Persay: Combining its deft hands, your voice

How many times have you lost your password? How many have you been warned not to write it down on a post-it note that is liable to fall into the wrong hands? One-year old start-up Persay, founded by Comverse Technology, plans to help us forget old-fashioned authentication methods and simply start talking.

Voice verification is divided into two categories: speech recognition and speaker recognition. The first category facilitates intuitive interfacing between humans and various machines, by interpreting the voice command to computer language. The second category is further sub-divided: recognition of a single speaker within a group, for example at meetings with many participants, which necessitates voice band adjustment. Persay’s sub-category, that is voice verification, confirmation of the identity of the person seeking access to information.

Persay CEO Renana Peres is a physicist by training. She started working in Comverse about five years ago, intending to stay a year as a replacement for someone else. To use a cliche, “Look at her today”.

Comverse developed the technology for military use, but later discovered there was a huge potential in the civilian market. The company decided to set up a start-up and continue development. Peres explains efficiently than in a large corporation, although she says this should not be seen as hinting at a bureaucratic system in Comverse.

Mama Converse’s hug certainly won’t hinder Persay in exploiting the brand name to break into the European and US markets, where it has already posted sales in the past six months, although it declines to disclose figures.

There are several start-ups dealing with voice that working in a start-up environment means being able to attain a goal more recognition, some of which are Israeli. Persay, however, claims that the others chose to focus on recognition technologies, not authentication, which the company believes is a waste of resources. “Voice recognition depends on the language the speaker uses and so an entire team of advisors is needed,” I believe that the moment we become well-known, these companies will recall that they are capable of entering the field, and we will see real competition. At the moment, we’re trying to take as much of a market share as possible in this enormous market.

Peres would actually like to see some competition, since otherwise, it could mean it is an unwanted field. Persay is marketing a final product, which can be installed on the customer’s calls management system, without the need for VoIP capabilities. The product is priced according to the number of users the customer organization wants the system to verify.

Mythological system

The technology is based on algorithms which analyze the speaker’s voice patterns. These patterns differ from person to person, even if someone tries to imitate them. The technology is applied in two sectors. One sector is applications for the information providers market, not necessarily content. A financial institution such as a bank or investment house is required to authenticate the identity of someone conducting a transaction. Using Persay’s technology, the verification process takes place during a regular conversation between the call center and the customer. The customer’s voice is compared to the database information obtained in a previous conversation.

The system re-analyzes the information in future conversations to achieve high precision and verify the speaker’s identity even when voice changes occur, such as during illness, using cellular calls, and so on. The company claims over 90% accuracy, but here the price factor comes into the equation, for in the case of requests for a run-down on calls for a possible court case (for example tracking a husband/wife suspected having an affair), obviously maximum accuracy is needed. On the other hand, if a caller merely wishes to check how much he has in his current account, without ordering any transactions, a bank would not need the same level of accuracy and a slightly lower level would be sufficient in this case. Pricing of the product in these two examples therefore differs.

Initially, the company is concentrating on the financial information market, where caller verification is critical. This market will also constitute a sort “standards test” when Persay tries to sell the product to a wider market.

The other market is m-commerce, which is likely to descend on us in the next two years. During the purchasing process, the customer will be asked to verify his identify by saying a pre-arranged word (agreed upon when he registers) instead of a password or using his mobile phone number (which can be stolen) as the identifying factor. The key problem lies in the registration itself. If a customer wishes to change his voice password, he must key in the word, which means going back to the old way. This point is not only a problem for Persay, but for the entire biometric authentication sector.

Persay’s system is mythological. I am not merely referring to its capability, but to the product’s name as well. The product is named Orpheus, after the Greek hero with a nightingale’s voice while the system’s digital cards and hard discs are named harp (his accompanying instrument).

Persay even took care to minimize the system as much as possible, with the customer in mind. According to the company, its development and marketing are very “customer-oriented” and Peres says this is not merely a slogan.

Published by Israel's Business Arena on 31 January, 2001