There’s an old saying that, on the Internet, no one can tell you’re a dog. It turns out that that’s probably not true. In fact, anonymity is going to be getting hard with this kind of analysis.

…differences remain in the way that people tap out their electronic secrets. Internet users have characteristic patterns of how they time their keystrokes, browse Web sites, and write messages for posting on online bulletin boards. Scientists are learning to use these typeprints, clickprints, and writeprints, respectively, as digital forms of fingerprints.

While the aims of this research are to strengthen password security, reduce online fraud, identify online pornographers, and catch terrorists, the technology is raising some troubling possibilities. “It’s a bit scary,” says Jaideep Srivastava, a Web researcher at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. “The privacy implications are huge.”

[Via Geek Press]