He has a fingerprint scanner in the tiny lab where three technicians work behind the company's storefront office in Puyallup. I can lift a print from you and make a latex copy in 20 minutes, and then for all intents and purposes, I'm you. He has the visitor place his index finger on the reading device, and in a few seconds the machine says the visitor has been rejected. Then the visitor holds the latex mold over the same reader, and this time the machine records a match. All I have to do is tape-record your voice.
Hand scans are as unique as fingerprints, but virtually impossible to copy.
That's why Stiver and Peterson are so bullish on their patented technology. Others are, too. James E. Hays Jr., a founding member of the game company Wizards of the Coast Inc., is ABI's largest investor. Hays recently built and owns Habana Lounge and Cafe in Tacoma. The most unusual vote of confidence for the new company came last month from the owners of Carlson Formetec, a small but profitable machine shop in Tacoma.