trust Files.

Tony Allen is busy organizing the Global Age Assurance Standards Summit, coming to Manchester from April 12-14, 2026. But he took some time to give the Biometric Update Podcast a preview of some festival highlights, as well as his thoughts on how age assurance legislation is unfolding in Australia and the UK -- and, on chairs. 

In a contribution to The Trust Files, presented by Velvet and Biometric Update, Venkatesh argues credentials are just one piece in the larger continuous trust machine. He explains the urgency of the situation and the other pieces of the system needed to scale AI safely.

Conversations from on the ground at MOSIP Connect 2026 in Rabat, Morocco. Biometric Update Managing Editor Chris Burt talks digital identity, inclusion, interoperability and biometrics with Andrew Musoke of CMU Africa and Digvijay Kanwar of Next Biometrics. 

The agent economy is replacing the digital economy the world is still adjusting to, Ping Identity Group Product Manager Adam Rusbridge says in the new episode of The Trust Files, from Velvet and Biometric Update.

But unauthenticated AI agents represent a trust gap in this new three-actor system, according to Rusbridge. He suggests the paradigm shift requires a universal trust layer to enable visibility and governance, which fortunately can be achieved by extending zero-trust identity foundations. It is an evolution, he says, not a revolution.

Jay Meier of FaceTec wants you to know that not all liveness detection is of the same pedigree. Testing is critical, so relying parties can know who to trust. Universal Wallet Infrastructure (UWI) is set to change the game for interoperability. And the VC guys? Maybe we don't need them in ten years, when biometrics and liveness do everything. A lively conversation between FaceTec's Chief Identity Technology Strategist and Biometric Update Managing Editor Chris Burt. 

The status quo, with personal data as the default currency for value exchange, underpins the free online services that are central to the way most people experience the internet.

Empowering consumers may benefit businesses more than commonly thought, however, MyTerms Co-founder Kari McMullen suggests in the new episode of the Trust Files, from Velvet and Biometric Update.

OpenAge, the reusable age assurance system based on passkeys, launched in November of last year. Since then, it has garnered support from all sides of the debate, from Meta to the adult content industry to children's rights campaigners. In this episode, Julian Corbett, head of the OpenAge Initiative, explains how it spun out from compliance provider k-ID. 

The latest market forecast from Goode Intelligence focuses on biometric physical access control systems. Chief Analyst Alan Goode talks modalities, technological innovation and market opportunities with the Biometric Update Podcast.  

Access to technology is more commonly discussed than digital literacy when considering how inclusive technology is, Chloe Coleman of Vouchsafe points out in the latest episode of The Trust Files, from Velvet and Biometric Update. But digital literacy is also multi-faceted, and a generation encouraged to think everything should be a single click or scan away can struggle with practical requirements for digital access.

Onboarding users to corporate systems involves complexity beyond consumer applications, particularly for multinationals. Henry Balani of Encompass Group argues in a new episode of The Trust Files from Velvet and Biometric Update that while it may never be as painless as the best consumer verification experiences, but digital identity can make it better than the status quo.

Would you be comfortable knowing your life depended on a healthcare worker remembering a password? What if it was sixteen characters long, with letters, numbers and at least one symbol? On the latest episode of the Biometric Update Podcast, Imprivata's Chief Medical Officer Dr. Sean Kelly discusses the company's new report on why passwordless technology matters in medicine. 

Vidos ID Co-founder Tim Boeckmann has good news about the future of an open and interoperable digital ID ecosystem; It is inevitable.

He makes the argument that “Identity infrastructure cannot be ideological” in the latest episode of The Trust Files, from Velvet and Biometric Update.

The window to save the internet’s reputation is closing. That is the stark warning of Evin McMullen, CEO and co-founder of Privado ID and Billions Network, in episode two of The Trust Files, from Velvet and Biometric Update.

Hartley Thompson, the CEO of Microblink, discusses why the company has shifted its focus from document capture to the larger picture of trusted identity, as generative AI keeps making it harder to tell what's real from what's a deepfake. As an "Identity Intelligence OS company," Microblink aims to  orchestrate trust across the identity spectrum.