Media Releases

Nymi by Bionym launches using your unique heartbeat to unlock your world

September 3, 2013

TORONTO, ON – The next gen­er­a­tion of bio­met­ric tech­nol­o­gy launch­es today with the Nymi, from  Bionym, a tech­nol­o­gy start-up found­ed by Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to engi­neer­ing grad­u­ates. The Nymi is the world’s first wear­able authen­ti­ca­tion device that uses your unique heart­beat to unlock your iden­ti­ty. The con­ve­nient and secure authen­ti­ca­tion is enabled through an embed­ded elec­tro­car­dio­gram (ECG) sen­sor. When the Nymi rec­og­nizes your per­son­al ECG, it will com­mu­ni­cate your iden­ti­ty to your devices. You remain authen­ti­cat­ed until the Nymi is removed. The acti­vat­ed Nymi can then be used to gain access to all reg­is­tered devices, com­plete­ly bypass­ing pass­words and PINs for seam­less and secure access. Pass­words, PINs and even keys and cards will become a thing of the past.

Not only is your ECG entire­ly unique, but the tech­nol­o­gy alone is also unlike any­thing cur­rent­ly on the mar­ket. The Nymi empow­ers users to bring their iden­ti­ty back to the dig­i­tal world, not as a num­ber, but as a per­son. Beyond direct access to your tech­nol­o­gy, the Nymi also allows users to take their iden­ti­ty to a com­plete­ly inter­ac­tive lev­el. Sim­ple, task-spe­cif­ic ges­ture com­mands allow for a dynam­ic inter­ac­tive expe­ri­ence between the user and the tech­nol­o­gy that sur­rounds their dai­ly life. Both motion sens­ing and prox­im­i­ty detec­tion work simul­ta­ne­ous­ly to enhance tech­no­log­i­cal expe­ri­ences. Some­thing as sim­ple as the twist of a wrist now has the capa­bil­i­ty to unlock a car or more.

While offer­ing con­ve­nience and ease of use, secu­ri­ty remains a top pri­or­i­ty. The Nymi func­tions as a three-fac­tor secu­ri­ty sys­tem. It requires your per­son­al­ized Nymi, your unique heart­beat, and a smart­phone or device that has been reg­is­tered to the app. This sys­tem, and the cut­ting edge bio­met­rics sup­port­ing it, allow for com­plete secu­ri­ty with­out com­pro­mis­ing con­ve­nience. By reg­is­ter­ing with the app, users have the abil­i­ty to cre­ate cus­tom noti­fi­ca­tions, allow­ing for seam­less con­nec­tion to emails, texts, social updates and more. The app will be avail­able on iOS, Android, Win­dows and Mac OSX.

“When it comes to iden­ti­ty, pri­va­cy is a chief con­cern,” said Karl Mar­tin, CEO of Bionym, “The Nymi has been built by the prin­ci­ples of Pri­va­cy by Design. This means that each user has com­plete con­trol over their data and iden­ti­ty. Trans­paren­cy is very impor­tant to Bionym’s cul­ture, and every user has a right to know where their data is going.”

Most impor­tant­ly, the Nymi is about the future. The unlocked poten­tial of this authen­ti­ca­tion-based tech­nol­o­gy is far reach­ing. The Nymi is look­ing to inter­act with devel­op­ers to cre­ate a com­mu­ni­ty that will explore the dig­i­tal and social oppor­tu­ni­ties that the Nymi unlocks.

The Nymi will be avail­able for pre-order as of Sep­tem­ber 3, 2013 for under $100, and will be deliv­ered in ear­ly 2014. To find out more about pric­ing, or to pre-order now please go to www.getnymi.com, or fol­low us on Twit­ter @Nymiband.

About Bionym

Bionym is a leader in cut­ting-edge bio­met­ric recog­ni­tion sys­tems. Bionym devel­ops inno­v­a­tive iden­ti­ty and con­ve­nience-based secu­ri­ty solu­tions for mod­ern prob­lems, using rev­o­lu­tion­ary tech­nolo­gies to pro­tect pri­va­cy and ensure data secu­ri­ty. Bionym was part of the inau­gur­al cohort of the Cre­ative Destruc­tion Lab at the Rot­man School of Man­age­ment at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to. In August 2013, Bionym closed $1.4M (CAD) in seed financ­ing, with the major­i­ty of the invest­ment via the Cre­ative Destruc­tion Lab “G7” mem­bers. Bionym was found­ed in 2011 and is locat­ed in down­town Toron­to, Cana­da.

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For more infor­ma­tion, con­tact:

Kurt Bartlett
Mar­ket­ing and Pub­lic Rela­tions
KBartlett@bionym.com
Tel: 647–637-3390