The European Biometrics Forum is an independent European organisation supported by the European Commission whose overall vision is to establish the European Union as the World Leader in Biometrics Excellence by addressing barriers to adoption and fragmentation in the marketplace.  The EBF is a multi stakeholder network that spans the wider biometrics community including biometric companies, research agencies, policy makers and user groups.

The EBF is a non-profit organisation which relies on support from its members to allow the forum support, initiate, facilitate and organise activities that will bring about the appropriate and beneficial use of biometrics within the European Union and abroad. The EBF also represent its members in Europe and internationally on biometric related issues.

MEMBERSHIP FEES 2009
The EBF’s membership rates for 2009 are as
follows:
Large Organisations (75+) €1,075
SME's/government €550
Individuals/academics €280

EBF Membership: Through its activities, the EBF offers its members the following benefits.
(1) EBF Newsletters, EU Reports and Forthcomoing events.
The EBF sends out regular newsletters, email alerts and reports to its members. They include the EBF EU report which contains important news from the EU including the latest Council decissions, comments from European Commissioners and the latest information on analysis and action plans from the EC. A comprehensive list of forthcoming events in Europe is sent to all members which includes Biometrics Conferences, Seminars, Working Groups, European Parliament Committee Meetings, Plenary Sessions and Biometric Schools.

Regular news articles on biometric issues are provided on www.eubometricsforum.com.

(2) EBF Commissioned Reports
Standards Report
A comprehensive Global report on Standards sponsored by the EBF is sent to every EBF member on a quarterly basis. The detailed
reports looks at a range of issues relating to standards including country by country updates, the activities of key standard organisations,application programming interface standards, and standards interoperability.

(3) Access to members section of website
The EBF’s website, www.eubiometricforum.com is the information hub of the EBF and provides an updated service of news, features and interviews. It also provides a list of EBF members and information on biometric events around the world. The website also has high level reports, presentations and research papers in its members section.

(4) Networking Opportunities
The EBF has members from the wider European Biometrics Community including Policy, Industry, R&D and users groups. The EBF provides a platform for information exchange and networking with the biometrics community during the events organised by the EBF or where the EBF is present.
 
(5) Special Interest Groups 
The EBF organises Special Interest Groups as platforms for discussion. Topics can be brought in by members or external contributors or can be generated by the EBF itself. Once a subject has been chosen, stakeholders come together to define an action plan and deliverables.

(6) Discounts on Conferences and Publications
The EBF has negotiated significant discounts on International Conferences and on Biometric Publications. Please read our event announcements for more information.

(7) Access to members section of website
The EBF’s website, www.eubiometricforum.com is the information hub of the EBF and provides an updated service of news, features and interviews. It also provides a list of EBF members and information on biometric events around the world. The website also has high level reports, presentations and research papers in its members section.

(8) Inclusion in company profile
Organisations can have their profile and logo included in the EBF members section on the website with a link to their website. Traffic to the EBF’s website, www.eubiometricsforum.com is increasing significantly, which allows more exposure for a member.

(9) EBF Sponsored events
The EBF has sponsored certain biometric events in order to increase the profile of the EBF. This sponsorship relates only to assisting in co-organising the programme or by delivering Speakers. EBF Directors and CEO have represented the EBF at numerous events in 2005. By doing this, the EBF has being brought into the focalpoint of discussions, ranging from industrial developments to end user matters and ethical issues. There is also priority for EBF members to be put forward as speakers at events.

(10) Invite to EBF events
The EBF runs a number of important events that are open to members. This includes the highly successful ‘EBF Research Seminar’ in Brussels last September which was addressed by Jacques Bus, DG Info Soc and Dr Alois Sieber from the Joint Research Centre, European Commission. A full report from this Seminar was provided to members.

(11) Research Projects
MIT Project
As independent organisations, the EBF along with NPL (National Physics Laboratory) are leading the Minutiae Template Interoperability Testing project (MIT), a European FP6 project. This FP6 contract was awarded in December 2005. The aim of the MIT project is to achieve general accepted criteria and to create a test bed for testing the interoperability of fingerprint minutiae products. The
MIT project is funded by the European Commission. Updates on developments in the project will be available on the MIT website, which will be launched shortly.
 
(12) European Biometrics Portal
As a strategic partner of the EBP, the EBF actively contributes content to the portal, by generating content and by motivating our members and network to contribute to the EBP. The EBF has a supportive role in helping contributors become acquainted with the portal, including the procedure of uploading articles, reports and other information. The EBF is one of the administrators of the EBP

(13) High-level International Biometric Advisory Council launched
The EBF launched the International Biometric Advisory Council (IBAC), the first of its kind, which will provide advice and expert opinion to the EBF, its members and partners on the most pertinent issues facing biometrics globally. The board of the IBAC includes Professor Helmut Reimer, TeleTrusT; Mr. Bernard Didier, Sagem Défense Sécurité; Mr Christoph Busch, Cast Forum; Dr. Ann Cavoukian, Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario, Canada; Mr. Clive Reedman, Chairman, iAfB; Mr. Christer Bergman, IBIA; Mr. Akio Kokubu, Chairperson, Japanese Biometric Security Consortium; Mr. Robert Mocny, Deputy Director, US-VISIT, DHS, Mr. Norbert Kouwenhoven, IBM and Dr Ted Dunstone, Biometric Institute, Australia.

(14) EBF Network – National Biometric Fora
After building up relationships with individual biometric organisations in Europe, the EBF has begun to establish more coherence between the National Biometric Fora (NBF). The NBF is comprised of key national biometric organisations which include the iAfB, Danish Biometric Forum, TeleTrust, Italian Biometric Forum and Swedish Biometric Forum. The EBF will continue to build strong relationships with the NBF’s with the purpose of establishing the EBF as the information hub between the NBF’s and the European Commission.

The EBF has also cultivated strong links with key biometric organisations outside the EU. Some of these relationships include; the Japanese Biometric Security Consortium, KISA, Biometrics Institute and the US Department of Homeland Security.