Biometric technology—the automated recognition of individuals using biological and behavioral traits—can connect bodily persons to identity records to create a one-to-one correspondence between people and records, restricting people to one record or records to one person. They are a natural tool for identity management, but many suggest that biometric technologies invade privacy. The author addresses the controversies surrounding biometrics by looking more deeply into the basic assumptions made in biometric recognition. He discusses how biometric attributes can be used as verifiers and identifiers, and make suggestions about how people can regain control over how their identities are managed.