Method and device for recognition of natural skin

Device for the recognition of natural skin from a living being (5) during touchless biometric identification of a person, wherein characteristic line patterns at a sample area of a finger or palm of the hand are touchlessly determined, the device comprising:

• a papillary line sensor (24) for determination of a characteristic line pattern of skin (5);
• a data processing unit comprising a comparator;
• a plurality of light sources (10,11) having different wavelengths and adjusted for illuminating an irradiation point (1), assigned to the finger or the palm of the hand, with light (2) in a manner precluding at least a part of said sample area from being illuminated;
• and
• a detector (20) adjusted for detection of a fraction of a part (3) of the light (2), entering at said irradiation point (1) through a skin surface (4) of the person into the skin (5), scattered by skin tissue inside of the skin (5) and exiting from the skin (5) through the skin surface (4) as scattered light (7) at a plurality of detection points (9) wherein said plurality of detection points (9) are disposed at respective different distances from said irradiation point (1) and at respective locations different from said irradiation point (1) and are assigned to the part of the sample area precluded from being illuminated;
• wherein a signal determined by said detector is passed to said comparator and compared with stored data to determine whether said sample area agrees with natural skin based upon a dependence of an intensity of the scattered light on the respective different distances between said plurality of detection points and said irradiation point and on a respective wavelength of the light.