Spain-based startup Herta named the winner of the best facial recognition vendor at 2018 Biometric Rally by US Department of Homeland Security

Herta, the leading facial recognition company that develops security software and identification of crowds in real time through IP cameras,   was named the winner of the top 3 facial recognition vendors at 2018 Biometric Rally by US Department of Homeland Security. Herta came out on top of the three vendors with highest scores for efficiency, customer satisfaction and performance. Eleven companies participated in the Biometric Rally organized by the US Department of Homeland Security, in collaboration with NIST. The test took place in March 2018, at the Maryland Test Facility (MdTF), a DHS affiliated laboratory.

Founded in 2009, the Barcelona, Spain-based Herta Security is the world leader in the development of cutting edge facial recognition solutions. Based in Barcelona, Spain, – with offices in Madrid and London -, the company offers fast, accurate, robust, end-customer oriented solutions for video surveillance, access control, and marketing requirements. The company has led many international projects including safe-cities, airports, train and metro stations, prisons, banks, casinos, sports stadiums, shopping malls, military, police and forensic applications. The company has offices in Madrid, London, Los Angeles, Montevideo and Singapore, the company offers fast, accurate, robust, end-customer oriented solutions for video surveillance, access control, and marketing requirements. Herta has partners in 50 countries and more than 150 certified integrators globally.

The rally participants were provided with a gallery of 3,000 images of around 300 people, and each contestant was required to match people’s faces one at a time as they were going through a facial recognition checkpoint. The test measured the average transaction time, failure to process an image, percentage of satisfied customers and the effectiveness of providing a positive identification within a 5 and 20 seconds interval.

Herta designed a specific solution for this one to many (1:n) test despite its speciality is many to many (n:m) as in some of its main projects to improve safety in safe cities or sports stadiums. The scenario simulated an airport control point where the solution compares traveler’s passport pictures from the images captured through the CCTV cameras. Herta used its real-time face identification technology to meet the Rally requirements, and it exceeded the average for most of the metrics as well as the 95% successful face identification rate in less than 5 seconds, compared to an average of 65%.

Alex Collado-Castells, CTO at Herta and responsible for the rally deployment, explained that the test was very successful and it helped to prove how the company’s technology stands out among other competitors, and to see what governments are looking for when it comes to a checkpoint solution.

“It was an inspiring experience, where we had to work under pressure in order to design a specific solution for a test which reflects a real world use case.” Collado-Castells said. “The test generated very useful metrics which are aligned to the current government requirements and needs. Herta performed excellent at efficiency, customer satisfaction and performance, the three main goals of the Rally.”

The 2018 Biometric Technology Rally was the first experiment testing different technology solutions against each other, but more rallies are planned to check future applications of the technology for DHS needs. The results of the 2018 Biometric Technology Rally can be found at http://mdtf.org/rally/.